Route 66: The Highway and Its People

Are we there yet? Just need to hit on a few memories to start, since the book left me with a vision of sitting in the back seat of our '57 Chevy playing "Jinx, you owe me a Coke". Route 66: The Highway and Its People is the best I've read, and there has been a collection or two of some good history novels on my shelf, but not one of those books is as interesting and well written. The book that gives us a roadside view stretching for miles through the eyes of a kid battling boredom, is now a priceless possession at this kid's home library. The Photographic Essay by Quinta Scott is incredible. Page after page of written text by Susan Croce Kelly brings it all to life with characters we only dream about or see on TV and never thought existed. Folks collecting every penny, stuck in the middle of nowhere tending bar, the owner of a local eats pit stop serving the lonely trucker, or the hungry migrant worker who is pathetically parked on the side of a small patch of road he and his family called home during the Great Depression. The '57 Chevy is gone, it's just a photograph now, but the inner soul will bring back the experience of a not forgotten trek back in time. Thanks to the hard work of Quinta Scott and Susan Croce Kelly, we can all live it.

I just finished re-reading this book after a long hiatus and found it just as refreshing as it was many moons ago. The team of Scott (photography) and Kelly (text) put together one of the first 'comprehensive' tomes to be made available about Route 66 during its post-1984 revival. Quinta Scott also has a nice blog that is worth checking out. As of 2009, there are lots of 66 books crowding the shelves and as such one needs to be careful about selection, but this book is (as ever) a safe bet.

All too many Route 66 books focus on the Kitsch and the primary colors one could see on the Road, and are written in a jokey, 'weren't people in the old days a hoot' style that wears thin in a few pages. This book by contrast, takes a more serious look at the Mother Road. The photos are by turns otherworldy and 'down home' and the writing is crisp, factual and engaging. I found out more than I ever expected about the Road, its rise and fall, and the people on the road and in the towns along its path. It's reminiscent in many ways of some of Studs Turkel's oral histories, as the people 'of and on' the road tell their stories in first person, but here you also have the advantage of the journalistic and historical perspective the writer offers, and the undeniable impact of the photos, which tell stories that mere words cannot. --------- Some quotes from press reviews of the book include: Wall Street Journal '...while the new interstates are faster and safer, it is impossible not to miss old Route 66. Fortunately, the words and pictures of this delightful book preserve the memories of a road that ran through everyone's life.' Library Journal 'Route 66-the late, lamented American Main Street that ran from Chicago to the Pacific-is here given life once again. Those who served its travelers for nearly 50 years (selling Indian artifacts, 'hamburgs,' and chunks of petrified wood, or renting rooms, patching tires, and digging the wounded out of head-on collisions) offer memories both enthusiastic and touching. . . An enjoyable and rewarding book on a uniquely important road that turned the heat up on the American melting pot.' Arizona Highways 'Susan Croce Kelly and Quinta Scott spent seven years traveling the route from end to end, interviewing and photographing the people and structures that gave old 66 its flavor. The text is carefully researched and well written, and the 93 photographs (appropriately, black and white) provide convincing images of ordinary people and places lacking the glamour of those at either end of the 2,200-mile-long line.' Booklist 'The evocative photographs and interviews pay tribute to thousands of small businesses and the people who fueled, sheltered, and entertained millions of travelers. This is a fascinating study of individual entrepreneurs and the growth of advertising, as well as a paean to a vanished way of life.' --------- I recommend this book to anyone interested in histories of the 20th century, the impact of the automobile in American life, and to anyone who appreciates fine photography.

I really enjoyed this book as it was one of my fisrt to purchase about Route 66. This book didn't cover only the road but also took you from town to town and introduced you to the People. Great photography added to the experience. This is one book I read over and over.

This books contains all that is needed to make the reader -or viewer- want to travel the road, even just by looking at the pictures. It isn't called a photographic essay for nothing. The text is more social oriented and is probably one way to look at the 20th century and its cultural heritage along Historic Route 66. Those readers going travel old 66 might be a little bit disappointed that it does not give many clues to find the locations easily. This is a book about an icon on its own terms.A must in your library if you're interested in Route 66.