Saturday, May 1st - Joplin MO to Oklahoma City OK
Got a little extra sleep time last night and we all awoke to rain. It had been rumored that there would be severe thunderstorms with hail but most of it passed us by. We've had rain (a little) but today it was raining steadily as we hit the road at 8:45a. The Hampton Inn in Joplin was just fine (the second and last Hampton Inn we'll be using on the trip). Today is the last day in which we'll spend time in Missouri (and only a few minutes of that as Joplin is very near the Kansas border).
Here are our last few photographs from Missouri:
(This was a drive-by in Joplin; did I mention it was raining? I think the reflection is cool! )
Jackie (our navigator par excellence) found a short stretch of the original Route 66 roadbed dating back to 1928. As far as I could tell it hadn't seen a lick of maintenance since then. It did have Route 66 shields frequently painted on the road:
The Route 66 shield is painted on the main drag of Galena, KS as well. Not your bustling metropolis, Galena...
Of the eight states through which Route 66 meanders, the shortest section is through the southeastern corner of Kansas. Only thirteen miles of Route 66 ever existed in Kansas. The Kansas Route 66 Association has done a bang-up job of marking and preserving elements of this old road.
We tried to visit the Galena Museum but it was closed; we were too early for Saturday operating hours, I guess:
So our first visit was the Eisler Brothers General Store in Riverton, KS:
This is a real operating store with a separate room for Route 66 memorabilia. We bought a little. Here's Mr. Forrest R. Nelson who served us (his son Scott is the manager):
They have LOTS of Route 66 stuff!
A few miles outside Riverton is a preserved "rainbow curve" bridge, built in 1923. The main road bypasses it but, thanks to the Kansas Route 66 Association, the bridge is kept in good repair and a sideroad still permits visitors to drive over it -- and we did:
In Baxter Springs, KS was a real find. The Baxter Springs Museum doesn't look like much from the outside:
In fact, after wandering about outside for a few minutes (the museum was closed) we were about to leave when the curator arrived to open up a few minutes early. This place is amazing!
Inside are hundreds of items from the early 1800s to the 1960s. They are beautifully organized into rooms depicting the items in context. There's a one-room schoolhouse, a bank tellers' cage, an entire five room house and much more. And there's a complete 1920-30 era full-size small town Main Street recreated on the lower level:
 
(Just who are these people talking to?! ?)
These folks know how to present material. All the items were described by a nearby placard with type big enough to read! A wonderful find. You have to see this!
(Extra credit to anyone who can tell me what this is)
We eventually scurried on out of the Baxter Springs Museum, marking it down as one of our trip highlights.
This is another drive-by: The "Cafe' on the Route" in Baxter Springs. When the building it's in used to be a bank (in the 1870s), it is rumored to have been robbed by Jesse James and his gang. The fact that the James Gang was elsewhere at the time does not stop folks from insisting that it's true!
(See?)
Sadly, it too was closed -- as was Murphey's Restaurant across the street:
.. so the Baxter Springs economy only got a boost from Buzz & Jackie's generous donation for the Museum.
It only took a minute to bid Kansas good-bye (thirteen miles goes by quickly even by our standards) and we crossed into Oklahoma.
Ten minutes farther down the road in Quapaw, OK we happened upon some more murals on the sides of buildings. We're developing a real fondness for these:
The next town we visited was Miami (pronounced: Myamma). We first did a photo drive-by of Waylan's Ku-Ku Hamburgers:
But the centerpiece of this town is the under-restoration Coleman Theater:
This theater is in the grand style of 1930s theaters; rococo opulence abounds. It has 1,600 seats and a very large Wurlitzer pipe organ, the very same pipe organ that was originally installed when the theater was built in 1929. As we entered we could hear an organist playing tunes from the 20s and 30s. We stole into the auditorium and there was this little lady playing with gusto (and using all three manuals and all the stops):
The sound was awesome! After listening for a while we continued our self-tour until we ran into the chap who is managing the restoration, Mr. Jerold Graham:
(I wish I'd checked this picture; I'd have taken another photo. But I did catch him talking about his theater! )
He told us all about the history of the theater and brought us up-to-date with the six-stage restoration which is presently between Stage II and III. This is a "must-see" (and hear, if you're lucky as we were) when you pass through Miami, OK.
On the road again, stopping next in Foyil, OK at the Totem Pole Park. I was expecting carved wooden totem poles either carved by hand or with a chainsaw. What we saw were these:
 
