DennyG
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Posts posted by DennyG
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People in the Route66 group over at that place we just left (yeah, Yahoo) have been praising a new book on the route. I just got my copy and had to echo all the good things that guys like Bob Moore, Rich Henry, & Jim Conkle were saying. What follows is the same note I posted there as a reply to one of their messages.
Let me get in the line of folks praising David Wickline's "Images of 66". My copy arrived yesterday and it's a real page turner. About 90% (unsupported SWAG) of the book's surface area is covered with photographs but it's not an artsy coffee table book. It has plenty of descriptive text, quite a few directions, and a fair amount on contact information but it's not a guide book. Wickline calls it "An Interactive Photographic Journey". Good enough for me.
Each page contains a half dozen or so photographs with descriptions. Some of the photos could be works of art in a large format coffee table setting but in "Images of 66" they're more works of documentation. The whole route is covered and that's a lot of motels, diners, and just plain cool spots. Most appear in just a picture or two but some get a little more attention. These include La Bajada with six pages and a page (plus a pic) on El Vado. The La Bajada pictures let me get a much better feel for a place currently (and maybe forever) outside of my experience.
The Lay-Flat binding is a nice touch and indicates that the book is made to be used. Sure you can read it (The four page introduction doesn't just introduce the book, it's one of the better intros I've seen to the road itself.) and it is a great view-port for armchair touring, but it is intended to ride along with you to help find, identify, and appreciate all sorts of things along Historic Route 66. That means that a page might get folded or even torn now and then and there will probably be coffee or worse spilled on some of those great photos. I'm pretty sure David won't mind.
I know you can get the book at Henry's Rabbit Ranch and probably several other places along the road or it can be ordered from the author's website:
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Three former chains from southwest Ohio came to mind immediately: Sixty-Second Shops, Carter's, & Parkmoor. All were Big Boy style drive-ins with car-hops, etc.
A story I've heard has the Sixty-Second Shops (Service in 60 seconds!) coming from a split between two partners in a place called The Clock Restaurant or Clock Burgers. I understand that was a chain, too, but I don't personally remember it. There is a building downtown with the imprint of a clock in cement above the door. I've been told that that is the original Clock Burger location but I have nothing to support that. I don't recall where that clock is so have the target for a future treasure hunt.
Carter's was the local Kentucky Fried Chicken franchisee and I believe they tried a legal challenge when KFC opened their own stores in Ohio. For awhile (late '60s, early '70') you could buy official Kentucky Fried Chicken from either of them.
Parkmoor was in Dayton, Cincinnati, and several other towns in the area. The other two may have been Cincinnati only. It also featured fried chicken which a matchbook that recently went unsold on eBay identified as "Dixie Golden Fried Chicken". I remember others having arguments over whether Carter's or Parkmoor had the best chicken but for me it was the Parkmoor onion rings that stood out. Those at Parkmoor came in a box and were the best. I still miss those.
And I do remember Lum's. They sold beer in big frosted schooners one of which I believe I just may still have at home. Adopted legally from the schooner orphanage if anyone asks.
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Tod Swormstedt has a great collection in a relatively small space
I saw this "small space" comment earlier (It's from Glenn Wells' RoadSideFans report.) and had to smile. "relatively" is certainly the operative word here. A thousand postage stamps fit in a desk drawer. Get yourself a few Holiday Inn, Big Boy, and Earl Sheib signs and you're talking some noticeable real estate. The American Sign Museum is a wonderful addition to Cincinnati.
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Know thy enemy --- but just barely.
There were three rounds of five questions each and untallied rounds of 23/12 ounces each. The questions were on the interstate system. The ounces were of Amber Bock. I barely reached my "don't be embarrassed" goal of five digits on the questions: 10096. Details on the Amber Bock score will not be published.
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Thanks to RoadDog I've learned that there is a pre-festival Chain of Rocks crossing and tour planned for the morning of Sep 22. Some info & phone #s at the festival website ( Springfield 66 Festival ). I hope to be there and I have the distinct impression that the RoadDog will, too.
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SA has stops & vias and I've always managed to eventually get the route to go where I want but it sometimes takes some effort. Trouble spots are things like a road that has been "streamlined". Several vias may be required to stay on the old alignment.
That construction data seems pretty cool. Apparently there's no subscription required as they let me download the update. Of course it's of no use to me but I got it. I'm not ready to switch just yet (there's a lot in DeLorme that I like) but I'm always looking.
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Matt: While I have my issues with electronic maps, gross inaccuracy isn't one of them. I've encountered some errors but I'm actually rather impressed by how much they (Mapquest & DeLorme SA for me) get right. I can get incredibly frustrated at how they want me to get from A to B but they usually have A and B in the right places with the right roads between them. Maybe I'm not looking close enough.
Jennifer: Do you mean that S&T includes automated access to current construction information that it uses in maps and routing? That's something that SA doesn't have.
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First off let me note that you're making a trip that's on my list, too. US-36 is one of the few US routes with an endpoint in Ohio and one of only two that pass through the county where I was born (Darke). Last year it looked like my son might be stationed in Colorado and I started planning a full length Thirty-Six run with visiting him as the justification. He ended up elsewhere and the trip got shelved. Someday.
I'm a GPS fan, too. I've have used GPS in conjunction with a laptop and admit that it's probably the best way to stay on a route you've defined. But that approach is bulky and almost requires an operator/navigator. My old "buddy" is a Garmin GPS III that does no routing but with which I've become rather comfortable over the years. I've just recently upgraded to a Garmin Quest which did require some retraining but which seems a perfect unit for me. I guess it wasn't actually retraining since the stuff I had/have to learn is stuff that the old unit didn't do. It even accepts routes directly from DeLorme SA2006 but I guess the maps don't line up precisely so it sometimes gives funny directions and it really wants to calculate the route itself. Although I've learned the basics of operating it, I'm still working out how to best use it to feedback routes of my choosing.
