Page 58 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Southwest USA & National Parks

56  ARIZ ONA INTRODUCING ARIZ ONA  57

Route 66 in Arizona Route 66 in Popular Culture

Route 66 is America’s most famous road. Stretching for 2,448 In the 1940s and 1950s, as America’s love affair with
miles (3,940 km), from Chicago to Los Angeles, it is part of the the car grew, and more people moved west than ever
country’s folklore, symbolizing the freedom of the open road before, hundreds of motels, restaurants, and tourist
attractions appeared along Route 66, sporting a
and inextricably linked to the growth of automobile travel. vibrant new style of architecture. The road’s end as
Known also as “The Mother Road” and “America’s Main Street,” a major thoroughfare came in the 1970s with the
Route 66 was officially open ed in 1926 after a 12-year building of a national network of multilane highways.
construction process linked the main streets of hundreds of Today, the road is a popular tourist destination in itself, Locator Map
and along the Arizona section, enthusiasts and conser-
small towns that had been previously isolated. In the 1930s, vationists have helped to ensure the preservation of Route 66
a prolonged drought in Oklahoma deprived more than many of its most evocative buildings and signs. Map area
200,000 farmers of their livelihoods and prompted their trek
to California along Route 66. This was movingly depicted in Holbrook was
John Steinbeck’s novel The Grapes of Wrath (1939). Seligman features several Route founded in 1882
66 stores and diners. Set among and is another Route
Arizona’s Upland mountains, the 66 landmark. It is
road here passes through scenery famous for Wigwam
that evokes the days of the Village, a restored
westward pioneers. 1950s motel, where
visitors can stay
in rooms that
are designed
to resemble
A street sign amid deserted plains in a section of the Indian teepees.
iconic Route 66.
Route 66 in Arizona passes through long
stretches of wilderness bearing none
of the trappings of the modern
world. The state has the Nelson
longest remaining stretch of Hackberry Valentine Ash Parks Chambers
the original road. Fork Winona
Bullhead Kingman
Key City Joseph Navajo
City
Route 66 Winslow
Other road
State line

Flagstaff is home to the famous Museum Club
0 kilometers 40
roadhouse, a large log cabin, built in 1931. It became
0 miles 40 a nightclub nicknamed “The Zoo,” which was favored
by country musicians traveling the road, including
such stars as Willie Nelson.
The Grand Canyon
Caverns, discovered
in 1927, are around
0.75 miles (1.2 km)
below ground level.
On a 45-minute
guided tour visitors
are led through
Oatman is a former gold-mining football field-sized Williams is known for its many nostalgic diners
boomtown. Today, its historic main caverns adorned with and motels. Twisters café (see p249), also known
street is lined with 19th-century stalagmites and as the Route 66 Place, is crammed with road
buildings and boardwalks. Gunfights seams of sparkling memorabilia, including an original 1950s soda
are regularly staged here. crystals. fountain and bar stools.

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