In the late 1800s, the bustling town of Oatman, Arizona, was overflowing with miners who hoped to stake their claim on some of the millions of dollars in gold and silver from the surrounding mountains. The town was named after a Mormon teenager named Olive Oatman who, as the locals tell it, was captured by Apache warriors, sold to a Mojave tribe, and eventually freed after five years of captivity.
The Sandhills Curiosity Shop, opened by Harley Russell and his late wife Annabelle, is one of the few stores with countless items on display, but nothing is actually for sale. Instead, the shop is a showcase of decades’ worth of Route 66 memorabilia, proudly displayed in every square inch of the property.
Route 66 stretches for 2,500 miles from the heart of Chicago to Santa Monica’s iconic pier. Known as the “Mother Road,” it is one of the most popular cross-country road trip routes. Here are just 30 of the countless things to see along the way.
“Bottle Tree Ranch” is an obscure open-air art gallery created by artist Elmer Long. This whimsical roadside attraction, featuring a massive collection of thousands of colored glass bottles, is located on historic U.S. Route 66, in Oro Grande, California.
