Stuff You Should Know - What's so special about Route 66?

Episode Date: August 5, 2010

In this episode, Josh and Chuck hit the open road as they explore the history, allure and decline of America's most iconic highway: Route 66. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You've been dreaming about this baby your entire life a small beautiful bundle of joy that deserves only the best Everything about your baby is one of a kind from the pregnancy to the birth from whether they're a napper or a baby Who doesn't want to miss a thing at Caden Lane? We want you to make everything as unique as your bundle of joy even that essential hospital overnight bag We're the one stop shop for all things baby mommy and family Celebrate your perfect baby Caden Lane comm It's time to reboot your credit card with Apple card Apple card is designed to help you pay less interest Unlike other cards it estimates how much interest you'll owe and suggests moves to help you pay off your balance faster

Also, you can keep more of your money apply now in the wallet app on iPhone and start using it right away Subject to credit approval interest estimates on the payment wheel are illustrative only and may not fully reflect actual interest charges on your account Estimates are based on your posted account balance at the time of the estimate and do not include pending transactions Or any other purchases you make before the end of the billing period brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry It's ready. Are you? Welcome to stuff you should know from how stuff works calm Hey and welcome to the podcast, I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Chuck a lot

Bryant poor Chuck. He was the little kid who? Whose name could never be picked in that song of the name is cool. Yeah. Oh, no Yeah, was it? Oh, yeah, the bad kids everyone that did it thought they were just so clever because they were the first person They'd ever done that to me and I was just like getting line jerk. Oh, yeah, my name rhymes with bad words. Yeah, the deal only does So does Josh though. No, it doesn't. Oh, yeah, you're right. No, it's free and easy My parents gave it a lot of thought they're like, what can they call our son? Josh nothing. It's got nothing on that one. No, so they just called me fatty instead

Doe boy. How's it going? Good. Chuck. Yes. Um, we've got a Little bit of highway stretching out in front of us today. Are we on the open road route 66 man? Woo-hoo. Yeah, probably the most Iconic road in America most romanticized for sure. Yeah, that's not saying a lot though I mean it is for sure, but how many roads are there really even like? You know, well, I was thinking about that too. This is a Debbie Ronca. Yeah, article She's your buddy freak girl, right? Uh-huh, and she says in the article like it is, you know, the most romanticized the most The most immortalized road in pop culture, and I was thinking like

There is nothing else. There aren't any other roads. What other roads are there that are mentioned like specifically more than once? There's not it's not a song called I to 85 the only no, there's um 85 south Oh, really? Yeah Uh, which is mentioned by outcast and the group 85 south. Oh, yeah, sure. And there's another One called that mentions 85 south. That's all I could think of. Well roads back then and this is one of the basis of this article is It was a different deal back then roads were much more important and meant a lot more Than nowadays when you'd kind of take it all for granted because you'd get anywhere and my hats off to the guys who, you know

Made sure that route 66 came into existence Because they didn't they they didn't follow them the path that we followed Today, which is you know when you create a highway to go from point a to point b with as little resistance as possible as fast as possible, right? Yeah, these guys shaped route 66 so that it literally went through the main streets of small towns throughout America that's right Josh and these guys are Two gentlemen in particular an Oklahoma real estate agent named Cirrus Avery Yeah, Cyrus. Sure. I like Cirrus and John Woodruff who was a highway guy and they were

The two big advocates for starting route 66 from Chicago to Los Angeles. Yeah, and Well, I think that there was a plan to have a highway from Chicago to Los Angeles They're in on the debates on where to take it and how to do it and everybody was like, well, we'll just use the old Santa Fe trail Yeah, I wouldn't we I mean it's already there you go right there and Cirrus was good enough for the wagon. Yeah, Cirrus was like, oh, no, you don't because that doesn't go through Oklahoma I'm an oaky and I want this road to go through my home state Absolutely and by God if he didn't wrestle it into reality. Yeah, and I got a stat for you here. I found The reason this was necessary is because

from 1910 To 1920 in that decade. Yeah, 500,000 cars grew to 10 million cars in the United States in 10 years Yeah, and we weren't ready for that at all. I know we weren't chuck. That was a huge boom of um automobiles and we Basically, it was like having um Going from 500,000 computers to 10 million computers and not having an internet. Hey, you know, it's a nice analogy. Thanks Yeah, so the Associated Highways of America they developed the plan. Um It I mean it was pretty comprehensive. It wasn't just like hey, let's build some roads. It was let's let's link them all

