The Discreet Traveler: Illinois 2

With our hosts in Chicago's Greektown

When you last heard from me, I was writing about our chat with the man who welcomed us to the Launching Pad in Wilmington: “In a typical year, we have people from 90 countries visiting!” I also mentioned that I am one of those people, as well as having been born in the U.S.A. This means I am frequently an interpreter of American culture. For example: The U.S., at least along a road route like Route 66, is set up for cars, not people walking places. So even though the restaurant’s address may be a number on one street, walking up to it may not reveal the front door. The entrance (and a huge sign indicating the restaurant) may instead be on the other side of the building, where the parking lot is.

In other words, I am the navigator of a culture, not just a road trip. In each new place we stay, I figure out how the shower works, because there are so many different designs even in one country. I also figure out how to turn keys, open various forms of packaging, and operate the remote control (on the rare occasions we’ve turned on a motel TV). It’s a division of labor that seems to be working for both of us.

Anyway, our new friend in Wilmington was just the first of many people who, in addition to making us feel welcome along Route 66, recommended others down the road in the direction we were going. We had to stop at the Route 66 museum in Pontiac, housed in a historic firehouse. On the way there, “America’s Main Street,” true to its name, took us through several more towns, including Gardner and Dwight.

The early route through Gardner takes you to the 1906 two-cell jail.

Restored cottage-style gas station, Ambler's Texaco in Dwight

South of Odell, T. pulled over on an abandoned stretch of even-older 66 to admire a restored barn sign. These signs, advertising a “world famous” tourist trap in Missouri, once adorned barns for hundreds of miles along the Route.

Grain elevator at Cayuga

When we got to Pontiac, we were warmly greeted by the woman running the museum. Already, we realized that there was more to see on Route 66 than even three weeks would ever allow us. We could easily have stopped in Pontiac, because our late start meant that we wouldn’t finish the day’s driving until after sunset. We would not make that mistake again!

Pontiac, and the Route, also have lots of murals.

Pontiac was named for Chief Pontiac of the Ottawa (1720-69). He united several tribal nations in resistance to the British military occupation, although he (and his French allies) eventually lost. Pontiac's strategic efforts are sometimes credited with the British decision not to underestimate the indigenous peoples of the Americas; they had much better luck with the British Empire than they ultimately had with the independent United States.

In most, though not all cases, Route 66 was aligned through the downtown of each community. In Illinois, especially, this means lots of angled turns. I relied on recommendations from McClanahan’s EZ66 and others to ensure we checked out as many downtowns as possible, even if that meant a detour of a block or two. One that was definitely worth stopping at was Atlanta, IL.

The Seth Thomas Clock (hand-wound!) and octagonal public library

Every town has a water tower, but only Atlanta's is a yellow smiley face!

The afternoon sun on one side and cornfields on the other were truly beautiful, especially on the two-lane country highway, which we had virtually to ourselves. But the sun was setting over the grain elevators by the time we got to Elkhart, and it’s no fun driving on an unlit road. Besides, there’s nothing to see on Route 66 in the dark. We were glad to get to our pre-booked hotel, which appeared to be the only tall building in Springfield. Fortunately T. had researched places to eat in advance. Walking the downtown streets, everything appeared to be shut up tight at 7:00 P.M., but the one place that was open was Jerk Shop Go, a wonderful jerk chicken place.

It was also a stop on the 1908 Race Riot Walking Tour, which is marked at a number of places in Springfield. These events led to the founding of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). It’s good to have this more recent recognition of history side by side with plaques celebrating the pioneer past. Like Route 66, America is more than one story and has many alignments.

Illinois State Capitol with statue of Abraham Lincoln

In the night I could hear long, lonely train whistles from the 23^rd floor.

Bright and early in the morning, we toured some of the Lincoln sites. It was at the old state capitol in Springfield that Lincoln, who practiced law in the town from 1843 to 1852, first gave his major antislavery speech.

The only home Lincoln ever owned

Tomb

We then had our first major alignment choice to make. I'd selected early Route 66 south of Springfield.

