Missouri Route 66 - Carthage

     The southwestern Missouri town of Carthage has prospered ever since the coming of the railroad in 1872. Back in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the town boasted a furniture factory and a foundry, grain mills, liveries and a plow works. (What, exactly, is a plow works?)  In addition, it was surrounded by lead mines and limestone quarries. The turn of the century populace was wealthy enough to build fancy Victorian-style homes in the city, some grand enough, in fact, that the Carthage South District that shows them off is a tourist attraction today. Highways 66 and 71 passed through the city, but any business generated there was probably an afterthought, and Carthage as a whole was not affected all that much with the coming of the interstate in the 1960's. The 14,000 or so citizens of modern day Carthage can work for the Leggett & Platt Corporation, which employs close to 2,000 people, or the turkey folks at Butterball, with nearly 600 workers. Schreiber Foods, headquartered in Green Bay, opened a cheese plant in Carthage in 1950 that still keeps 650 Missourian cheeseheads busy.
     66'ers should plan to spend some time in Carthage. The iconic Boots Motel is still there, after a sharp left turn onto Garrison Street. The motel was named for Arthur and Ilda Boots, the original owners, with a wonderful, though aging, neon sign and a main building constructed in 1939 with a streamline moderne architectural style. The palatial Jasper County Courthouse in downtown Carthage was constructed in 1894, with material from the local marble works. I imagine it was quite an impressive structure to the Route 66 Traveler of the 1930's. The classic outdoor 66 Drive-In movie theater was built in 1949, when drive-ins were big. It was closed down for many years as the age of television took hold, but re-opened in the late 1990's. I remember a mess of drive-ins in New Jersey when I was a kid, but at the 66's prices, there is no need to pile your friends in the trunk of the car. Log Book: 591 miles motored on old 66.