Bobby Troup told people to ‘get their kicks’ there in his 1995 song, “Route 66.” He said that for those traveling out west, this highway is the best.

U.S. Route 66 is more than just a 2,448-mile highway stretching from Chicago, Ill. to Santa Monica, Calif. This “Mother Road” is contemporary American history.

According to the Route 66 Web site, www.route66.com, it all started when the idea of an inter-regional link between Chicago and Los Angeles by two entrepreneurs from the Midwest, Cyrus Avery and John Woodruff, merged with the national program of highway and road development. In 1926, construction began and, with the help of thousands of unemployed male youths as road laborers, in 1938 the highway was reported as “continuously paved.”

The highway was unlike any other of the time, such as the Lincoln or the Dixie. Route 66 didn’t travel linear route, but a weaving one, connecting hundreds of communities in the eight states it crosses.

Initially, it was most significant to the trucking industry, which was, at the time rivaling the railroad.

Today, Route 66 isn’t one continuous highway. Starting around the late 1950’s, the old route was bypassed by high-speed highways. According to www.historic66.com, it has been interrupted by many interstate highways such as I-10 and I-55. While the entire road may not be in existence, many people continue to feel compelled to travel Route 66. According to Road Trip USA, “a trip on their road takes in some of the country’s most archetypal roadside scenes.” My future in-laws did just that. Last summer, Lonnie and Mary Keeton took a road trip out to Arizona and decided to take Route 66 as much as they could.

“It was like a trip back into the past,” Lonnie Keeton said. “I’d never been on it before but had heard so much about it. It’s a historical highway.”

Along the trip, the Keeton’s stopped at the Route 66 Historical Museum in Clinton, Oklahoma..,

“The museum was this building with about eight different rooms,” Lonnie Keeton said. “They give you headphones and you take a one hour tour while the cassette tells the history of the road.”

While that may have been the Keeton’s idea of a fun road trip, it might take a little more than headphones and a historical recording to entice the younger crowd to travel the route. It might even take more than the world’s largest McDonald’s in Oklahoma.

Along Route 66 in St. Louis, Mo, is the Anheuser-Busch Brewery, which offers public tours and even some taste testing for those of legal age. According to the official Budweiser Tours web site, people get to “witness the making of the brewing of the world’s finest beer.”

If tours of any kind, even a brewery seem non-vacation-like, there are many tourist-oriented brew pubs alehouses along the way. According to the Beer Travelers, a project created by Midwesterners Daria Labinsky and Stan Hieronymus, road trip and beer seem to be one in the same. According to their web site, there are many stops worthy along Route 66, such as TapWerks Ale House ‘ Café in Oklahoma City. Many of the stops have over 30 taps, pouring lagers from around the world.

Along with the many bars and pubs, hotels, restaurants and museums adorn the old road across three time zones. “It’s a great sight-seeing road trip through rural America,” Keeton said.

While not everyone may have been on a road trip on Route 66, many people know just how fun any road trip can be. Phillip Kennedy, senior, may not have traveled the “Main Street of America,” but has experienced the excitement of summer road trips on his way to Florida.

“There’s a feeling of excitement when you think about your destination,” Kennedy said.

No matter where people go, whether it’s out west on Route 66 or down south to Florida, road trips are always an inexpensive and fun way to vacation. Some people may even say that the car ride may be the best part. Even if it isn’t, it’s still filled with just as many memories.

“There’s always that definite song that will always be related to the road trip,” Kennedy said. “No matter how long it’s been since you’ve heard it, it always reminds you of the trip.”