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Ah ha! Another person who not only wastes time on the internet but also whiles it away in noisy unsavory taverns by punching buttons in response to meaningless questions. I am so there! Even though I'm hardly an interstate expert I will commit to posting my score here. Assuming, that is, you will, too.
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I just finished John & Lenore Weiss' "As the Story Goes..." over breakfast and I thought everyone would want to know that:-) Actually, I'm hoping that someone has an update on one of the stories in the book.
For those who don't know, "As the Story Goes..." is a collection of stories with a Route 66 connection ( see http://www.il66authority.com ). The stories are short - most under a page - so it's a great "intermittent read". You can put it down between stories and come back days later and not have to reread several pages to reestablish your place in a complex plot. Of course, if you do happen to reread a page or two, no harm done and, if your memory is anything like mine, you might not even notice. There are even a few pictures in the book including one of Ron Jones' attractive legs. My question concerns the story that appears one page in front of Ron.
"Celebrating His 66th Birthday" describes how 66 year old Geores Buttner-Clevenger drove, bicycled, and jogged Route 66 six miles at a time. The story ends by reporting that Geores is writing a book about the trip and I'd really like to know where that stands. Does anyone know when I can get in line for a copy?
--Denny
P.S., Love the yellow daisies on the front; The only bit of color in the book. Lenore's touch I'm guessing.
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I'm currently using DeLorme Street Atlas but have used Streets & Trips in the past. These two seem to be the leading computer mapping/routing products and I believe they offer similar capabilities. Several years ago I looked at these plus AAA & National Geographic branded offerings and settled on DeLorme. The primary reason, as I recall, was DeLorme's facility (called vias) for forcing a route through a specific location. I believe that S&T is now much improved in this department but haven't personally looked at it for about five years. I've just recently installed SA2006 and am slowly getting familiar with it. I know it's a wonderful thing but there's a lot of new tricks for this old dog to learn. (I haven't uninstalled SA9, yet:-)
I usually have a printed atlas in the car but seldom open it and can't remember the last time I used a modern printed map for planning. Old maps, both printed and online, are a different story. When a trip involves retracing an old route or trip, old maps are key. Of course, finding current equivalents of old roads and then getting a route to use them can be a fairly challenging "computer game". Fortunately for me, it doesn't require Halo 3 level reflexes.
I do use printed history and guide books. Not for every trip but if a trip is at least a little bit in the future I'll spend some time reading anything related that comes to hand. Sometimes books are readily available for a specific road (e.g., Route 66, Lincoln Highway) or area, and there are bunches of "Ten best trips in/from/near..." publications. Some books (e.g, Horatio's Drive, Blue Highways) will just get you in the mood for a road trip and that's a form of preparation, too.
The information highway certainly provides a lot of input. This forum and other e-groups can provide information and are clearly the place to go with specific questions. Sometimes just putting a town's name into a search engine will turn up something like a museum or historic site I didn't know about. If I'm concerned about finding lodging in real-time, I'll look for, and sometimes book, motels online. But, if I only make one online visit for a trip, it will almost be certainly at RoadsideAmerica. What a great website and you can now enter a city and get a map with attractions marked.
Now, actually following a route is another story.
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I received a note today from a fellow who just came across a stock certificate from the National Road Turnpike Company of Clark County (Springfield) Ohio issued in 1877. 185_ is printed with 77 written over it so the company may have been formed in the 1850s. My guess was that it might be a company formed to take over a portion of the National Road as the feds were running away from it but I really have no idea. I've never heard of it before. Any other ideas or guesses?
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I'm one of those people who forgot to take a step back when the word "moderator" came up and now I am one. "Trip Planning" sounded like one of the forums that I'd be following closely and Jennifer made sure I had a front row seat.
I've planned a few trips myself (and enjoyed more unplanned ones) but haven't begun to approach the point where I consider it a science. I saw the title of this forum and figured it would be a good place to learn how others are planning routes, pre-picking some stops, and then following those routes and getting to those stops. Modern mapping software and GPS units are wonderful things but they aren't exactly tailored to roadies. They'll get you from point to point and probably let you select whether you'd like to minimize time or distance. They might even offer to pick a scenic path for you. But they're not much help in finding the 1930 alignment of US-66 through Illinois or how the Lincoln Highway once traversed Nevada. And they're not likely to tell you that the world's largest collection of used lighter flints is only twenty miles out of the way let alone how to get there. Yet some of us/you manage to find those alignments, actually follow large pieces of them, and visit some of the world's largest things. I'm thinking that how we do that is kind of what this forum is about.
Of course, others might have their own ideas of what "Trip Planning" means and I'm not so much trying to guide discussion as to start it. Moderating an empty forum is easy but not very interesting.
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http://www.route6tour.com/ is the Route 6 Tourist Association site.
I've personally only been on US-6 between Mansfield & Warren, PA. That is a very nice drive and, judging from the squiggly path east of Mansfield, that should be pretty nice, too. And then there's all those other states it goes through.
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Yesterday, Becky officially announced the birth of this forum to the e-group and the transition has begun. E-group members have been migrated here but passwords and instructions have yet to be mailed. That makes for a quiet time on both fronts. I got in by using my e-group ID and requesting a password reset. That means I get to write something on this mostly blank slate and wait for the faithful to arrive. I suspect it won't be long.
Feasting on Asphalt
in General Discussion
Posted
I've read that all four episodes will be shown back to back starting at 6:00 EDT on Saturday. Check local listings for a television near you.