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I have added a new blog page, named Upcoming Events, which can be accessed from the link near the top of the sidebar on the right side of the page. I have listed all of my library presentation dates for April and May 2008 that have already been booked. I have several more libraries that are interested in hosting the Historic Route 66 presentation but have not yet settled on a date. So, as more events are scheduled, I will add them to the list.

As of today, I have two presentations in April and five in May. Most libraries ask that people wishing to attend events register in advance by phone or on their websites. All the necessary contact information is just a single mouse click away, by clicking on the link on the upper right, or by clicking here!

If anyone would like more general information about my Historic Route 66 presentations–especially if you have a venue that might want to host an event–take a look at this website’s Presentation Page.

Last month, while I was neglecting my blog, I was busy working on a nomination submission to have Frank T. Sheets inducted into the Route 66 Association of Illinois’ Hall of Fame.

While Mr. Sheets is not a household name, it is my view that his contributions to the Illinois section of 66 make him worthy of being called the “Father of Route 66 in Illinois.” I guess I made a good case, because this weekend the Hall of Fame committee voted in favor of Mr. Sheets’ induction. I appreciate the committee’s due diligence and careful consideration that let to this positive outcome.So, who is Frank Sheets? I have the full nominating materials that I submitted available for viewing or download here (warning, the file is 1.5 megabytes and may take a while to open or download). Below are some bullet points about Mr. Sheets:

• Frank T. Sheets headed the Illinois Division of Highways from 1920-1932. During his tenure, the state came from “out of the mud” to break the record four times for miles paved in a year by any state. The Division’s work under his command included the completion of hard surface pavement on all of Illinois State Bond Issue (SBI) Route 4 between Chicago and the McKinley Bridge (over the Mississippi River into St. Louis) by the end of 1926. When U.S. 66 was commissioned and routed along SBI 4, Illinois could boast of being the only state with hard roads along the entire length of its share of the highway.
• Mr. Sheets also served as President of the American Association of State Highway Officials (AASHO) and a member of its “Committee of Five” that created the original U.S. Highway map and numbering system. He fought against the regional interests that wanted the highway connecting Los Angeles and St. Louis to continue east through Kentucky and Virginia. He and his fellow committee members won the battle for a “single-numbered highway” connecting Chicago to Los Angeles, and thus they created the highway we now “preserve and promote.”
• From 1927-1932, the Division of Highways under Mr. Sheets continued to improve Route 66 with wider pavements, grade separations, and the change in routing that brought such beloved towns as Litchfield and Hamel into the Route 66 community.

For these reasons, I thought that Frank T. Sheets belonged in the Illinois Route 66 Hall of Fame. He was in charge of building, maintaining, and improving the highway, and he was instrumental in its designation as U.S. Highway 66. I believe he truly is the Father of Route 66 in Illinois. I am glad the Hall of Fame committee agreed as to his worthiness for induction.

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Real life has gotten in the way of my posting activities in the last few weeks, so I just wanted to make a quick entry here to catch up on a few recent items.

• As stated in a previous post, I gave a presentation on Historic Route 66 at the Park Ridge, Illinois Library on February 26, 2008. There was a snowstorm the previous day, and the night of the 26th was extremely cold, but nonetheless an overflow crowd showed up to see the presentation. It’s great to see so many folks with an interest in 66–so much so that they brave nasty weather in order to take a virtual tour on the Mother Road. My thanks again to the staff at the Park Ridge Library for hosting the event and helping to make the evening a success.
• In February, I spent a large chunk of time preparing a nomination for the Route 66 Association Hall of Fame. Each year, nominations are sent to the Hall of Fame committee for people, businesses, or structures that “have made significant contributions to the character or history of the Illinois portion of Route 66 while it was an official United States highway in the State (1927-1977),” (quoting from the Association’s bylaws). The person I nominated was Frank T. Sheets, who was in charge of the Illinois Division of Highways from 1920-1932. In 1926, when State Bond Issue (SBI) Route 4 was designated as U.S. 66, Illinois was the only state that could boast of having its entire piece of the highway completely paved with a hard surface. Frank Sheets was the guy in charge of making that happen. Later today, I will post up the full text of my nomination. Yesterday, I received a call from Marilyn Pritchard, Hall of Fame Museum Curator, and she told me that Frank Sheets had indeed been inducted into the Hall of Fame by the committee. This is great news, since, in my opinion, Mr. Sheets was truly the Father of Route 66 in Illinois. So check back a little later to read more about Mr. Sheets.
• On Saturday, after a long, bitter winter, I gave my first walking tour of 2008. An Irish family from Toronto was in town for St. Patrick’s Day. They had never been to Chicago before and had little foreknowledge of Route 66, so I gave them a good orientation to the city and the highway. It was 40 degrees and a bit breezy, but as always we explored inside of buildings as well as outside, so we were never far from places to warm up. So, to anyone out there–if you come to Chicago, I am available to give you a tour that will be enjoyable even if the weather isn’t!

