History of The Mother Road Ride/Rallysm
You won't find Route 66 on any current highway maps. To roughly trace its path, get a map of the Interstate Highway system that, for the most part, replaced Route 66. At Chicago, trace I-55 to St. Louis, then switch to I-44, through Oklahoma City. At Oklahoma City pick up I-40 and follow it all the way to Barstow, CA. Then switch to I-15, then to I-10. Follow I-10 all the way to its end at the Pacific Coast Highway.
The Next Three Paragraphs Are The Thoughts And Dreams Of KIRK WOODWARD Who Made This Mother Road Ride Rally Become A Reality. Kirk Passed Away In 2002 And His Wife PAM WOODWARD Has Keep This Rally Alive In His Honor.
Back in the Fall of 1994 I was leafing through a mail order catalog. They were offering memorabilia from Route 66. A book, a coffee cup, T-Shirt, etc. When I lived in Peoria, IL I had often been on Route 66 as a part of my work as a sales representative in Central Illinois.
Gosh, that would be a GREAT motorcycle ride. Route 66 crossed two thirds of the United States, millions upon millions of people have been on that road... all the way from the fictional Roads of The Grapes of Wrath to Bobby Troup in 1946, when he wrote the song: Get Your Kicks on Route 66.
My day job is marketing so it wasn't much of a project to type up a news release describing a brand new motorcycle event. It wasn't too hard to think up a name either. John Steinbeck called it the Mother Road in The Grapes of Wrath so The Mother Road Ride/Rallysm was a natural. A RT66 Motorcycle Tour.
The rest, as the saying goes, is history. Forty-eight Mother Roaders ran the first rally in June of 1995.
Participants have included riders from Canada, England, France, New Zealand, Sweden, Bermuda, Virgin Islands, Hungary, Ireland, Norway, Australia, and all 50 states. The Mother Road Ride/Rally (a.k.a. the Mother Road Rally) is a great introductory tour of undoubtedly the most historic road in America.....Route 66!
The year 2011 George Higgins & his wife Ann purchased the MOTHER ROAD RIDE RALLY to continue the tradition of providing a fun filled travel adventure for motorcycles on RT-66 and what is becoming the premier event for the serious touring motor cyclist.
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