Route 66 Museum renovation opening May 26
Will Rogers will be inducted into Route 66 Hall of Fame
Oklahoma Route 66 Museum in Clinton has undergone a renovation of exhibit galleries and will celebrate a grand opening Saturday, May 26, at 2 p.m. At the same time, Will Rogers will be inducted into the Route 66 Hall of Fame. Will, whose name was on the Highway many years, and Carol Duncan of Clinton, are the inductees.
After 17 years, the gallery has undergone a full renovation, “bringing the facility into the 21st Century,” said Museum Director Pat Smith.
Following the designation of Route 66 as a Scenic Byway in 2007, the museum was awarded a $120,000 federal grant from National Scenic Byways Program and the Department of Transportation. The Friends of the Oklahoma Route 66 Museum, Inc., and Oklahoma Historical Society collaborated and raised the remainder of funds needed to complete the project.
The grand opening ceremony will be during Clinton’s 2012 Route 66 Festival. Activities are scheduled throughout the day, including special Route 66 guests, music, free museum admission and refreshments. Clinton is on Highway 66 between Oklahoma City and the Texas border.
“With the possible exception of Curtis Avery, no historic name has been as closely associated with the iconic Route 66 than that of Will Rogers,” said Steve Gragert, Will Rogers Memorial Museums executive director.
Three years after his death on Aug. 15, 1935 in an Alaskan plane crash, Will Rogers was posthumously honored with the official designation of the entire length of United States Highway 66 as Will Rogers Highway. Markers were placed along the 2,200 –plus miles route and at each end, from Chicago through Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California, ending at Los Angeles and Santa Monica, where Will Rogers lived at the time of his death.
As a youngster, Will Rogers rode his pony along the old cattle trail that became Route 66 when he went from Chelsea to Vinita to attend school, and later as he drove the highway between his sisters’ homes in Chelsea and his self-declared hometown of Claremore, a concrete plath where his fellow Cherokees, his father’s herds, and the pioneer settlers of the West had made early history of what became Oklahoma, according to Gragert.
Jim Ross, Route 66 author; Shellee Graham, Route 66 photographer; and Jerry McClanaham, Route 66 author/artist; will host a book signing of their collaborative work, Route 66: Sightings, during the opening. Jared Deck will perform rock and roll hits heard during the Route 66 heyday.
Exhibits at the Route 66 Museum have not been updated since being built in 1995, Smith said. The museum continues in the thematic approach of Route 66 by decade. Modern technology allows interaction with exhibits. Pre-recorded conversations and the more common sounds of a diner are overheard as patrons sit in booths located in the “Diner” exhibit. Kiosks are strategically placed; loaded with games, video excerpts and other interactive activites for patrons of all ages.
An embedded children’s tour is a special addition, as caricatures of popular models of classic cars guides through the exhibits.
Changes create a more personal, hands-on Route 66 experience, Smith said.
The event is open to the public and is free of charge.
(For additional information contact Pat Smith at rt66mus@okhistory.org or call 580-323-7866.)
Posted by Rick Mobley
