The Route 66 Chick

Last weekend I took the new Route 66 in Kansas book on the road for a mini book tour to the Tri-State area. Three events were planned, sponsored by three terrific museums, for Friday through Sunday, July 22-24. It was a great weekend, and as a bonus, I stayed three nights at the wonderful Boots Court in Carthage, Missouri, and enjoyed the new neon. The first event was a book display and signing sponsored by the Powers Museum of Carthage at the Carthage Art Walk in - where else? - historic Downtown Carthage on the Square on Friday evening. Michele Newton Hansford of the Powers Museum secured a prime space for me inside the Carthage Deli, and she and her husband, Gary Hansford, joined me for the evening at the deli. Owner Chris was a gracious host as usual, and we enjoyed a fine supper and great conversation. The oppressive heat and humidity caused some of the artists to cancel out of the art walk. That, combined with construction around the square and the weather itself, made ...

Today I managed to shrug off my time-management-deficiency guilt from yesterday and just be productive. Of course, not having to drive 335 miles today, most of it in the rain, helped both my time management AND my mood. It was a lovely day. This morning I did a media interview by phone about the upcoming conference. Wow, the interest and momentum are really growing. The new format of this event coupled with the amazing lineup of Route 66 experts all descending upon Illinois, much less Edwardsville (a charming Route 66 city with a less than stellar past of promoting it) is creating some local buzz. (Seriously, dear readers, if you are not signed up for this event, go to the website, check it out, and then ask yourself why not.) Back to my morning. Conference (and book) details, communications, and posts plus a nice walk finished up the morning hours.  This afternoon I spent at the delightful Baxter Springs Heritage Center, happy as a clam down in the basement archive room...

But we were there - for a couple days of work on the new book.  I drove out to Baxter Springs on Saturday to get there in time to spend a couple hours at the Baxter Springs Heritage Center. There, I needed to pick up scanned photos from Museum Manager Linda Kennedy and take another look at the exhibits.  (On our trip there back in April, co-author Joe Sonderman and I enjoyed a guided tour of the museum from Linda. Then we spent hours perusing the exhibits and photos, snapping reference photos, and compiling a list of what we would use from their great collection.) Late Saturday afternoon, after some time at the Center and a visit with Linda, I took some photos of the Fort Blair site on nearby grounds. Baxter Springs has a significant military history, which we'll reflect in the book. Then it was downtown (a whole couple blocks away) onto Military Avenue/Route 66 for some photos and a light supper at Cafe on the Route.  Next was...

I had been looking forward to the International Route 66 Festival in Joplin MO for months, and I wasn't disappointed. The big event was held August 1-3 in Joplin and neighboring 66 communities Carthage MO and Galena KS. Since I didn't have my blog started at that time, I'm going to make up for lost time and post some photos from that weekend. The kickoff on Thursday evening was a showing of the hugely popular movie "Cars" at the Route 66 Drive In at Carthage MO. Michael Wallis, voice of the Sheriff, was there to sign autographs. There was a long wait along the road to even enter the drive in and it was packed to capacity. Excitement was contagious as one person after another snapped photos from cars or darted from them to get a special shot. My evening was even more fun as good friends Josh and Wendy Friedrich from Springfield IL graciously invited me along. It was especially fun sharing the movie and good times with their little Route 66 fans, Charlie and Lizz...