US Route 6; "Creating the Mythology"

I was sitting at a luncheon table with award-winning author/filmmaker, Steven Beschloss this afternoon at the ASJA (American Society of Journalists and Authors) conference in New York City earlier today.  We were discussing our various writing projects.  His - a new book; Adrift - Charting our Course Back to a Great Nation, is coming out in July.  Mine, of course, is my Route 6 trip and this blog.  I mentioned that I was basically UN-political, pointing to my very purple shirt with pride.  "I'll be driving through blue states and red states and this is the blended color I hope to see," I laughed.  Steven grinned and quipped - "You're creating a mythology around Route 6, the same as has been done with Route 66."

That's an interesting take on my humble project.  As I see it,  I'm just driving along one long road and writing about what I see, what I eat, who I meet and where I sleep. If a mythology creeps up around it, that's for others to interpret.  I'll be cruising along US Route 6, but, with all contacts I've established along the way,  I certainly won't be adrift.  

Route 6 in the New Yorker Magazine; Dave Hanson's Shouts and Murmurs Piece

From this week's New Yorker Magazine (May 2nd), in the Shouts and Murmurs essay by humorist Dave Hanson , Route 6 is mentioned in the faux Kindle App instructions to find the home of poet Dylan Thomas (who lived in London, died in New York and probably had no association with the route): 

Type in “Dylan Thomas”:

Do not go gentle when you make that right

For you must merge, merge into the flood of rushing lights

Route 6 goes for miles, and you must push into the night.

A Rare Find at the New York City Auto Show; Antique Iowa Highway Patrol

I suppose a patrol car like this must have cruised US Route 6 circa 1950-something.  (Or - 60-something?).  Even in Manhattan, on a stormy April Saturday in 2011, I find myself exposed to reminders of my chosen cross-country route.  No signs indicated that this Iowa Patrol car cased Route 6 in particular, but I'm pretty sure this vehicle existed prior to the construction of the Interstate and therefore it would be a pretty good guess that it covered "Highway 6." 

If anyone out there (Dave, Rex?) can "steer" me in right direction, I'd love to know!

That's the Smell of Annie Oakley, Baby....Indiana Perfumery on US Route 6

Annie Oakley is not the first name that jumps to mind when thinking about perfume.

Channel, perhaps, or Dior....but Oakley?  Sure - she was gorgeous.  And talented; with a gun, on a horse, as a Buffalo Bill Cody Wild West Show star and Peerless Lady Wing-Shot.  But did she smell good, too?

I hope to find out in Ligonier, home base for the Annie Oakley Perfumery.  The only perfumery in the state of Indiana.  How did the owners settle on the name?  What does Eau De Sharpshooter smell like?

Logonier, IN is on US Route 6.  I'll be there in a month or so.......

Pete Seeger's "A Thousand Little Initiatives" on US Route 6

These are tough economic times for our country, but it's not the first time and it won't be the last.  About 8 years ago, I had the good fortune to interview Pete Seeger, born in 1920 and with intimate knowledge about the Great Depression, for a boating magazine.  The topic was the part he played in the cleanup of the Hudson River.  I told him I just needed thirty minutes.  He invited me to his home - set on a wooded hillside overlooking that mighty Hudson - and at 8am, we sat at his kitchen table where I listened and wrote and listened and wrote until I looked up and it was 2pm. He spoke about getting the Sloop Clearwater built and about all the people who came down to the "stinking sewer that was the Hudson," recognizing the need to clean the river up when the ship docked in each town.   Six hours had gone by in an instant.  Pete apologized for not offering me lunch.   Shortly after the interview began, Seeger stated that he had little hope for the human race; that he didn't think there'd BE a human race in 100 years.  But by the end of the six hours, something made him change his mind.  He considered all the causes he is (still) asked to support, the "thousands of little initiatives" out there in America, and believed that with all these initiatives and all this energy and hope - why, there might be a chance for us yet.

As I research my way through Route 6 cities and towns, I understand what Seeger was telling me.  Small towns are in decline, businesses and corporations move out leaving unemployment in their wake.  Tornadoes, hurricanes, floods and fires wreak havoc.  And yet, there's this strength out there, people helping neighbors, recreating downtowns, preserving what's important.  A thousand little initiatives on Route 6.

And, just so you know, I'll be traversing and then crossing the Hudson River - so breathtaking it inspired a whole school of art.  Stay on Route 6 and you'll see it, too. 

