On November 11, 1926, the Bureau of Public Roads launched Route 66, a 2,400-mile-long federal highway system, the first of its kind, that ran from Chicago to Los Angeles. Though largely unpaved initially, the new transcontinental highway connected local state roads and rural Main Streets. It immediately became a popular route because it offered better weather conditions than previous east-west roadways.
Legend says that the so-called Mother Road begins here, on West Jackson Boulevard, at Lou Mitchell’s, a classic American diner, where “the world’s best coffee” has fueled patrons for the road trip of a lifetime — or just another day at the office — since it opened over 100 years ago, in spring 1923.