Let's establish a numbering system Let's um road signs road signs uniform road signs. Absolutely warning signs Upkeep how are we going to upkeep all this? It was really comprehensive right because prior to the the creation of the Associated Highways of America Plan. Um, it was like immigration today. It's all patchwork or you know You never know if you are an illegal immigrant You don't know what you're going to run into in Illinois, right? And if you go to california, you have no it's patchwork. Well, and you would name it, you know, you're like this is the lincoln highway Right or the same faith trail. Yeah from here to here. It's the lincoln highway, right?

Yeah, because the same road could be adopted and renamed by any locality this this group Can't have the very um A tremendous amount of foresight. Oh heck. Yeah in saying like no no no like if we can get people easily from one place to another in these cars They'll spend money along the way right and that's exactly what happened. Yeah so one of the um One of the roads that came into existence out of this Associated Highways of America plan was Eventually named route 66 and it was officially designated Uh on november 11th 1926 when the um national highway act was passed, right?

Yes, josh route 66 was born And it was a very popular road and it meant a lot more than Here we've got a road it linked Uh chicago to la which was a really big deal. It helped bring industry from east to west Quickly too. Yeah, and this is the 1920s. So it wasn't like The wild wild west but the west wasn't like it was today. Thanks to route 66. It helped, you know Bring it forward and join. You know the rest of the country, right? Uh, the whole thing stretched uh 2400 miles, right?

Roughly. Yeah, one of the things that interests me is it's changed so many times and had some carved out or added on or whatever That even the um national scenic byways association can say Exactly how long it was, right? Right, but roughly 2400 miles. Yeah, and and like we said it didn't take a direct route from los angeles Or from uh, chicago to los angeles It it's snaked through eight different states illinois Missouri and chuck has a map here Illinois, missouri, canzas, oklahoma. Yeah, texas. Yeah new mexico, arizona and california Yeah, and although it didn't follow the old santa fe trail

It did follow some obscure wagon trail used by minor 49ers during the california gold rush So people driving on route 66 were actually following an old wagon trail Well, yeah, another cool thing too is uh what it what it did besides make it quicker and bring industry, you know back and forth quicker It uh This is the first time a lot of these people and a lot of these towns had access to a road like this Right like back in the day you were just kind of stuck where you were and if you wanted to get to los angeles It was a lot tougher than just hopping on What became route 66 right or later on i-40 boo right and and remember we said that

People um were spending money along the way at filling stations at hotels and all this and there was kind of this um celebratory idea of You know, let's let's attract these people. Let's get them to stay here. Let's get them to stop here and get their guests Let's get them to eat here. Uh-huh. So all these really great odd Yeah places sprung up. Uh-huh like um There's the the twin arrows, which is just this old Store basically and it's two old telephone poles sticking out of the ground Made to look like arrows. They're painted yellow and red. Yeah, and I mean that's it

Oh, yeah, but I mean if you think about it chuck if you and I were to go down peach tree We're not going to see two giant arrows sticking out of the side of the road Yeah, and that could be enough for you know word of mouth to get through like you have to see the two twin arrows They're huge and enormous and cool That's what's in your head over this other town that you heard nothing else about right and this is kitsch now obviously when we look Now and see peewee's big adventure and we see the cabazon dinosaurs It's it's like it's funny. Mm-hmm or the world's tallest thermometer