Keeping it Real on US Route 6

When did authentic turn into "branded."   When did bartenders become "mixologists" and annual crops become "sustainable agriculture?" Who invented the first "gastropub" and why has it proliferated?

Part of the reason I'm taking Route 6 through the heartland of America is to find authentic farmers and authentic bartenders.  Authentic, plainspoken men and women of the Plains.   Outdoorsy, unpretentious gals and guys out West.  Not everything has to be superlative, awesome, "viral."  Often, "keeping it real" is just right.  I'm hoping to discover the real people of US Route 6.

Monster Trucks on PA Route 6

The back page of New York Magazine consists of The Approval Matrix - a grid indicating what editors consider "highbrow, lowbrow, brilliant or despicable" each week.

Though I won't be utilizing a grid in my posts, I can tell already that my daily Route 6 jaunts will encompass sites and experiences that would fit into each of the four quadrants; highbrow brilliant, lowbrow brilliant, highbrow despicable and lowbrow despicable.

Yesterday, I learned of a Monster Truck field and gravity-defying event - called the Cornfield 500 - held on a Route 6 farm in Pennsylvania.  I'll give it "lowbrow brilliant" for the clever repurposing of fallow land (and the rolicking crowd it draws). Adding delightful deep-fried silliness to the deal; the owners of the Cornfield 500 were recently featured on  CMT's "My Big Redneck Wedding." I'm looking forward to meeting them and perhaps taking a ride. 

Chain Hotels and Other Fallbacks Along US Route 6

Not every Route 6 town is graced with extraordinary, fancy, individually-owned hotels, inns or B&B's - though finding those along the way is among my several quests. Whenever possible, I'll overnight or at least peek into these establishments, but there will be nights when - gasp -  I'll have to resort to staying in Chain Hotels.  This is especially true in Utah, where Route 6 manages to miss every single National Park (an enormous feat, since Utah is riddled with them), but cuts through huge swaths of BLM land. I'll pass on the run-down, seemingly filthy roadside motels (curb-appeal counts!), and unpainted sagging flop houses, thanks. (I don't mind flea market accouterments.  Just keep the fleas out of it.). In many small towns Out West, it seems, Holiday Inn Express and Best Western will be my chosen home away from home.

That said, there are B&B's with genuinely warm, grandmotherly owners, off-the-map inns with creatively themed rooms, lodging both homespun and architecturally interesting.  And I can't wait to be a pampered guest.

I'll report back on the best places to stay along Route 6........

"The Father of the Modern Skyscraper" on Route 6

 

Architect Louis Sullivan has been called the Father of Modernism, the Father of the American Skyscraper, the "Spiritual Leader of the Prairie School."  He was a mentor to Frank Lloyd Wright, and a "starchitect" in his day.  Route 6 town, Grinnell, Iowa,  home to the highly rated Grinnell College (the first college established in  the West - in 1846), is also home to a Louis Sullivan "Jewelbox" design Merchants' National Bank building.

While most of the building is stark and boxy the ornate medallion over the front entrance looks like a clue in the Davinci Code or something Richard Dryfus would cook up to attract alien spaceships.  And what's up with the church-like stained glass?  There is an explanation, and I aim to discover it and pass it along to you when I hit Grinnell sometime early June.  Stay tuned....

"Why We Travel" A Paul Theroux Essay in the New York Times; How It Pertains to US Route 6

Sunday's NY Times Travel Section (which, as a subscriber, I get delivered on Saturday) asks - or posits - "Why We Travel."  Written by war-zone reporter, Paul Theroux, the piece waxes romantic about traveling to places where you might, just might, get your head blown off.  "But if the traveler manages to breeze past such unpleasantness....he or she can return home to report; 'I was there.  I saw it all.'" Theroux goes on to explain, "In my experience these maligned countries are often the most fulfilling. I am not saying they are fun."  For that, he advises, "bake in the sun in Waikiki with a mai tai in your fist."


For me, when it comes to travel, there is a middle-road between war-torn countries and palm-dappled resorts; and that is literally the "middle road." If you are not the sort who likes to jump in the car at dawn and watch the world unfold before you as the tops of mountains, trees and water towers glow yellow  with the rising sun, if you are not the sort who is curious about that great little history museum or destination restaurant in an otherwise dead and dusty downtown, if you are not the sort who is beckoned by the promise of farm-fresh food in unlikely places, then you'll never understand the romance of the two-lane highway.  




Not quite work and not quite rest, the open road in the United States of America is a voyage of discovery; whether of your roots, our history or just the best damn cherry tart in the country.  And there's no better - or longer - open road than US Route 6.  The voyage begins on May 20th.

