Day Four - Missouri to Oklahoma - June 24, 2010

Leaving Springfield MO, we continued our trek west stopping for a photo op at the Gay Parita Sinclair Station at Paris Springs. And, no, this does not refer to a sexual orientation, but rather an interesting old gas station with a lot of 1940s and 50s memorabilia. After crossing the state line into Kansas we stopped at the little bump-in-the-road town of Galena's gift shop, 4 Women on the Route. Their claim to fame is an old 1940's vintage tow truck that was the inspiration for the character "Mater" in Pixar's movie CARS. The Route 66 Visitor Center in Baxter Springs provided enough tourist information to get us halfway across Texas. And just like that we were out of Kansas and in Oklahoma.

In Commerce OK, we stopped at Mickey Mantle's childhood home. It's interesting to consider that somehow he made his way from there to the big lights of New York City. South of Miami OK we got on a stretch of   pre-1937 Route 66 highway where the pavement was literally 9 feet wide. No place for a Winnebago! At one point the Corvette nearly became an off-road vehicle.

On the outskirts of Foyil, there is an interesting place that has the world's largest totem pole (90 feet) plus a field of a dozen or so lesser ones. They also had a collection of 400 violins all made by the same man. He obviously did not spend his spare time playing golf.

Claremore OK and the Will Rogers Memorial and Museum was the next stop and probably the highlight of the day. The place was built in 1938 in 7 months at a total cost of $200,000! The building and grounds are unbelievably well maintained. The museum itself is world class considering the scope is simply to honor Will Rogers who is truly an American icon.

After Claremore, we pretty much cruised along until reaching Stroud where we stopped for dinner at the Rock Cafe (Greg Carp's recommendation). Although it'll never make the Zagot list for fine dining, they did have some pretty good chili-dogs and chili with homemade cornbread. Needless to say, we'll have the top down on the Corvette tomorrow.

Fine dining out of the way we continued on to Oklahoma City and "clocked out" at about 7 pm after logging 320 miles for the day.

                         Corvette Dave

This truck was the inspiration for "Tow Mater" in the movie "Cars."

Tow Mater!!!

Dave and his new best friend?

Peoria should have been located in Oklahoma????

Mickey Mantel's boyhood home in Commerce, OK.

The tin shed was Mickey's backstop as his father Mutt pitched to him.

The pre-1937 Route 66 was only 9 Ft. wide between Miami and Narcissa, OK.