Which I've always had a problem with because it's not even a thermometer What does it just look like a thermometer? Well, yeah, it's it's actually that's not on route 66 That's in baker, but every time I used to pass it it angered me because it claims to be the world's tallest thermometer And it's just a readout of the temperature that's really tall. It's not like it's full of mercury Oh, and it's like a hundred and feet of mercury measuring, you know, it's just phony Yeah, but probably if they did fill it with mercury it would violate some sort of law, yeah There are I mean

Route 66 is still we'll talk about the decline of it in a minute, but it's still packed with some weird things like the twin arrows the The cozy dog drive-in Which looks delicious in Illinois. They claim although other people claim this as well to have invented the corn dog Yes, one of our favorite things aka the hot dog on a stick. It's a corn dog. Yeah Uh, and they are still open today. They've been open since the late 40s. And did you see the sign? No, that was another thing too. They're um signs sprung up for these places and there's some great signs The cozy dog in has two hot dogs and they're look they look like honeymoon hot dogs. They're cozy. They're very cozy And it's just uh, I would stop there just for the sign and I guess that that's the point, right?

Yeah, same with the giganticus headacus Yeah, did you see this thing? I didn't see a picture of it. No, it looks like one of the Easter Island statues kind of buried up to its Chin maybe yeah, and it's 14 feet tall, right? 14 feet above ground. Yeah, I don't I don't know how much is underground. Yeah So again, no reason for it like the twin arrows other than like to get people to stop get out of their car and open their wallets, right? Right. Have you ever been to the Cadillac Ranch? I haven't. That's pretty cool Like a lot of these I kind of turn my nose up at because it's really like south of the border type stuff And I don't mean Mexico. I mean that place in North Carolina. Anyway Cadillac Ranch

in Texas, Amarillo, Texas It um, that is where you will find 10 Cadillacs from 1949 to 1963 stuck nose down into the ground You can paint them You can graffiti them. You can do anything you want to them. Really? I didn't know that I just assumed that the graffiti was now they encourage it. Oh, okay And it's it's part of the allure and that was a helium magnet named Stanley Marsh uh commissioned that in the 1970s and then it was moved in the late 90s because it was

Like civilization was getting too close. Gotcha. So they actually moved it So I had that confused with the chicken ranch until I read the description. I was like, oh, that's not the chicken ranch What's the chicken ranch? It's a famous brothel Oh, okay in Nevada. I think I guess it would have to be Nevada. Yeah, I've never been there I haven't either. I would like to go officially on the record one more time. I have never been there either I saw it on like I think a HBO real sex special. Oh, yeah, I was 12. I got you. Yeah Uh, and then josh, there's the meteor crater Which I've actually been to and that's why I pulled that page for you. Yeah

So Chuck Chuck came up with a little extra, um, supplemental research that included a picture and a description And I just I couldn't make heads or tails of why he chose that Now I understand why did you go stand in the crater and get all irradiated? No, but that is in amboy, california and we Did a tv commercial there and it's across from or it's very near Roy's cafe and right there on route 66 Mm-hmm Roy's cafe is like the only thing around because I 40 killed route 66 in that area And um, I got a shirt. I should have worn it. It's like a little Roy's cafe amboy Amboy like a sort of like a mechanic shirt nice Like a hipster mechanic shirt very nice. The crater is really cool though, right josh

Yeah, I think it's like 50 000 years old. Yeah, and it's huge It's like two two and a half miles. Well, I let me correct myself I imagine that the dirt is far far older than 50 000 years old, but the Shape right occurred 50 000 years ago the event Nice that created the crater the meteor, but it's enormous like when you see it It's like two and a half miles in circumference 550 feet deep and you drive by it and you're like wow, what if that thing were to hit somewhere today near civilization? Yeah, but anyway hats off to Roy's cafe. They they're still around

