The Route 66 Chick

Now that the City of Edwardsville, Illinois, has announced that it will hold a Route 66 conference in 2015, some of you farther afield might still be saying something like, "Oh, I think I drove through Edwardsville in between Henry's Rabbit Ranch and the Luna Cafe," or, "What does Edwardsville have left of its Route 66 heritage, anyway?," or "Frankly, my dear, where in the hell is Edwardsville?" Those of us who are Edwardsville residents - whether long-term or transplant (like I am) -realize that we have done a less than stellar job of sharing our Mother Road heritage with the larger Route 66 community. Although, I will point out that in the past two years my Historic Preservation Commission colleague Cindy Reinhardt and I have nominated two local businesses/businesspersons to the Illinois Route 66 Hall of Fame (both accepted), we have researched, designed, and had printed Edwardsville Route 66 rack cards, and every other year, Edwardsville hosts the...

Crime and murder stories can be fascinating and intriguing but the shocking memories such events leave behind are with the victims' families forever. They endure loss, shock, and often the public airing of their grief. They deal with police, investigators, reporters...and writers who keep coming back many years after the crimes were committed. This summer I've been researching the local (Litchfield-Troy-Edwardsville-Mitchell, IL) angle of a vicious, senseless crime spree across the country in 1961. The story of two GIs in their late teens gone AWOL and gone murder-crazy made the national news and kept making it as their story unfolded. The very brief version: Ronald York and George Latham went AWOL in Texas in May 1961 and headed into Louisiana, beginning a two-week orgy of crime that took them east to Florida and then west across the country. They killed seven people, stealing their vehicles and money. Two of their victims were here in the Metro East. Their names we...