If you’ve ever dreamed of America’s most famous highway having a soundtrack, Route 66 has you covered.
Just outside Tijeras, New Mexico, there’s a stretch of historic Route 66 that quite literally sings. Thanks to carefully spaced rumble strips, drivers cruising at exactly 45 mph can hear the road play “America the Beautiful.” Installed in 2014 by the New Mexico Department of Transportation for a National Geographic show, the musical roadway was designed to encourage drivers to slow down and stick to the speed limit. The road has since been repaved, but listen closely—and the melody is still there.
It’s a fitting tribute for a highway that has always been about the journey.
The Birth of an American Icon
Route 66 was one of the original highways in the United States Numbered Highway System. Officially established on November 11, 1926, with signs appearing the following year, the route stretched 2,448 miles from Chicago to Santa Monica. It crossed eight states—Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California—linking the Midwest to the Pacific Coast with a single, easy-to-follow road.
At a time when car ownership in the U.S. nearly tripled during the 1920s, Route 66 made long-distance travel simpler and more appealing. It even shortened the drive between Chicago and Los Angeles by more than 200 miles, turning road trips into a new American pastime.
The Father of Route 66
Before numbered highways existed, roads were often marked and promoted by private auto trail organizations. One man, Cyrus Avery, the Oklahoma State Highway Commissioner, helped change that. Known as the Father of Route 66, Avery championed the highway’s creation and later helped form the U.S. Highway 66 Association.
The association aggressively promoted the route through magazines, brochures, and billboards—and even staged a publicity stunt: a footrace from Los Angeles to New York City with a $25,000 prize. Anything to get America moving.
Hard Times and Hope on the Open Road
During the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, Route 66 became a lifeline. Farming families—especially from Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kansas, and Texas—traveled west along the highway in search of agricultural work in California. For towns along the route, the steady flow of travelers offered much-needed economic relief during the Great Depression.
This traffic fueled the rise of classic roadside Americana: gas stations, diners, motels, and motor courts—many of them family-run and built to serve weary motorists chasing opportunity.
A Pop Culture Legend
Route 66 didn’t just move people—it inspired them. The highway runs through the pages of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath and appears in Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. It became immortalized in the 1946 song “(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66,” and even had its own television series, Route 66, which aired from 1960 to 1964.
Few roads can claim that kind of cultural footprint.
The Long Goodbye—and Lasting Legacy
The decline of Route 66 began in 1956 with the signing of the Interstate Highway Act, which introduced faster, more direct highways that bypassed many small towns. Route 66 was officially decommissioned in 1985, but it never truly disappeared.
Today, about 85 percent of the original route is still drivable. It lives on through a patchwork of state and county roads, frontage roads, and main streets winding through small towns that still embrace its spirit.
And if you find yourself in New Mexico, driving just the right speed, you might even hear it sing—a reminder that Route 66 has always been more than a road. It’s an experience.