Uh today and back in the day they had 70 people that worked there Yeah at its height when when route 66 was swingingist now when I was in there I got a milkshake. There was like two two dudes in there. Yeah, and you Hats off to to still going because there's even parts of route 66 are just gone Yeah, like 15% they say is is just not even there anymore. You can still drive 85% of it Yeah, and so let's talk about the heyday chuck in the heyday There was a tv show called route 66 that premiered in 1960, right? Yeah Had a great little

little swinging Theme song nelson riddles route 66. Have you heard it not bobby troops on no no okay different in my opinion It's way better. It's instrumental, but I listen to it all day today while we were researching. It's really it's a good song Um, and then you know the the tv show route 66 was written by this guy Who traveled actually traveled the country and like got inspiration for the tv show as he was writing it? Yeah So he was going in like he'd see a va hospital and then he was writing a story about these two main characters who are like They kind of represent the post-war baby boomer angst of like

America won the war and like they have all this money now and there's a lot of like disenfranchisement Which led to beatniks and hippies and jet carowak and all this stuff and route 66 became emblematic of people Pushing westward toward la after the war. Yeah easy rider. That was route 66. Yeah, but the tv show Little factoid it was filmed in 40 different states Yeah, and that's like they don't even do that now No, so to do that back then was like really revolutionary. I know and robert redford was almost in that too. Did you see that? I did Didn't make the cut though. No, we didn't 40 states. I know for one show one show

That's route 66 right near josh. Yes, it is. Uh, so can we are we at the decline the sad decline? I think we are Yeah, that same highway plan Uh, kind of is what killed it because after world war two. They were like we need people working and we need more roads better roads faster roads Yeah, like we need to go against what? Um, cyrus aviary came up with yeah, which is just we'll circumvent towns right towns slow things down Towns have red lights in them. Yeah, we're going to create these super highways. Yes, and that's what happened Yeah, Eisenhower was inspired by the autobahn and created the federal highway act finally

right and um That that pretty much killed route 66 like I said I 40 killed a great portion of it and a lot of it still runs Side by side, which is the saddest part. Yeah, like you can be on route 66 and All you look to your right and you see people just like zooming by you and it's really kind of depressing you suckers Yeah, get out of the rat race and they're looking at us going you hippie right following the old route 66 I actually I followed route 66 a little bit in New Mexico when I was living in the van Beautiful country there. Yeah on route 66. Yes historic route 66 red rocks. Uh, that's a lot of yeah

That's a lot of the uh, the only way you can find route 66 these days are historic route 66 markers because You're saying I 40 killed it. Yeah, not only did It was I 40, you know, can you say it was probably responsible I 40 was completed in 1984 And in 1985 route 66 was officially decommissioned So it doesn't appear on any maps basically said you're not a highway anymore. No, which is really sad. Yes So if you want to drive route 66 or the portions that you can drive You need to get a special map these days and thankfully they make them That shows the old trail and or the trail the old highway and uh, all the little quaint little

Kitchy cheesy things you can see and do along the way. Yeah So chuck one of the things you can see is a statue All right. Yeah in foil, Oklahoma right Do you know about this? Uh, oh, I love this guy. Um, there's a guy named andy pain and he is the guy who the statues of Okay, back in 1928. He won the transcontinental foot race. Oh that guy. Yeah This guy was part Cherokee. He was from, Oklahoma. Yeah, and he ran From los angeles to new york in a foot race. Yeah

And won 3400 miles. He won a $25,000 prize and this is 1928. So that's a substantial amount of money Oh, yeah, I would probably run that for $50,000 today. I can only imagine I didn't do the math That's what you would get like in the new jersey. You need to quit I know. Yeah. Um, you're not part Cherokee though. No, I'm not. It's in his blood. I'm part Choctaw Um, are you really? No. Oh Because I am. No, you're not. Yeah Like way way very small part Yeah, isn't everybody. Yeah, I think so. Um, so the uh, so mr. Payne ran from

