Rt. 66 at Springfield Ill.

Rt. 66 passes through Springfield, the Capitol of Illinois. This the land of Lincoln. It's good to see that they have not forgotten him here. For example, they have the Lincoln Savings and Loan, Lincoln Middle School, Lincoln Grill, Lincoln Tanning Salon, Abe's alteration's, Lincoln's Lavatories and the list goes on. A touch of overkill.

We visited the 16th President's home and Burial Monument at Oak Ridge Cemetary. Lincoln lived in what is now the downtown of Springfield. He left here in 1861 never to return. He was emotional about Springfield saying," to this place, and the kindness of these people, I owe everything..."

The house was close to everything for Mr. Lincoln his office and the old Capitol Building. To the left is his office with hs partner Herndon.

The old Capitol is where Lincoln gave his house divided speech. The insides are open to the public and are beautifully preserved right down to the seat that Licoln occupied with his stove pipe hat resting there waiting his return.

Downtown Springfield is a mix of building styles that reflect its growth. At present the old houses are being restored and they are doing a beautiful job. One house restored by the state is the Dana-Thomas house. The house was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1901.

It is a three bedroom house with 12,000 square feet of living space. It was the first house in Springfield to be wired for electricity.

The dining room seats up to forty comfortably. Every window and glass door is bejeweled with stain glass that change the color of the interior rooms as the sun passes. The house also has 16 levels, a bowling alley, and a rain water channel system to spread the rain water out to the various flower boxes.

We ate at the Cozy Dog Cafe. It was my first corn dog and pretty tasty. It is an icon on Rt. 66. We left Springfield knowing we would have to return and see all the other historical sites, but now it was time to get lost again and go to St. Louis.

By the way, did you know that Illinois has some pretty good lawyers, you can call Lawyers.com and find out, they use Lincoln as their logo too?

Rt. 66 Road Trip

After passing through the buckle of the corn belt, we needed food! So we stopped on Rt.66 at the Launching Pad Cafe. The Launching Pad is a mom and pop store that is all decorated in 66 memorabilia. The feature was the whopper, no relation to the king. It was fresh made, delicious and wrapped up in wax paper like when I was a kid. We ate for $19.25 for a family of five and the Gemini Giant above watched us as we waved bye.

We drove from Wilmington Ill to Braidwood just down the road. Stopping for ice cream on a hot day, we ran into a cast of characters at the Polka Dot Drive In.

The drive in was recently redone in a 50's retro look and the wife was happy we stopped. The kids loved the ice cream including the hot fudge shake.

After cooling off, everyone wanted to dance.

Jumping back on Rt. 66, we headed south. Directions from signage is not consistant. One moment you are cruising along and then you are lost because some sign that was a must was not there and you are circling a development. Illinois is doing an upgrade on this along with resurfacing the road. In the meantime, Rt. 66 is long stretches of nothing. Some people say, "what is the point of traveling this at 55, when the interstate is right there and you can do 65!"

So I remind them," it's not about making time, it's about having a good time."

In Bloomington, there were alot of u-turns due to a lack of signs, but I am flexible. We wound up going through several small towns on the different configurations of Rt. 66. One of the small, small towns was Funk's Grove Illinois. In the Grove, they make maple sirup(no mis-spel). They have done so for decades and let me tell you, it is delicious.

We cruised on staying for the night at the Comfort Suite in Springfield and eating at Cheddar's. It was a needed recharge for sick kids and a tired mom. The route will get tougher after we cross the Mississippi and into the desert. The Comfort Suite was 9 towels and Cheddars was a wonderful meal with a cold libation, excellent.

This morning, we visit Lincoln's home, the Dana-Thomas House, and the State Capitol, both old and new. Then we move on with our great American road trip along Rt. 66