I’ll be working on my next quarterly newsletter in the next few days–I have several more library presentations coming up in April and May, as well as other announcements. Stay tuned!

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A few days ago, a couple of messages were posted by me and others on the Route 66 Yahoo Group concerning incorrect signage of Historic Route 66 through Springfield, Illinois, along with questions about the changes in routing that occurred in 1930 and 1932 in Springfield and on the alignment south to Staunton. Some of this information comes from research done by “Road Scholar” Carl Johnson.

U.S. Highway 66 was created along with all of the other original U.S. numbered highways when the first map was approved by the American Association of State Highway Officials (AASHO). As in all states, the U.S. routes in Illinois were placed on existing state public highways. Originally, 66 followed State Bond Issue (SBI) Route 4 from Chicago to the McKinley Bridge over the Mississippi River in Venice, Illinois. In 1930, the alignment was moved away from SBI 4 from Springfield to Staunton, following SBI 126 from Springfield to Litchfield, and SBI 16 from Litchfield to Staunton.

Prior to 1918, the State’s role in road building was to help county and township highway departments with design and planning of roads and bridges and to administer the State Aid and Federal Aid programs. In 1918, the voters of Illinois ratified “An Act in relation to the construction by the State of Illinois of a State-wide system of durable hard-surfaced roads upon public highways of the State and the provision of means for the payment of the cost therof by the issue of bonds of the State of Illinois.” The law would come to be known as the $60 Million Highway Act, and it was the first legislation to authorize direct “construction by the State of Illinois,” rather than simply providing funding and design aid to local highway departments. Read the rest of this entry »

Just a reminder to anyone interested–I will be bringing my “Historic Route 66″ PowerPoint presentation to the Park Ridge Public Library on Tuesday, February 26th at 7 p.m. The Library is located at 20 S. Prospect Street, just south of Touhy Avenue and Northwest Highway. The Library would like anyone interested in attending to register by calling 847-825-3123 or by using their online E-vents registration.

My wife, Carol, is a member of the Lincoln Highway Association and periodically receives a newsletter from the Illinois chapter, entitled the Land of Lincoln News. The issue that just came in the mail included information about a great Internet resource, the Internet Archive. They included a direct link to a digitized version of a 1919 book, Illinois Highway Improvement Bluebook, by Laura K. Kennedy, published by the Illinois Highway Improvement Association. Here is a page from the book which talks about William G. Edens, for whom the Edens Expressway (I-94) was named.

Also on the Internet Archive site is the 1917 Illinois Road and Bridge Laws, a fascinating resource of information in a transitional phase of road building in the state. Prior to 1913, responsibility for maintaining the public highways of the state resided with townships, county road districts, and municipalities. In 1913, the state created a State Aid program that required each county to take charge of what would be considered the “primary” highways in their jurisdiction and provided that the state would pay half of the cost of construction, as well as the total cost of maintenance of State-Aid “hard roads.” By 1918, the state formally entered into the business of road building, with the passage of the $60 million dollar road bond law. The laws remained relatively unchanged until more roads were added to the State system in 1924, with another bond issue of $100 million dollars.

I have not had the chance to explore the Internet Archive in more detail, but I certainly will. It is a great online resource, and I thank the Lincoln Highway Association for introducing me to it!

Nicolson Pavement

Originally uploaded by daveandcarol.geo

In my recent research on early Chicago roads, I came across references to “Nicolson Pavement.” A little internet search brought me to this page, where the University of Michigan has placed the full text of over 10,000 books on line. This is a great resource, named the Making of America (MOA) Book collection, that I intend to explore further. The book that this drawing is from is titled The Nicolson Pavement, published in 1859.

