2026 Spring Read: The Ephemera of Route 66
by Lauren Pronger
Hi, I’m Lauren Pronger from Amarillo, TX and I’m talking about The American Dream?, a graphic novel memoir by Shing Yin Khor for the HPPR Radio Readers.
As an avid graphic novel reader, one of the things that struck me about this book is that the illustrations tend to float on the page removed from their contexts. While there are a fair share of full-page illustrations of landscapes and surrounding locations, many of the iconic elements of Route 66 are simply drawn onto a white background with a name and location listed to the side. It’s almost as much a catalog of the giant statues and famous motels as it is a road trip journal. Khor acknowledges that due to the restrictions of camping in their car along the route, they did most of their drawing after the fact based on pictures they took along the way. But I can’t help thinking of this monument inventory as a reflection of the ephemeral nature of Route 66 itself and the nostalgia it represents.
While I’m sure some Route 66 travelers drive along the highway to see the scenic vistas of the American West, the listed highlights are usually the various roadside attractions one can stop at and easily capture a picture of. While a picture of a “Route 66” motel sign can be easily placed into context years later, it’s also much less likely to be there than the red rocks of the Navajo Reservation or the rolling plains of Oklahoma. Capturing the temporality of a place is part of why we take pictures when we travel, but it’s also a huge reason why Historic Route 66 exists 40 years after its decommission and why people still seek it out to experience a piece of what America was like at the height of the highway.
That isn’t to say that ephemerality isn’t an attraction in itself. If Route 66 were still an official US highway and it weren’t being preserved as a capsule in time, it wouldn’t be as popular today. Many of the places documented in Khor’s novel and explored by travelers are those that have fallen victim to time - the ghost towns, abandoned motels, and derelict museums hold their own sort of captive gravity and invite us think both about what has been and what might be, all while appreciating what still exists in the present.
And isn’t that the key to nostalgia? To be nostalgic for something, it can no longer exist, either at all or as it once was. As much as various people and agencies try to hold on to Route 66 and establish historical precedent for protecting buildings and sections of the roadway, it will never exist again as it was, and that’s part of the attraction. Take almost any page out of Khor’s American Dream and the diners and railroad bridges could be anywhere or anywhen, but it’s the distinct atmosphere of Americana, of specific architecture and signs proclaiming “Historic” that make it obvious they’re from the famous highway. Where on that highway would be more difficult to guess, because despite crossing 8 states, a mountain range, a desert, the high plains, and more, almost everything notable along those 2500 miles blends into an amalgamation of what once was, an homage to this golden age ideal. It’s almost impossible to imagine that LA, Chicago, and Santa Rosa share a common aesthetic or sentimentality, and yet, this century old highway connects them all.
This is Lauren Pronger from Amarillo, TX for the HPPR Radio Readers Book Club. Thanks for listening.