They seem to be made of painted cement. Some of the paintings are fairly intricate and the largest (billed as the "worlds largest totem pole") is about 50' high.
One of the biggest towns we visited on our southwestward trek was Claremore, OK.
Claremore is notable for two things worth seeing.
The first we encountered entering Claremore is the J.M. Davis Arms and Historical Museum.
This is the largest collection of firearms I know about. They have 15,000 guns on display along with 8,000 other non-firearm items and 5,000 additional guns not on display. You can easily spend two or three hours in there and still not see all the guns and other items on display. Even if you aren't "into" guns you'll be impressed by this display, I guarantee.
(This semi-auto belonged to Bonnie of Bonnie & Clyde; not a woman to be messed with, I'm thinking..)
Looking at thousands of guns can generate an appetite. We heard about a place called "It's The Pits" for (of course) Bar-B-Q. Their specialty is chopped beef; very good.
Claremore is the home of Rogers State University and is the birth and burial place for humorist/philosopher/cowboy Will Rogers. After his death (in a small airplane accident in Alaska) in 1935, funds were raised to build the Will Rogers Museum around his gravesite. This is a wonderful structure and very well done. There are videos and hundreds of bits of Will Rogers Memorabilia.
He is famous for the line "I never met a man I didn't like". Friends of mine will understand when I say that he obviously never met Paul Harrison.
Just outside Claremore, in Catoosa, was the Route 66 icon, the Blue Whale. This is a, well, blue whale that is the centerpiece for a nice little park. Whimsical? You bet!
 
On our way to Sepulpa, OK we saw several abandoned motor courts and restaurants along the road:
(Did I mention we had RAIN!?!)
We also found the Rock Creek Bridge. It's driveable and the bed is brick:
Hey! Wanna buy a drive-in theater? Huh? Do ya?
(I can make you such a deal...)
In Stroud we stopped for Cokes at the Rock Cafe. I wonder why they call it that?! ?:
I used the restroom (I do that a lot it seems) and it was tiled in white 4" tiles apparently inviting folks to sign 'em:
Down the road a bit in Chandler, OK is the Lincoln Motel. This place has been meticulously maintained since it was built in the 1920s:
Also in Chandler is this Phillips 66 station under restoration:
It, too, has the ubiquitous Route 66 shield painted on the driveway:
In Warwick, OK is the famous Seaba Station (sadly closed when we got there):
With the day nearly darkening we made our way to Arcadia, OK and the Round Barn. This design was tried as a solution to tornado protection. It never caught on. Since we got there too late to go inside, we plan to return tomorrow:
Right across the road is Hillbillee's Route 66 Cafe:
(We did kinda dress up the place..)
Our original plan was to meet Ken and Melissa Turmel there for a dose of Route 66 lore from the "Landrunner". But they had a conflict and couldn't get away so we carried on as best we could. Hillbillee's had live country music to go with the home cookin':
..and we had a grand time ('cept for the cigarette smoke)
We visited the Oklahoma City National Memorial and it was so inspiring at night with the hundreds of lighted chairs representing those that died here. It's tough to take a nighttime photo and none of ours came out very well. Here's a couple, though, that give you the idea:
-- but tomorrow morning we're going back and that will be the start of Day #6 on the Mother Road.
Made our weary way to the Ramada Limited and so to bed....
Another loooooong day, lots of stops -- and much, much more to come...
Watch for more tomorrow, Day #6 on the Mother Road!
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