Samuel Nicolson of Boston came up with several methods for paving streets with wood blocks that were secured in place by a mixture of pebbles and pine tar. The book indicates that the first use of Nicolson pavement in Chicago was on Wells Street south of the Chicago River in 1856.

The gems one uncovers when digging through old newpapers and documents for research purposes are sometimes the very items that keep researchers like me going. And sometimes those little gems, although they are not the objects we were actually looking for, become the most interesting and intriguing, or at least the most amusing.

Case in point: An article from the Chicago Tribune of April 2, 1911, entitled “‘It’s Surely a Fine Thing to be Billed as the Equator of Chicago,’ Says Madison Street, ‘but Finer to be the Heart of the West Side’.” The article talks first about the renumbering of addresses in Chicago which made Madison the “zero” point for north and south street numbers. It contrasts the development occurring in 1911 with Madison street’s earlier history as a pioneer pathway that connected with many other trails first blazed by Native Americans. In the 1850s, Madison and its intersecting routes were the first Chicago area thoroughfares to be improved with a wooden surface.

“Like all the other great highways of the early days, it became a plank road. Milwaukee avenue ws the northwestern plank road, Madison was the western plank road; Ogden avenue, which branched off it, was the southwestern plank road. The Madison street plank road was carried out westward fromt he city to the branch of the Desplaines river at Robinson’s. This work was done in 1850 and 1851. The road was soon built west to the DuPage county line, making seventeen miles in all. The Elgin and Genoa company then carried the plank work westward through DuPage county for twenty-eight miles, making a total plank highway to the west of fifty miles.

“The Southern Plank Road was carried out ten miles to Kile’s tavern. This is said to have been the best plank road leading out of the city. It was kept in better repair and was more popular than any of the others. It led to Riverside and LaGrange. Another famous old road that branched out of Madison street was what is now Colorado avenue. In 1834 and for may years afterward it was known as Barry Point road, because it led to the Widow Barry’s farm.

“Many interesting associations cling about the intersection of Madison street and Ogden avenue, where the plank roads joined. Here was situated the famous Bull’s Head Inn and the first Chicago cattle market. This cattle yard began business in a small way in 1848, just southeast of the intersection of the plank roads. There was nothing west of Ashland avenue, known as Reuben street at that time. Farmers from all over that wild section beyond Ann street [now Racine] used to drive their herds into this market; wild uncouth men from the wilderness, some of them coming in from as far as Oak Park.”

For those unfamiliar, Oak Park is about 5.5 miles west of the Madison and Ogden intersection, so by today’s standards it seems that those wild and uncouth Oak Parkers did not have far to go through the wilderness to offend the sensibilities of the refined Chicago city-dwellers. It would not suprise me if virginal city ladies had many a sleepless night from the nightmares of having Oak Parkers so close at hand–much like barbarians at the gates of Rome! Here’s hoping they were wearing their chastity belts at all times when perambulating around the west side plank roads!

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Yesterday’s mail brought me this great promotional item for my upcoming presentation at the Park Ridge Public Library. I am looking forward to this event. I will be talking not only about Route 66, but also the history of some of the roads local to Park Ridge. That is a rich history that includes one of Cook County’s earliest thoroughfares, Northwest Highway (U.S. 14), and several State highways, including 72, 171, and 58. Park Ridge is also served by Metra commuter rail on the historic right of way of the Chicago Northwestern Railroad.

The presentation is on February 26th at 7 p.m. The maximum seating in the venue is 90 people, so the library would appreciate that people register for the event by calling 847-825-3123. Admission is Free. You can also register via their online calendar.

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Last week on January 15th, I had the pleasure of presenting my Slide Show on Historic Route 66 at the Crystal Lake Public Library . On a bitter cold evening, we had a standing-room-only crowd show up! Kudos go to the Library staff for their promotional efforts–they got the word out and the results speak for themselves.

The facilities as the Library are modern and functional–It is always a great plus when all the equipment works and a smooth presentation follows. Janet Windeguth of the Library staff asked the guests to fill out comment cards, one of which she shared with me:

“Very enjoyable to see old sights and
relive memories of driving Chicago to LA twice on 66 in 1962 and 1963.”

The presentation was followed by a lively Q & A session. Clearly, lots of folks in McHenry Country are interested in the old Mother Road!

I of course would love to bring my presentation to your local library or organization, so check out the info on my presentations page.

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