In 2026, Route 66 will turn 100 years old. Between 1926 and 1985, an estimated 200 million vehicles drove this legendary highway. Dust Bowl refugees in overloaded jalopies. Soldiers returning from war. Families in wood-paneled station wagons. Beatniks in Volkswagen vans. Truckers hauling goods coast to coast. Since its resurrection in the late 1980s, millions more have followed: road trippers in rented RVs, motorcyclists on cross-country runs, Instagram influencers chasing neon signs at sunset, families recreating scenes from Pixar's Cars, and international tourists who flew halfway around the world to drive America's most famous highway. They all drove the same 2,448 miles of asphalt connecting Chicago to Los Angeles, and every single one of them had a story. 

Route 66 carried more than vehicles. It carried American dreams across eight states, through small towns that appeared suddenly on the prairie and disappeared just as fast in the rearview mirror. For 59 years, this highway was the main artery of a nation always moving, always reaching westward, always believing something better waited at the end of the road. 

Though officially retired in 1985, Route 66 refuses to fade. Today, travelers from Tokyo to Berlin still drive it, searching for what modern interstates paved over: the real America. 

This is the story of how a simple federal highway became "The Mother Road," and why it matters more than ever as it approaches its centennial. 

Picture America in the 1920s, when the promise of the automobile collided with the reality of America's roads, which is to say, there barely were any. What existed was a chaotic patchwork of unmarked dirt paths that turned into impassable mud rivers when it rained. Cross-country travel wasn't a vacation; it was a dangerous gamble that could take weeks or end with your Model T axle-deep in a Missouri creek. 

Route 66 changed everything when it roared to life on November 11, 1926, as one of America's first continuous highways. It carved a diagonal path through the nation's midsection, linking eight states from the Great Lakes to the Pacific Ocean. But here's what made it different: while other highways connected major cities, Route 66 intentionally threaded through small farming communities and forgotten prairie towns, bringing economic opportunity to places that had been invisible to the rest of America. 

The highway's chief champion was Cyrus Avery, a road commissioner from Tulsa with big vision and bigger stubbornness. He fought hard for that memorable double-digit number. The number 66 was catchy, symmetrical, easy to remember, and most importantly, available. 

America's Main Street had been born, though nobody yet understood it would become a legend for the next century. 

When the Great Depression arrived, it brought a companion even more terrifying: the Dust Bowl. Massive black clouds of topsoil, whipped up by relentless winds, rolled across the Great Plains like an approaching apocalypse. The sky turned dark at noon, dirt piled in drifts like snow, and crops that hadn't died from drought were simply buried alive. 

Route 66 transformed overnight from a tourism route into an escape route for the desperate and dispossessed. 

Hundreds of thousands of families (Okies, Arkies, and Texans) loaded everything they owned onto rickety trucks and jalopies held together with wire and prayer. They pointed their vehicles west on Route 66, following rumors of work in California's orchards and fields. John Steinbeck captured this mass migration in The Grapes of Wrath, bestowing upon Route 66 its most enduring nickname: "The Mother Road," a path that offered not guarantees, but possibilities. 

Small towns along the route transformed themselves to serve this flood of desperate humanity. Gas stations, motor courts, and diners materialized like desert flowers after rain. The businesses that survived understood something fundamental: travelers needed more than fuel and food. They needed kindness, hope, and the feeling that someone cared whether they made it to California alive. 

💡 Did You Know?
Route 66 wasn't completely paved until 1938, a full twelve years after it officially opened. Before that, long stretches remained dirt and gravel, which meant Dust Bowl refugees were driving through an environmental disaster for two thousand miles. 

After World War II ended, America exhaled, smiled, and bought automobiles in record numbers. Prosperity returned with a vengeance, suburbs sprawled across former farmland, and families discovered they could pack the station wagon and... go. The open road was calling, and Route 66 answered with the most spectacular show America had ever staged. 

Route 66 exploded with personality, creativity, and shameless roadside capitalism at its most gloriously weird during this era. 

Motels competed for attention with architectural fever dreams and neon signs that could guide aircraft. Diners served homemade pie and bottomless coffee to travelers hungry for both sustenance and stories. Entrepreneurs built increasingly outrageous roadside attractions designed for one purpose: to make families in passing cars slam on the brakes and shout, "We have to stop there!" 

This golden era created Route 66's most iconic landmarks: Cadillac Ranch outside Amarillo (ten Cadillacs buried nose-down in a wheat field), The Blue Whale of Catoosa in Oklahoma (a massive grinning whale built as an anniversary gift), The Wigwam Motel in Holbrook (concrete teepees under desert stars), and Meramec Caverns in Missouri (advertised on barn roofs for hundreds of miles). 

The CBS television series Route 66 (1960–1964) portrayed the highway as a place where two young men in a Corvette could find adventure in every small town. Nat King Cole's "(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66" became an instant American standard, later covered by Chuck Berry, the Rolling Stones, and countless others who understood that the song wasn't really about geography. It was about freedom. 

Route 66 became American culture on wheels, neon-lit and wide open. 

By the 1950s, Route 66 was choking on its own popularity. Two lanes couldn't handle the endless stream of cars. Traffic crawled through every small town, stopping at every red light. America needed something faster, safer, and more efficient. 

