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Eighteen years ago, my parents gave each of my siblings and I a copy of a then-new book, Route 66: The Mother Road by Michael Wallis. Route 66 had been a part of my childhood -- I can vaguely remember the press coverage when I-40, the road that replaced the Mother Road through my home state of Oklahoma, was finally completed -- but I hadn't ever really given it much thought.
I'm not sure my brother and sisters ever opened their books, but I stayed up late Christmas night poring over mine, and the next morning, I was inspired to set out in my father's Volvo to travel the road east from Oklahoma City to Tulsa and beyond, as far as Joplin, Missouri.
My interest in the Mother Road hasn't waned over the years. In 1992, I spent four months traveling cross-country, visiting all 48 of the contiguous United States, and the unquestioned highlight of that trip was my journey along the entire length of 66, from the shores of Lake Michigan in Chicago to the beaches of the Pacific Ocean in Santa Monica.
I even, some years after completing that memorable journey, had a Route 66 highway sign tattooed on my upper left arm.
So it was with a thrilled jolt that I learned from Dad some years back that my family, on my father's side, had its own connection to the Mother Road.
My father's parents were an oddly matched pair. Grandmother was a quiet little church mouse of a woman. Devout and reticent, she was dominated (willingly, I've always assumed) by my grandfather, who was a large, aggressive man who lived sixty or so years without ever experiencing self-doubt (or so it seemed to me). Pawpaw, as we called him, always had a few questionable irons in the fire, looking to get ahead, to make a buck, to clear the way for his ship to finally come in.
So it was, in a sense, no surprise at all to learn from my father that, in 1935, when Dad was just six and the Mother Road was only nine years old, my grandparents operated a combination tourist court/service station/bar-and-grill along Route 66 in western Oklahoma City.
I couldn't believe my ears at hearing the news. I was giddy with delight at the very thought of it, and when Dad further revealed that he'd learned, years later, that many of those who stayed at my grandparents' tourist courts arranged to pay not by the day but by the hour, I was really thrown for a loop. I couldn't imagine my meek, moral Grandmother serving beer at the bar, much less looking the other way as couples registered as Mr. and Mrs. John Smith for a brief stay in her motor court.
But that was reportedly the situation, for as long as it lasted. Within twelve months, Pawpaw had moved on to some other get-rich-quick scheme, and operation and ownership of the motor court/service station/bar-and-grill was placed in other hands.
Ever since I learned of this colorful chapter in my family's history, I dreamed of one day finding photos depicting that storied roadside establishment, but I doubted it would ever happen. As organized as my mom always was, our family photos were all thrown into a box or two in the attic, waiting to be sorted through.
Mom's not well now, not up to undertaking the task of making sense of that collection of images, and Dad's trying to sell their home, which is now too big for the two of them. He's busy enough caring for Mom -- he doesn't need the additional task of keeping an oversized (for their purposes) house.
So when Flo and I were in Oklahoma City over the holidays, I took it upon myself to sort through at least one of these boxes of photos. It never really occurred to me that I might come across a visual record of our family's connection to the Mother Road. I'd have been fully satisfied to find pictures of my grandparents in their younger years; somehow, I'd never seen a photo of any of the four of them as young adults, teens, or children.
But I did find some photos of their younger selves and was delighted to do so. But I was beyond thrilled when I showed my father a photo of his parents as young adults, and he spotted an "Eat Here" sign painted on an adobe or plaster pillar behind them.
"That must be the bar and grill on Route 66," Dad said. Grabbing the photo from him and looking closely, I knew he must be right. Tickled pink, I couldn't wait to dig further into the box to see if there were others.
There were -- I've found three additional pictures so far, and I'm hoping that my next trip home will reveal even more. It's a little frustrating that all four of the images I've found so far are taken from roughly the same angle -- it's maddening to think that it didn't occur to someone in the family to cross the Mother Road and snap a picture of the entire establishment from across the way.
But I'm thrilled to have these photos, and if they're all I ever find, I'll be satisfied.
The first photo, depicting my grandparents, is the first one I came across. It caught my eye initially because it appears to have been torn into pieces (in a fit of pique, perhaps? I have no idea), put back together like a jigsaw puzzle, and pasted to a piece of cardboard. At the right edge of the photo, you can spot the "Eat Here" sign that tipped my father off as to the picture's provenance.
This second picture shows Pawpaw and Grandma with their three eldest children. That's my Uncle Harold on the left -- he was 10 at the time; Dad, who was six, is in the center; my Aunt Jo, who was eight or so, is on the right. The same "Eat Here" sign appears in this photo, too.
I have no idea who's pictured in the third photo, and Dad wasn't sure, either (he had a guess as to the identity of one of the two women, but I can't now recall what it was). It appears the "Eat Here" sign is just out of the frame on the right, and we can see a different sign on the upper left. As best as I can tell, it reads "...MO ...NS." I'm willing to bet the second word is CABINS, as in Tourist Cabins, but I don't know what the first word is (Dad doesn't recall the name of the business, alas).
In the fourth photo, we see Grandma with Harold, Dad, and Jo, and we see, for the first time, that there was some kind of advertising sign to the right of the "Eat Here" sign. It appears to be for a product called Colony something. Something about the insignia suggests a cigar brand to me, though a quick Google search on "Colony Cigars" turned up little.
I've linked the above photos to very large versions of each image, and I'd be pleased to hear from anyone who finds something -- a clue, if you will -- in any of the photos. Look them over, and see if you find something I've missed.