Breakfast was at Charlie Parker’s Diner, another T. find that is housed in a Quonset hut! I have been unable to determine any connection to Charlie Parker the jazzman. Despite its kitschy interior, the restaurant is only 30 years old.

I got an education by ordering something called the “country fried shoe.” About a million pounds of hash browns and a gallon of gravy on top of what I grew up calling chicken fried steak. With eggs and toast it was too much. I would not make that mistake again either!

The highlights of day 2, for me, were the great stretches of old road that the 1926-30 routing permitted us. Much of the time, we were the only people on the road, and could pull over or simply stop whenever we wanted to take a picture. Many sections of the two-lane are historic “dog-legs,” right-angle turns that both cars and trucks had to take before the interstate came to town.

For about a mile and a half between Chatham and Auburn are Snell and Curran Roads, still paved with brick and beautifully maintained.

Many yards really went to town on the Halloween decorations. This was in Thayer.

Fall is a great time to travel!

Between Girard and Nilwood, the road is original 1920s concrete, often with an evocative crack snaking along the middle instead of a line.

Tracks of a 1926 turkey, immortalized in concrete

Carlinville has a brick-lined town square and the stunning Macoupin County Courthouse.

We needed cash, so I went into a bank. There I discovered that the only ATM was a drive-through.

We also needed the bathroom. Rest areas are not a thing on Route 66; you have to go at the gas station or some other business, or else a park (I became expert at looking out for port-a-pots, some of which are helpfully unlocked for members of the public).

This was as nostalgic for me as neon signs and vintage diners are to Baby Boomers traveling on Route 66. I didn’t even know rest areas existed in the 1970s and ’80s; perhaps they did, but my dad would only stop when he had to. So the only restrooms I knew of between home and Ohio were in gas stations (and not those indoor restrooms many service stations have now, but the nasty metal ones out back). To this day, the smell of gasoline in the cold reminds me of Christmas.

Anyway, not much was open in Carlinville so we went into a real local bar. There were only two other customers, men discussing their vaccination booster shots. I didn’t hear any conspiracy theories against the vaccine, though one man did seem confused as to whether he’d be charged for something that was supposed to be free.

After our Cokes, T. went into the Mother Road Antiques shop. It’s a woman-owned business, but the person working there was a guy (who am I to judge? Maybe his business identifies as woman-owned!) He told T. she was only the second visitor from abroad for 18 months, “and the first one didn’t speak English!” Again, we felt like pioneers traveling west.

North of Gillespie, the Deerfield Drive loop took us across what McClanahan calls “a stout (but endangered) little concrete bridge from 1920.”

We did, eventually, need gas, and it’s always a crapshoot whether an American pump will recognize a foreign card. So I went in to pay with the cash I’d successfully obtained in Carlinville. I asked the woman for it; she paused for a second and said, “And how are you doing?” I’d forgotten myself. I should have said hi first!

Already, Chicago felt far behind. All this friendliness and people taking the time to say hello, even if you’re not spending any money. We also saw, and would see, more on Route 66 than we could ever hope to take pictures of, let alone stop and visit. More giant objects (big crayon, bottles, bowling pin, boot, buffalo), more old motel signs and auto shops or gas stations, whether restored or decaying into the earth.

Luna Cafe, Chain of Rocks Road, Mitchell

More old bridges, some closed, others still part of the Route but in danger of being torn down, so we crossed them while we could. We even took a dead end before leaving Illinois, to walk towards Missouri on the (now closed to motor vehicles) old Chain of Rocks Bridge.

The Chain of Rocks Bridge was built 1927-29 and in 1936 became the Route 66 crossing of the Mississippi River. During the three decades of its use, there were hundreds of elm trees lining the Illinois side, and even a Chain of Rocks amusement park. River users complained about the placement of the bridge, so it was built with a 30-degree angle in the middle of it. This, in turn, caused bottlenecks on the bridge. It would have been demolished in the mid-’70s, but was saved by the plummeting value of steel, which made it too expensive to tear down. A nonprofit group preserved the bridge for pedestrians and cyclists, one of whom stopped to take this picture of us.