{"id":6272,"date":"2015-06-25T10:06:09","date_gmt":"2015-06-25T15:06:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/?p=6272"},"modified":"2015-06-27T23:13:23","modified_gmt":"2015-06-28T04:13:23","slug":"missouri-trip-day-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/2015\/06\/missouri-trip-day-4\/","title":{"rendered":"Missouri trip Day 4"},"content":{"rendered":"

Branson, Missouri, June 25, 2014 \u2014<\/strong> Today, near the literal heart of the American population<\/a>, was an all-American day: Getting my kicks on Route 66, visiting the museum complex at Fort Leonard Wood, finishing I-44 and US 65 in Missouri, and capping off with a Titanic exhibition.<\/p>\n

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\nOne of the many murals in downtown Cuba, “Mural City,”<\/a> along old US 66.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Missouri Ozarks are nice to drive through, at least on an interstate. The drive is very scenic. I stopped at Route 66 Diner (how could I not?) near the north end of Spur I-44 to Fort Leonard Wood. Burger and fries were $8, a very un-66-like price.<\/p>\n

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\nThings move a little slower on the old<\/strong> old US 66 at Devil’s Elbow.<\/em><\/p>\n

One thing I learned about Fort Leonard Wood was that the base originally was planned for Leon, Iowa<\/a>, but was relocated. One of the first four-lane segments of 66 was built to handle fort traffic. That segment was the last part of 66 bypassed by I-44 (PDF),<\/a> and both it and the Devil\u2019s Elbow alignment before it are drivable today.<\/p>\n

I spent two hours at the one-building-three-museums covering the Army Corps of Engineers, military police, and Chemical Corps.<\/p>\n

Then it was back on I-44, and to a rest area that is a microcosm of US 66’s history in Missouri. Literally. It has a lot in common with the Lincoln Highway-themed Iowa Welcome Center near Missouri Valley. The picnic areas are styled like US 66 roadside attractions and the building has an inlaid map of the highway on the floor.<\/p>\n

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\nA highway-quality US 66 shield is beside a sidewalk painted like a highway to the “roadside stops\/attractions.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Springfield includes Bass Pro Shops on its attraction signs.<\/p>\n

I turned south on US 65, which was clogged until Osage. Then it got hilly. Up and down and up and down. It may have been an expressway, but I am fine with not doing that on a daily basis.<\/p>\n

I crossed into Arkansas, clinching 65 in Missouri, and turned around, bound for Branson and the Titanic exhibit<\/a>. The exhibit was everything I’d hoped for and more. (And for the second day in a row, I could do something after 5 PM.)<\/p>\n

Bernard Hill (Captain Smith in the movie) narrates some of the audio clips you heard by pressing buttons. I saw things I hadn’t seen before, like Kate Odell photos<\/a> and Father Browne photos. Many artifacts from passengers were from the small time frame between stops in the British Isles.<\/p>\n

Then I got to the reproduction of the Grand Staircase\u2026and \u201cSouthampton\u201d was the background music. It was perfect. A \u201ccrew member\u201d pointed out that the staircase was built to spec, including a new design trend for 1912, linoleum.<\/p>\n

My passenger card was a third-class male going to Iowa (!), and I figured he was toast, but he lived.<\/p>\n

In the gift shop, it looks like anything vaguely boat-shaped with a black bottom, white top, and four funnels can be sold as Titanic-related. (We knew that already. -Ed.)<\/em> I wasn\u2019t impressed with some things. A kit from Poland was for the \u201c101th\u201d anniversary.<\/p>\n

I ended a very long day having covered two museum sites, the World’s Largest Rocking Chair<\/a>, and a bit of highway history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Branson, Missouri, June 25, 2014 \u2014 Today, near the literal heart of the American population, was an all-American day: Getting my kicks on Route 66, visiting the museum complex at Fort Leonard Wood, finishing I-44 and US 65 in Missouri, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-trip-reports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6272"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6272\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6298,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6272\/revisions\/6298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}