In 1956, President Eisenhower launched the Interstate Highway System: four lanes of limited-access, high-speed efficiency that promised to connect America's cities without the inconvenient interruptions of small towns, stop signs, or local character. 

As interstates opened across the 1960s and 70s, Route 66 communities watched their economic lifeblood drain away. Motels that had welcomed three generations of travelers sat empty, their neon signs dark. Diners served fewer customers each month until closing became inevitable. Gas stations were abandoned to rust and tumbleweeds. 

Williams, Arizona, fought hardest and lasted longest, but was finally bypassed in October 1984. On June 27, 1985, the U.S. Highway System officially decommissioned Route 66, removing it from maps and stripping away its federal designation. 

Americans believed the Mother Road had driven her last mile. 

A barber in Seligman, Arizona, Delgadillo watched his town dying and decided that Route 66 deserved better. In 1987, he founded the Historic Route 66 Association, sparking a grassroots preservation movement that spread across all eight Route 66 states. Towns began repainting faded murals, restoring vintage neon signs to glowing glory, and marking original sections with distinctive brown Route 66 shields. 

In 1999, Congress designated Route 66 a National Scenic Byway, acknowledging that this highway was more than infrastructure. It was American heritage. Museums opened in small towns that had nearly become ghosts. Annual festivals celebrated the highway with classic car shows, live music, and stories from people who remembered when Route 66 was "the road to California." 

Then Pixar released Cars in 2006, introducing Route 66 to an entirely new generation. The film's fictional town of Radiator Springs, inspired by real Route 66 communities like Seligman and Williams, told a story about the importance of slowing down and remembering that the fastest route isn't always the best one. Suddenly, children who had never heard of Route 66 were begging their parents to visit the real-life inspirations behind Lightning McQueen's adventures. Towns along the route embraced their Cars connection, with places like Galena, Kansas (which inspired Tow Mater's character) becoming pilgrimage sites for families. 

The highway has appeared in countless other films and documentaries: Easy Rider (1969) captured the counterculture spirit of Route 66 in the late 1960s, while more recent productions like the 2023 documentary Route 66: Spirit of the Mother Road explore the highway's continuing cultural significance. 

As Route 66 approaches its 100th anniversary in 2026, it attracts more visitors than ever. International travelers view it as the quintessential American experience. Social media has amplified Route 66's appeal, with vintage neon signs and roadside attractions ideally suited for Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube travel vlogs. Digital nomads work from RVs parked at Route 66 campgrounds. Classic car clubs organize annual cross-country runs. Motorcycle groups make the journey a rite of passage. 

The centennial celebration promises to bring renewed attention and investment to Route 66 preservation, ensuring the Mother Road survives for another hundred years. 

In our GPS-guided world of identical highway exits and franchise restaurants, Route 66 offers something increasingly rare: authenticity wrapped in weathered paint and flickering neon. 

The highway reminds us that the journey deserves as much attention as the destination, that small towns have stories worth hearing if we'll just slow down long enough to listen. In an era of algorithm-driven recommendations and curated Instagram feeds, Route 66 offers genuine discovery. You can't swipe through it. You have to drive it, stop at places that look interesting, and talk to real people who've spent their lives keeping the road alive. 

Route 66 proves that roadside attractions built with creativity and humor deserve to survive not despite their weirdness but because of it. It demonstrates that ordinary people can save extraordinary things when they refuse to accept that "progress" requires amnesia. 

As we approach 2026 and Route 66's centennial, the highway represents something more relevant than ever: the American character that values optimism in the face of hardship, creativity born from necessity, and the stubborn belief that the open road holds infinite possibilities for those brave enough to follow it. 

Most travelers carve out 7 to 10 days to drive Route 66's full length. Spring (April through May) and fall (September through October) deliver ideal weather: comfortable temperatures and thinner crowds than summer. 

An RV from El Monte RV transforms this journey into something the original Route 66 pioneers would have envied: the freedom to stop wherever inspiration strikes, combined with modern comfort, including air conditioning, full kitchens, bathrooms, and Wi-Fi connectivity. Experience the Mother Road exactly as it was meant to be traveled, on your own schedule, with adventure waiting around every curve. 

With the 2026 centennial approaching, now is the perfect time to experience Route 66 before anniversary crowds arrive. You'll be part of the highway's second century, joining millions who've driven it before and millions who'll drive it after. 

Route 66 was officially decommissioned four decades ago, erased from maps and stripped of federal recognition. By every logical measure, it should have disappeared completely. 

Instead, it thrives. 

The highway survives in neon signs that still glow at dusk, casting colored light across weathered parking lots. It survives in vintage motels where owners share stories about travelers from six continents. It survives in diners serving homemade pie and coffee strong enough to fuel another two hundred miles. It survives in communities that celebrate their Route 66 heritage with carefully preserved history. 

As Route 66 approaches its 100th birthday in 2026, it survives because it represents something that transcends pavement and paint: the distinctly American belief that the open road offers redemption, reinvention, and the freedom to become whoever you dare to be. 

The Mother Road has been calling across deserts, plains, and mountains for nearly a century. 

Are you ready to answer? 

Ready for your Route 66 adventure before the centennial crowds? Explore RV options at El Monte RV Rentals and discover current deals that make legendary road trips affordable.