Lost in America

Some people are products, even slaves, to their own imagination.

I was born next to a railroad track in the hills of Western Pennsylvania. At night, I would lay in my bed next to my brothers' room and listen to the wail of a train far down the tracks going somewhere. I wanted to follow that train.

During the warm summer days, I would hike up to Roundtop, a hill that hid the secrets of an ancient Indian burial grounds. Sometimes I would find arrowheads or pieces of flint that were once part of spearheads of Indian tools along the trail.

I would lie in the warm grass, listen to the buzz of insects and Ladybugs, and watch the contrails of jet planes as they streaked across the sky. I dreamed and it was Heaven.

When I was in my early 20s, my younger brother Legs and I packed all our belongings into an old Plymouth with used tires and headed West. With the rising sun behind us, we planned to follow America's Mother Highway, Route 66, across the country to Phoenix, AZ.

That was where Rev. Don Grosvenor and his wife, Gerri, were waiting for us. They had met us at a small church in Monongahela, PA. where Pastor Grosvenor was preaching a revival.

I loved his preaching and when he discovered I was an aspiring writer, he invited us to come to Arizona and stay in his house while we looked for work. Based on my childhood dreams and my wild imagination, that was an easy invitation to accept.

Our parents, especially my mother, tried to talk us out of making the trip. It didn't work. Dad just shrugged and warned us if we ended up in jail not to expect him to bail us out. That was fine with my brother Legs and me. We were young and felt invincible.

The Mother Highway was also known as the Will Rogers Highway. Route 66 was made famous by Bobby Troup, a jazz musician and songwriter who was married to a sultry vocalist named Julie London. While driving to Los Angeles along Route 66, he began humming and wrote a song, 'Get Your Kicks on Route 66."

In Los Angeles, he became friends with Nat King Cole and Cole agreed to record the song. It was an overnight hit that sold millions of copies and made Troop and London rich.

Legs and I left our hometown of Sutersville, PA. in a snowstorm. We didn't see the sun or a blue sky until we passed through Indiana.

Route 66 runs from Chicago to Santa Monica, CA. where it ends at the Pacific Ocean. It was a two-lane highway that passed through Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.

This was my brother's first journey out of Pennsylvania. We ate in diners and fast-food restaurants along the way. When we were halfway to Arizona, Legs emptied his pockets of money and handed it to me.

"What's that for, Brother?," I asked.

"That's from the money you left on the tables at the restaurants where we ate," he said. "You're sure careless with your money."

I slapped my head. "Legs, that money was for tips," I screamed. He just stared at me like he didn't know what I was talking about.

As our Plymouth ate up the miles, we passed reptile and alligator farms, tourist traps where brave souls wrestled alligators and handled snakes to attract the public. We fell in love with Stuckey's Restaurants and their pecan rolls and breakfasts.

In Oklahoma, we stopped at a restaurant owned by two spinster sisters. They were curious about where we had come from and worried about our welfare. After warning us to steer clear of loose women, they filled a bag with homemade biscuits and gave it to us as a road gift.

"You boys don't have your mother to guide you so we'll temporarily take her place," one said. "Good luck and God keep you safe."

The highway wound through the flatlands of Texas. We stopped the car along the road to give it a chance to cool down and Legs said, "Wow, this country is so flat you can look at your knees and still see the sky."

Today there are gambling casinos in places like Joplin, MO., Oklahoma City, Tulsa and other spots along the way. They have been added to the territory by Indian tribes that have developed their reservations during the past 30 years.

Today Route 66, once 2,448 miles of road stretching across the heart of America, has been replaced by Interstate Highways. You can still follow the old highway but it will make the journey longer.

I still sometimes get off the interstate and follow the old Route 66 signs. The road takes me through small communities like Vega, Texas, San Jon, N.M., Santa Rosa, N.M. and other places where I spent my early journalistic career. The memories are priceless.

Route 66 was so popular it even spawned a television series starring Marvin Milner and George Maharis. The series created by Sterling Silliphant ran from 1960 to 1964 and featured two guys in a blue Corvette who traveled from town to town and got into adventures along the way.

John Steinbeck, in his prize-winning novel 'Grapes of Wrath,' wrote about the Mother Highway and described it as an escape route for Okies who were trying to leave the Dust Bowl that plagued Oklahoma during the 1930s.

There was even a famous Bunion Derby, a foot race from Los Angeles to New York City, that was run. Actor-comedian Will Rogers stationed himself at one of the checkpoints to greet the runners. A first place prize of $25,000 was given to the winner.

No wonder Troop was inspired to write his classic song. The old Route 66 passed through Arizona's Painted Desert and the Meteor Crater, bringing untold millions of visitors to some of this country's scenic wonders.

If you ask me if this makes me proud to be an American, I would tell you damn right it does!