Answering the Burning Questions on US Route 6

Years ago, I wrote this about travel writing for magazines: 


The life of a magazine writer is a patchwork of mundane and thrilling, solitary and sociable. It requires Rube Goldberg ingenuity to schedule interviews and meticulous travel planning that one hopes, as a believer in spontaneity, will go awry. It involves demystifying the mysterious and transforming work-a-day into evocative. It also generates some big surprises. 

One of the surprises, pre-trip, is the number of emails I'm receiving and the enthusiasm with which small towns plan to welcome me.  Probably not so surprisingly, there seems to be an inverse relationship between a town's population and it's level of interest.  Representatives from Fleming, Colorado - with a population of 431 and not much more than a water tower - have asked me to stop by for a chat and "token." The Gretna, Nebraska (pop. 2,800) newspaper - The Breeze - would like to interview me.  I've had dozens of these invitations, and I'm happy to comply. 




I'm not crossing our country in any official capacity.  I'm not raising money for anything, I'm not campaigning for anything, I'm not on any type of crusade.  I'm taking no stance on issues (social, environmental, financial) that loom large these days.  I do not intend to open up a contentious debate. I am, in every sense of the word - if only for the purposes of this cross-country trip - nonpartisan. 


But I do plan to answer some burning questions. Why do several tiny communities in the midwest consider themselves "progressive?"  What kind of person would buy an old abandoned bank in the middle of nowhere and turn it into a destination restaurant?  Where is the oldest continuously operating soda fountain in the world? 


My objective is to write about what's out there on one single long but never lonely road. US Route 6.  The Grand Army of the Republic Highway.  This is my quest, this is my self-imposed assignment.  

Route 6 Champion Lives 1,000 Miles From The Grand Army of the Republic Highway

Yes, it's true.  The man who spearheaded the cause to reawaken interest in what was once America's Longest Highway (and remains the longest CONTIGUOUS federal road in the USA) lives in Washington State - nearly one thousand miles from any point on US Route 6.

Russell Lombard, President/CEO/Founder of the Non-Profit US Route 6 Tourist Association grew up in Pasadena, CA - and in the 1950's would visit family in Nebraska by driving on the only highway that ran from California to Nebraska - Route 6.  Memories of these road trips remained with him his whole life, and after a career in city planning and retirement near Puget Sound, he thought of a way to preserve and enhance them.

In October 2000, a few neighborhood teens came to Russell with a question.  They were asked to design a web-page as a high school school project and believed that Mr. Lombard would have some ideas.  He did.  "Why not start a US Route 6 Association?" he recommended.  It was once the only road that ran coast to coast and no-one these days really knew about it.  The kids were intrigued.  And then obsessed.

"What began as a school project turned into something much more," Lombard told me.  "Those kids would come over every day after school into the evenings, contacting towns and cities along the Route.  They started getting invitations from communities, from mayors and selectmen."  By the summer of 2001, The US Route 6 Tourist Association had obtained IRS Non-Profit Status.

Russ called me recently to tell me this story.  Even though he has never traveled on 6 East of Council Bluffs, IA, he has a deep fondness for America's Highway.  "US Route 6 is a symbol of culture and time and history and experiences.  It is a symbol of our country."

My own travel obsessions take me on the road.  It's there I discover our great, diverse and rich land firsthand.  I can't wait until I get and STAY ON 6 later this Spring.  Sign up for this blog and come along starting May 20, 2011. 

Happy Birthday Harry Houdini! Learn About Him on Route 6

Harry Houdini is trending on Twitter today.  Why?  It's his 137th birthday - posthumously, naturally.  This son of a Rabbi remains one of the best, most entertaining magicians in history, and you can learn his story at the Houdini Museum in Scranton, PA.  Yup - a US Route 6 town.  Though a mile or so off the route on Main Street, this little museum is more like an intimate theater - open most weekends in the warmer months and daily in July and August.  Virtually hidden in a cozy home, the museum owners tell visitors all about Houdini and his talents - and then put on a smashing magic show.  It's quite the attraction - and well worth the stop.  

Buffalo in Brooklyn; Route 6 Bison

Oh give me a home where the buffalo roam, and I'll show you Brooklyn. That's Brooklyn, Connecticut - which isn't quite as urban as Brooklyn, NY but it ain't "where the antelope play," either. (It is, however, where the deer play, but that's another story).

