Why is Route 66 in America so famous?
Olivier Smit
2025-05-17 08:34:47
Count answers: 3
Route 66 was the brainchild of Cyrus Avery, a businessman from Oklahoma, and chairman of its highway commission. Avery wanted to improve his state’s road system and proposed a new route between Chicago and Los Angeles, which would shorten the road journey between the two cities by more than 200 miles. The highway quickly grew in popularity, partly due to the increase of those seeking a better life in the west following the Great Depression. Route 66 was also popular because truckers liked its predominantly flat route. As traffic on the highway grew, it earned the nickname “Main Street of America” because of the hundreds of small businesses and tourist attractions that lined its route.
Die historische Route 66, auch bekannt als die Hauptstraße Amerikas, führte durch viele kleine Städte und Dörfer und förderte das Wirtschaftswachstum.
Officially opened in 1926, Route 66 operated continuously for nearly 60 years. During this period it became a symbol of America’s economic and industrial prowess.
Not only did it highlight the importance of the automobile and road transportation to the country, but it also helped it evolve into an economic superpower.
Hanna van der Ven
2025-05-11 19:53:06
Count answers: 1
This rich and long-standing history accounts for much of Historic Route 66’s fame.
The historic highway has long captured the imagination of the American traveler and the essence of the American road trip.
The automobile took its place as a pillar of the American lifestyle, and the open road—and Route 66—came to symbolize freedom, optimism, and individualism.
In 1990, Congress passed the Route 66 Study Act of 1990, finding that Historic Route 66 had become “a symbol of the American people’s heritage of travel and their legacy of seeking a better life.”
However, travelers are also drawn in by the unique places featured along the way.
Many tourists visit or stay in the Route’s iconic roadside motels.
Among the most famous are Wigwam Motel, with its teepee-inspired design, and Blue Swallow Motel with its pink stucco walls and legendary hospitality.
Both are listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
Historic Route 66 also offers quirky roadside attractions you won’t find anywhere else!
Elmer’s Bottle Tree Ranch, for example, is an art installation of more than 200 “trees” made of colored glass bottles.
The notable Easter Island-inspired “Giganticus Headicus” statue is also a popular attraction.
These and other unusual sights ensure that Historic Route 66’s spirit of individualism lives on in the modern-day.
Daniël Wunderink
2025-04-28 14:57:38
Count answers: 1
Route 66 was een periode waarin Amerikanen voor het eerst massaal aan autoritten dachten, zegt Dunaway. Dit was een tijdperk waarin Amerikanen vakanties hadden, dankzij de groei in de fabricage en de unionisatiecampagnes die mensen hielpen om een fatsoenlijk loon te verdienen. En ze wilden westwaarts rijden in hun nieuwe auto op hun vakantie. Dit was de tijd van wegattrakties, neonreclames en souvenirwinkels, evenals onafhankelijk bezitte motels, trailerhoven, vuile diner en tankstations.
Sophie Avci
2025-04-28 13:25:04
Count answers: 3
Route 66 has gained a reputation as the United States of America’s most famous road. It reveals a road that’s changed a lot over the decades but remains vital in unexpected ways. Cyrus Avery was one of the founders of Route 66 in the 1920s, and he strove to create a road that would connect the Midwest to the West, though he resorted to promotional tricks and wheeling and dealing to get it done. The road quickly became a key route for migrants escaping the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression, forming its early reputation as “the Mother Road.” That travel, in turn, inspired a second incarnation as home to kitschy roadside attractions and goofily beautiful motels that played home to travelers and road-trippers throughout the 20th century. Though the road was eclipsed by the Interstate Highway System starting in the 1950s, it remains vital today. That’s because it’s a road that’s more than a strip of concrete (or gravel, or dirt). It’s a historical document of everyone who’s traveled on it — as the many contributions from Vox’s YouTube subscribers show, that keeps it going even as the interstates run alongside it.
Jolie Koçak
2025-04-28 11:58:53
Count answers: 2
Route 66 werd een symbool van de Amerikaanse mensenreis en hun erfgoed van reizen en het zoeken naar een beter leven.
De vast migration van verarmde mensen die hun vroegere huizen ontvluchtten, zorgde eigenlijk voor meer verkeer op de snelweg en boden commerciële kansen aan talloze kleine bedrijven.
Met de Parade van Bobby Troupe’s nummer “Route 66” en het tv-programma Route 66 ging het beeld van de snelweg filhoof verandering van een stoffige migratieroute veranderen in een symbool van vrijheid en voor een kicks levensstijl.
In 1990 erkende het Amerikaanse Congres dat Route 66 "een symbool was geworden van de erfenis van de Amerikaanse mensen om te reizen en hun nalatenschap om een beter leven te zoeken".
Er is een geest, een gevoel dat langs deze snelweg leeft. De geest van Route 66 leeft in de mensen en hun verhalen, in de gebouwen en de waarnemingen van reizigers van de snelweg.
Rosa van Dam
2025-04-28 11:42:22
Count answers: 2
Having done it (and we would do it again!) we can see why people want to drive this iconic American road.
It’s EPIC! The road spans 2451 miles (give or take) and crosses 8 States from Illinois in the Midwest to California on the Pacific coast.
You follow in the footsteps of American history.
As westward expansion has taken place, thousands of people have trodden the path – from the Native Americans in the 1830s along the Trail of Tears when they were displaced from their lands, to the Dust Bowl migration of the 1930s where families up and left their homes seeking a better life in golden California – the promised land of jobs and prosperity.
From the road’s heyday in the 1950s and 60s where American families took to the road to holiday in the west, to the decline of the route (and a large proportion of the towns along the way) in the 1970s as the Interstate was born and people wanted a more direct route across America.
Route 66 is made for road tripping – even though each day’s destination town is great in itself, the best bits are more often than not along the way.
Lees ook
- When was Route 66 first opened?
- What was Route 66 known as in 1926?
- How much of the old Route 66 is still drivable?
- What is the most famous stop on Route 66?
- Who first performed Route 66?
- What is Route 66 most famous nickname?
- What caused the death of Route 66?
- Is there a cars town on Route 66?
- Who wrote the most famous Route 66 song?