New york to or LA to new york in uh, In uh, 573 hours, which is 23 days, right? But to make it 3400 miles in 573 hours He would have had to have run an average of six miles an hour For 23 straight days without stopping, right? So god knows how fast he was running because he had to sleep at some point in time Yeah, right. Yeah, but this guy if you ask me he deserved not only the $25,000. Yeah, I think I said 50,000 earlier, didn't I? So, uh, that's about it, huh? Yeah, I think a lot of uh, Route 66 is on the registry of national historic Places and and they're trying to preserve as much of it as they can thanks to a bill that

Uh, president clinton signed, but it's also on a list of what was that other list it was on basically say it was Endangered. Yeah The endangered species list of highways of highways. Yeah. Well, the problem was it wasn't like eisenhower was like Whoa, I'm going to destroy americana. It was Route 66 Was too busy. It couldn't handle the traffic that it was set up for which is the most embarrassing and humiliating Experience a highway can have really. Yeah, pretty much Yeah, that are a dead end. I'd say that's pretty humiliating. Oh poor dead inroads. Yeah

So that's route 66 as you were saying, um, it's still around buy a special mat go check it out and Just kind of drop out for a little while get your kids eight days Yeah, uh, chuck if they if you want to see any pictures find out more about this stuff You can go type route 66 In the handy search bar at house tough works dot com, which I said I was dropping didn't I? Uh, yeah, I just don't like the word handy After 235 episodes, you don't like the word handy. Not anymore. All right. Yeah

Uh, it just type it into the search bar the standard normal search bar at house tough works dot com Which is not at all handy. Right. So, uh, listener mail time, huh? Yeah, josh, I'm gonna call this uh, this is what you get for pledging a frat. Okay Hey, josh and chuck I listened to the ghost prison podcast and found one particular part pretty funny Unrelevant to something that happened to me. I've never been in a ghost prison or a political prisoner yet But I have been held captive and tortured with music This past fall I pledged a fraternity at a major university. He doesn't reveal like anything, of course That's what those guys do

One night while I was pledging the brothers had us all show up at this kid's house with the promise of a really good time That's when I would run screaming. Yeah as soon as we walked through the door. Isn't this kid seen to me like I know What a dummy. Yeah as soon as we walked through the door We were searched our pockets were emptied and we were put into a really dirty dank basement It's probably about 12 by 12 one couch for 11 dudes As soon as everyone got there, they slammed the door shut off the lights and started playing Mambo number five by Lou Vega

It's as bad as it gets It's as bad as it gets Um, if it doesn't come to mind also Lou Vega if you listen to this podcast we apologize, but it's true And get back to pumping that gas Uh, they had it on they had it on full blast From a pretty powerful stereo from about 8 p.m. To 2 a.m So like six hours straight of Lou Vega's song mambo number five Uh, we had to raise our voices even to be able to hear each other at 2

a.m. They abruptly turned off the music and shouted go to sleep We all breathed the sigh of relief The end and we tried to go to sleep after about 10 minutes We heard it playing faintly in the distance I thought it was my mind playing tricks on me But after about 30 minutes it got gradually and gradually louder and then it was full blast again And remained on for the next 48 hours with only a 10 second break So jack who was in a fraternity and had to endure that for like two days

And the reason he didn't include all this Is because that fraternity would be shut down and the university would be sued Oh, yeah, but this would came to light because that is wrong Yeah I'm not going to call for um fraternity stories. No. Yeah, so what should I call for? Uh, sorority stories If you have any generic funny interesting story, we want to hear it wrap it up send it in an email to Stuff podcast at howstuffworks.com

For more on this and thousands of other topics visit howstuffworks.com Want more how stuff works? Check out our blogs on the howstuffworks.com homepage Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? You've been dreaming about this baby your entire life a small beautiful bundle of joy that deserves only the best Everything about your baby is one of a kind from the pregnancy to the birth from whether they're a napper or a baby Who doesn't want to miss a thing at kaden lane? We want you to make everything as unique as your bundle of joy Even that essential hospital overnight bag. We are the one stop shop for all things baby mommy and family Celebrate your perfect baby kaden lane.com

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