The Best Hits on Route 66 by Amy Bizzarri

The Best Hits on Route 66 by Amy Bizzarri

Author:Amy Bizzarri
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781493036912
Publisher: Globe Pequot Press


In the late 1950s, Floyd Redman purchased the motel as an engagement gift for his future bride, Lillian. The kind couple soon became Route 66 legends, adored for accepting items for barter instead of cash on occasion, a gift to cash-poor travelers in a bind. Ms. Redman had once been a traveler to Tucumcari herself when her family journeyed from the east via covered wagon in 1915. She summed up the spirit of the Blue Swallow when she said, “I end up traveling the highway in my heart with whoever stops here for the night.” Indeed, she would run the hotel long after her husband’s death and into her late eighties.

Like so many other small towns, Tucumcari lost the Route 66 traffic it relied too heavily upon to today’s Interstate 40. In the late 1990s, new owners stepped in, restoring it to its former glory. The dim blue neon swallow sign glowed brightly once again, a good old-fashioned rotary-dial phone system was reinstalled, and the original fixtures and 1950s Albuquerque furniture were refurbished along with the rooms themselves.

You might recognize Tucumcari from old episodes of Rawhide (1959–66), starring Clint Eastwood, which was shot in part here, while the Cozy Cone Motel of Pixar’s 2006 hit Cars was inspired by the Blue Swallow. The original car garages with their original wooden doors still stand adjacent to their assigned rooms, perfect for motorcycles and vintage cars. Depart in the early evening so you have a chance to drive into the glorious New Mexico sunset on what was once the main street of America.

Lillian Redman provided each guest a copy of the blessing on page 133, still given to travelers passing through the Blue Swallow Motel today.



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