Guest Piece: Leslie Simpson – Route 66: A Method to the Madness

I have always wondered why Route 66 took such a circuitous path through Joplin.  Coming in on West Seventh, it made a sharp turn left onto Main, then headed east on First over the viaduct.  It continued on Broadway, turning north on St. Louis; after crossing Turkey Creek, it took off at a 45-degree angle on Euclid.  It went a couple of blocks on Florida, then right on Zora and left on Range Line.  If it were not for the fact that Route 66 was built during Prohibition, one might wonder if the cartographers had been a little tipsy!

 

Route 66 through Joplin

Recently I was looking at some old plat maps of Joplin, and I noticed something.  The Southwest Missouri Electric Railway, an electric streetcar that was established in 1893 by Alfred H. Rogers, took an identical 45-degree angle after crossing Turkey Creek in its route from Joplin to Webb City, Carterville, Lakeside Park, Carthage and other points east.  The trolley line angled through Royal Heights, a separate village that had incorporated in 1907.  Eureka!  This information may be common knowledge, but since I did not know about it, I was excited to figure it out on my own.

Plat map showing the Electric Railway line north of Turkey Creek

At its peak, the railway company operated a huge fleet of streetcars and 94 miles of tracks in three states. But its days were numbered. As private ownership of motor vehicles increased, railway patronage dwindled. In 1925, the company began running passenger buses and phasing out its streetcars.  The Joplin stretch of Route 66 was under construction from 1927 through 1932.  After Royal Heights was annexed into the city of Joplin in 1929, the railway company removed the tracks through Royal Heights. The old track-bed was paved as Euclid and became part of the historic “Mother Road.”

The 1902 Collapse of Easth Seventh Street

In the spring of 1902, just before noon, East Seventh Street collapsed.  The debris from the street plunged downward into the gaping maw of an old mine drift from the defunct Zola mine.  The dark chasm sprawled 50 feet.  The Joplin News-Herald remarked that the street was “the main thoroughfare east and there is scarcely a moment that if it is not traveled at every point along the route.” Fortunately no one was on the street when it collapsed.  Traffic was diverted onto Fifth and Fourteenth Streets until the vast hole could be filled in.

As we have noted before, there are numerous mine shafts all over the Joplin metro area.  For now, it seems that most shafts are filled up with water, and are holding steady.  In the future, though, with some speculating that the water table in the Four State area could drop, it seems plausible that shafts may open up as the water disappears.  While we here at Historic Joplin are not hydrologists, geologists, or any other type of “-ologist,” we find the idea of the underground honeycombs of mining shafts and drifts in and around Joplin intriguing.

Source: Joplin Daily News Herald, 1902

In the spring of 1902, just before noon, East Seventh Street collapsed. The debris from the street plunged downward into the gaping maw of an old mine drift from the defunct Zola mine. The chasm sprawled 50 feet. The Joplin News-Herald remarked that the street was “the main thoroughfare east and there is scarcely a moment that if it is not traveled at every point along the route.” Fortunately no one was on the street when it collapsed. Traffic was diverted onto Fifth and Fourteenth Streets.

As we have noted before, there are numerous mine shafts all over the Joplin metro area. For now, it seems that most shafts are filled up with water, and are holding steady. In the future, though, with some speculating that the water table in the Four State area could drop, it seems plausible that shafts may open up as the water disappears. While we here at Historic Joplin are not hydrologists, geologists, or any other type of “-ologist,” we find the idea of the underground honeycombs of mining shafts and drifts in and around Joplin intriguing.

Source: Joplin Daily News Herald, 1902