Creamery Brook Bison, Brooklyn CT

Brooklyn, CT, like much of the state, is green and lush, with rolling hills, ancient stone walls and lots of farmland.  And it's here that the owners of Creamery Brook Bison decided to install herds of these admittedly strange-looking low-fat and low-calorie animals (what's with the Viking horns, wooly mammoth hide, camel hump and spindly legs?  Buffalo meat may be healthier than chicken, but bison looks haven't won me over).

Buffalo at Creamery Brook Bison

The farm is just a mile or so off of Route 6, and is open for group tours on Saturdays in warmer months.   A retail store (selling bison meat and other buffalo products) is open from 2pm-6pm most days.  Check the website for more information.  Or you can check back with me when I roll through Brooklyn in May.

Where Did the Pilgrims Really Land in the New World? US Route 6 Has the Answer

Historic Route 6 begins and ends at oceans and in flamboyant, artsy, entertainment-rich towns.  Beach resort, Provincetown, MA on the Atlantic Ocean is home to a proud gay population and draws tons of tourists every summer.  Long Beach, on the Pacific Ocean, for many just a suburb of Los Angeles, is rich in glitz of a similar sort.  What’s in between is a virtual time-line of American history; remnants of the Revolutionary War Era in New England, particularly northern Connecticut, gives way to living and historic sites of  Westward-Ho pioneers who made their homes in the plains and prairies of Iowa and Nebraska and rugged strivers who sought wealth in the stark silver and gold mining camps in Colorado, Utah, Nevada and California.

Tiny Route 6 towns are unabashedly proud of their offerings.  Some have to embellish a bit, but hey, that’s advertizing! Wilton, Iowa celebrates the “World’s Oldest Ice Cream Fountain.”  Rural Hudson, Colorado is home to probably the only 100-year-old roadside eatery with a CIA (Culinary Institute of America) trained chef- The Pepper Pod Restaurant.   In LA, the old Route 6 boasts the “largest concentration of pre-war movie palaces – built in the 20’s and 30’s – in America.” There are thousands of these stories.

Route 6 travels through two towns called Brooklyn, and neither are in New York.  It touches two oceans, traverses a Great Lake, crosses most of the country’s major rivers, runs through five state capitals, and climbs, exhilaratingly, up and over the Continental Divide.

I'll be starting out on May 20th from where the Pilgrims REALLY landed in the New World - Provincetown, MA. I'll climb to the top of the Pilgrim's Monument and describe the view......

The Little Feat Route 6 Connection

Last night, I attended a Little Feat concert - a small, intimate affair in Ridgefield, CT featuring two lead guitarists - and while they were blues'ing their way through "Willing," I had an epiphany.

Being a Romancing the Road kind of girl, I'd always loved that song - a trucker's anthem - and knew the lyrics well.  But as Paul Barrere and Fred Tackett wailed out Williin' I heard the beginning of the chorus as if for the first time.

In Nevada, Route 6 runs through just two real towns; Ely and Tonopah.  When I began my research, I had this strange feeling that I'd been to Tonopah or at least had heard of it enough to get excited about stopping there.  And last night I understood why:

I've been from Tuscon to Tucumcari
Tehachapi, to Tonopah
driven every kind of rig that's ever been made
driven the back roads so i wouldn't get weighed

Tehachapi to Tonopah!  Tonopah!


Once known as the Queen of the Silver Camps, Tonopah  was also, apparently, a favorite of Dallas Alice. I'll be making the reverse ride (Tonopah to just outside of Tehapchapi, CA), in June.  


Follow along.....

PA Route 6: A Fracking Good Time

Natural Gas drillers are culprits or saviors, depending on who you ask. All I know is that while controversy swirls around the environmental impact of "fracking" - a slang term used for Hydraulic Fracturing, cracking rock in order to extract natural gas from deep in the earth - drilling crews have taken over some of Pennsylvania's Route 6 towns. Attention has been drawn to this part of the state, underneath which a massive natural gas field has been discovered, and not all of it is good.  But I'm curious to see what a little rural down-at-heals-kind-of-artsy town looks like when crawling with scientists and engineers and fracking machinery.  It will be just another day on Route 6.

A Flash of Gold - In My Glass: Coors Brewery on Route 6, Golden, CO

Just west of Denver, Route 6 cuts through Golden, Colorado, home of Coors.  Through I generally favor more obscure craft beers,  I do plan to take the self-guided Brewery Tour (oh, the lengths I'll go for research) most likely in the morning so I can walk off the effects of sampling before continuing west through a challenging stretch of 6.  From Golden, the highway snakes through Clear Creek Canyon, a cliff-laden, creek-running biker-favorite , so I'll be sure to pull off and take pictures.  Or, if I'm lucky, I'll find some agreeable rock-climbers to video and interview; Clear Creek Canyon out of Golden is considered a magnet for rock-jocks. 

