24 – Route 66: The Mother Road, Part 2

The Kitchen Sisters Present

The Kitchen Sisters & Radiotopia

Society & Culture

4.5 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 23 June 2015

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

John Steinbeck called it the “Mother Road.” Songwriter Bobby Troup described it as the route to get your kicks on. And Mickey Mantle said, “If it hadn’t been for Highway 66 I never would have been a Yankee.” For the Dust Bowl refugees of the 1930s, for the thousands who migrated after World War II, and for the generations of tourists and vacationers, Route 66 was “the Way West.”

Route 66, the first continuously paved highway linking east and west was the most traveled and well known road in America for almost fifty years. From Chicago, it ran through the Ozarks of Missouri, across Oklahoma and the Texas Panhandle, up the mesas of New Mexico and Arizona, and down into California to the Pacific Ocean. The first road of it’s kind, it came to represent America’s mobility and freedom—inspiring countless stories, songs, and even a TV show.

In part II of Route 66, Studs Terkel reads from “The Grapes of Wrath” and comments on the great 1930s migration along Highway 66. We hear from black and white musicians including Clarence Love, head of Clarence Love and his Orchestra, Woody Guthrie, and Eldin Shamblin, guitar player for Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys—who remember life on the road for musicians during the 1930s. We travel the history of the road from its beginnings as “The Main Street of America,” through the “Road of Flight” in the 1930s, to the “Ghost Road” of the 1980s, as the interstates bypass the businesses and road side attractions of another era.

Produced by The Kitchen Sisters and narrated by actor David Selby.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Radio Topia. Welcome to the Kitchen Sisters Presently.
0:04.0	PRX.
0:05.0	We're the Kitchen Sisters, Davia Nelson and Nicki Silva.
0:09.0	Hi, this is Nicky of the Kitchen Sisters.
0:13.0	Thank you so much to everyone who's already donated to support Radiotopia and this show during our fall fundraiser.
0:19.0	Radiotopia from PRX is a non-profit public media company. The money we raise from this fundraiser
0:25.6	is split amongst all the shows in the network. This creates opportunity for emerging shows
0:31.3	or those that wouldn't be prioritized at other networks.
0:35.4	We love reading the comments that people leave when they donate.
0:38.4	Kelly says, keep the great creator-owned work coming. And Erica writes, I have been obsessed with every radiotopia
0:46.2	podcast I have listened to. I appreciate this collective so, so much and hope that these
0:51.7	amazing creators can keep making what they want to make in a world where many shows are being shut down.
0:58.0	We are coming to the end of the fundraiser, but we are still short of our goal. Not very short but short. If we reach our goal of a
1:05.9	thousand donors after the holidays we'll share a digital zine with everyone who
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1:21.5	to the list of listeners who support independent podcasts.
1:25.0	Thanks so much. Radiotopia.
1:28.0	FM slash donate. First when I came in and I didn't have any clubs here. So I opened up a club I named the Clarence Love
1:42.2	lounge and it was an instant hit in the city of Tulsa.
1:45.7	Jam sessions, Lionel Hampton. I got pictures of Buddy Johnson, Route 66 boy, Matt King Cold, top musicians. Those are bands that travel 66.
2:00.0	Today on Fugitive Waves, it's the second part of Route 66, the Mother Road.
	...

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