In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:
  • Father of Route 66: The Story of Cy Avery by Susan Croce Kelly
  • Alicia M. Dewey
Father of Route 66: The Story of Cy Avery. By Susan Croce Kelly. (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2014. Pp. [xvi], 272. $24.95, ISBN 978-0-8061-4499-3.)

In Father of Route 66: The Story of Cy Avery, Susan Croce Kelly persuasively argues that Cy Avery’s entrepreneurial drive and talent, coupled with the right circumstances, not only made him the “father of Route 66” but also contributed to his key role in bringing about a national paved highway system. Combining business and political history, the book adds to our knowledge of the understudied subject of the nation’s highways and also contributes [End Page 469] to the growing historiography on entrepreneurship. Kelly sheds further light on the economic development of Oklahoma and how it became an important intersection of transcontinental highways.

Father of Route 66 follows a chronological format, beginning with Avery’s early years and ending with his death at the age of ninety-one, but the book primarily emphasizes Avery’s career during the 1920s, when the U.S. highway system emerged and Route 66 was built. Avery was born in 1871, a crucial time of economic change when the nation was transitioning from dependence on “man- and horsepower” to dependence on machines, electricity, and oil (p. 4). In the 1880s his father moved the family from northeastern Pennsylvania to Indian Territory, an underdeveloped borderland region between the South and the West, about the time railroads arrived. Avery lived most of his adult years in Tulsa, which had become a major business center for cattle, oil, and banking by the early 1900s. The capital and economic opportunities generated there made it a perfect place for Avery to develop his talents, which included ventures in agriculture, farm loans, oil leasing, insurance, and real estate.

After the discovery of oil on his land, Avery became known as an “oil millionaire” (p. 26). Like many businessmen of his day, he became involved in the burgeoning good roads movement because he saw that while trucks and automobiles were gradually replacing the railroads as the main means of transportation, road conditions were not keeping pace with the changes. As county commissioner for Tulsa, and later as the highway commissioner for the state of Oklahoma, he doggedly promoted road building and paving in his state and pushed for matching federal funds. He successfully spearheaded the construction of a bridge in Tulsa as well as a new dam and a water system for the city. Kelly explores the political opposition Avery faced, especially from the Ku Klux Klan, which eventually cost him his position as the state highway commissioner. However, Kelly’s discussion of Avery’s eventual dismissal from the state highway commission because of allegations of corruption and misuse of funds is underdeveloped and leaves unanswered questions. Perhaps the most interesting chapters in the book describe Avery’s participation in the American Association of State Highway Officials (AASHO), which he saw as the best vehicle to create a national highway system, and his role in the fight over renumbering state and local roads that became U.S. Routes. Kelly dedicates an entire chapter to Avery’s involvement in the U.S. 66 Highway Association, which promoted the completion, paving, and maintenance of that important road.

Kelly’s writing style is clear, engaging, and highly detailed. Her research involves an impressive array of original sources, including the personal papers of Cy Avery, the papers of the AASHO, the Tulsa Area Chamber of Commerce Archives, the archives of the Federal Bureau of Public Roads, Oklahoma state highway commission records, newspapers, and personal interviews, making Father of Route 66 a valuable contribution to our knowledge on the subject. [End Page 470]

Alicia M. Dewey
Biola University
...

pdf

Share