Tootsie; The Official Mascot of the California U.S. Route 6 Tourist Association

Mascots figure prominently in several Route 6 towns.  As I mentioned in a prior post, Mike the Headless Chicken is the town mascot and ill-equipped spokeschicken for Fruita, Colorado.  (Well, he's been dead and gone for over 55 years, but even when strutting around, he was ill-equipped to squawk a word).

And this here is Tootsie, the official face of the California U.S. Route 6 Tourist Association.  Naturally, there are actual talking humans - Fred and Bettty Hann - who can actually speak English and know every inch of the Historic Route 6 in Cali.  But, apparently, this cute mop-top doggie garners much more attention, hence this professional-looking Mascot Certification.    I'll be filling you in on other town mascots once I hit the road........

Why Has Route 6 Been Largely Ignored? I Blame Jack Kerouak

Though designated a transcontinental highway in 1937, Route 6 was not completely paved until 1952, just about the time that Jack Kerouac put the finishing touches on his ultimate road-trip book, On the Road. While Route 6 towns in the mid-West and West joyously celebrated a nationally recognized nearly straight-arrow connection to both the East and West Coast (news of the paving and parades made the New York Times), Kerouac was busy sounding the death knell for all would-be Route 6 explorers.

Apparently, Kerouac didn't intend (through the voice of his protagonist, Sal Paradise) to meander slowly through off-beat America.  He wanted to get to California fast and have some experiences along the way.  If Kerouac/Paradise hadn't been such a cry-baby near the Bear Mountain Bridge, perhaps US Route 6 would now rival Route 66 in nostalgia.

Here's the passage:


"I'd been poring over maps of the United States in Paterson for months, even reading books about the pioneers and savoring names like Platte and Cimarron and so on, and on the road-map was one long red line called Route 6 that led from the tip of Cape Cod clear to Ely, Nevada, and there dipped down to Los Angeles. I'll just stay on all the way to Ely, I said to myself and confidently started. To get to 6 I had to go up to Bear Mountain. Filled with dreams of what I'd do in Chicago, in Denver, and then finally in San Fran, I took the Seventh Avenue Subway to the end of the line at 242nd Street, and there took a trolley into Yonkers; in downtown Yonkers I transferred to an outgoing trolley and went to the city limits on the east bank of the Hudson River. If you drop a rose in the Hudson River at its mysterious source in the Adirondacks, think of all the places it journeys as it goes to sea forever -- think of that wonderful Hudson Valley. I started hitching up the thing. Five scattered rides took me to the desired Bear Mountain Bridge, where Route 6 arched in from New England. It began to rain in torrents when I was let off there. It was mountainous. Route 6 came over the river, wound around a traffic circle, and disappeared into the wilderness. Not only was there no traffic but the rain come down in buckets and I had no shelter. I had to run under some pines to take cover; this did no good; I began crying and swearing and socking myself on the head for being such a damn fool. I was forty miles north of New York; all the way up I'd been worried about the fact that on this, my big opening day, I was only moving north instead of the so-longed for west. Now I was stuck on my northermost hangup. I ran a quarter-mile to an abandoned cute English-style filling station and stood under the dripping eaves. High up over my head the great hairy Bear Mountain sent down thunderclaps that put the fear of God in me. All I could see were smoky trees and dismal wilderness rising to the skies. "What the hell am I doing up here?" I cursed, I cried for Chicago. "Even now they're all having a big time, they're doing this, I'm not there, when will I get there!" -- and so on. Finally a car stopped at the empty filling station; the man and the two women in it wanted to study a map. I stepped right up and gestured in the rain; they consulted; I looked like a maniac, of course, with my hair all wet, my shoes sopping. My shoes, damn fool that I am, were Mexican huaraches, plantlike sieves not fit for the rainly night of America and the raw road night. But the people let me in and rode me back to Newburgh, which I accepted as a better alternative than being trapped in the Bear Mountain wilderness all night. "Besides," said the man, "there's no traffic passes through 6. If you want to go to Chicago you'd be better going across the Holland Tunnel in New York and head for Pittsburth," and I knew he was right. It was my dream that screwed up, the stupid hearthside idea that it would be wonderful to follow one great red line across America instead of trying various roads and routes."