Traveling Route 66 with Willie Lambert
Article by Hanna Churchwell
Willie Lambert is an active participant in the most cherished traditions of Route 66, from starting a shoe tree to striking up conversations with locals living along the route and the characters traveling down it. Lambert began researching the road and its original alignment after his sister told him “When I turn 66, I want to cruise Route 66.” Lambert promised he would look into it. Two decades later he is still investigating the route in New Mexico as its documentarian and inimitable custodian.
There are portions of the original Route 66 in New Mexico, dating back to 1926, that we still traverse; however, many segments are now on private property. The remnants exist as someone’s driveway, a stray patch of pavement in the grass, or a scar that can be traced through the tree lines on either side of Interstate 25. Armed with an odometer to track mileage, old postcards, and a collection of binders containing his research (labeled Bridges + Culverts, Gates + Fences, Roadside Wildflowers, etc.), Lambert looks for physical clues to determine the precise location of the different alignments.
Determining the route of the original alignment using maps and books of the era is not straightforward. The red lines illustrating the route on maps differ materially. They are too vague, directing their interpreter towards a swathe of land rather than an exact location. Early books on Route 66 also miss the finer points of the road. When Lambert is confronted by gates, he dreams of receiving permission from landowners to go beyond them, saying, “We know every bit of trash we put on the moon, but we’re still trying to figure out where it [Route 66] is here.”
Historic Santa Fe Foundation has facilitated several historic and cultural tours of Route 66 east of Santa Fe to Romeroville, led by Lambert. During the first tour in 2022, his son diligently provided the driver with directions on where to pull over and when to slow down; while, Lambert, with his hands braced against the shelves of the shuttle bus, launched into the history of Route 66 and the land it passed through. Lambert is a seasoned storyteller and relays an encyclopedic knowledge of the road and the history of the land surrounding it with enthusiasm.
He starts his tours by recounting Hannett’s Joke. In the winter of 1926-27, Governor Arthur Hannett, motivated by end-of-term spite, used his executive power to push through an ambitious infrastructure project–a new road to Albuquerque. This road avoided Santa Fe and Encino, where his successor Richard C. Dillon lived, and improved access to Albuquerque from the east. This ultimately paved the way for Route 66’s realignment in 1937.
Traveling down the road, Lambert zigzags across the aisle, gesturing first to the left and then abruptly to the right,“Glorieta Pass, the Gettysburg of the West.” He points toward the surrounding Civil War battlefields and the 20th-century outsider art memorializing its veterans. The road leads to many churches, first Nuestra Señora de Luz Church in Cañoncito–photogenic with a small window high up under the bell canopy and a jasper red shed roof. San Jose Church, Capilla Santa Rita de Cascia, and Santo Niño Church follow. These small chapels, unique to their communities, dot the original alignment of Route 66, serving as landmarks and safe havens to travelers including Dust Bowl refugees.
Next year, Route 66 will turn 100. Lambert’s tours and guidebooks are good fun, but they are also calls to research and preserve the original alignment and the communities it served. The businesses and towns that sprung up along the original Route 66 and the road itself are falling into disrepair with some portions of the highway having returned to the land. Once-booming motor courts, general stores, bars, and tourist attractions, including the Fountain of Youth and bears at Pigeon Ranch, were the economic pillars for small towns in rural New Mexico: Rowe, San Jose, Bernal, Tecolote, and Romeroville. The realignment in 1937 and completion of Interstate 40 in the 1970s cut off these communities from their main source of income.
Most people whizzing down Interstate 25 will observe the present-day infrastructure—interstates, highways, and service roads—missing all evidence of Route 66. Lambert perceives these modern features as negative space, pushing them into the background of his mind, and directs his attention instead to scattered sections of pavement in pastures and scars following the path of least resistance along ridgelines. Lambert’s gift is an ability to conjure a vision of Route 66 so lucid that his traveling companions accept it wholeheartedly and start to feel as if they are viewing the landscape through his eyes. The tour’s climax is a humorous sight–Lambert exuberantly pointing out the shuttle window as a busload full of people stare out in awe at a patch of pavement partially buried in a grassy hilltop in San Miguel County.
In addition to odometers and binders, Lambert comes bearing anecdotes. He likes to talk about ‘characters.’ His expeditions have introduced him to all manner of travelers. A man walking coast to coast who refused every ride offered to him. A cowboy from Oklahoma riding his horse to Santa Fe. Lambert observes that had the cowboy taken his Toyota instead of his horse, people would not have been as eager to talk to him, let alone buy him lunch and offer a room for the night. He thinks the key to having strangers approach you, with their arms and resources extended, entails looking interesting or doing something offbeat. He wonders if he had an antique car people might find him more exciting, but Lambert doesn’t need to walk across the country, ride a horse, or post up by an antique car to be one of the most compelling characters of present-day Route 66.
Sites along the old Route 66 between Santa Fe and Romeroville.
