The Second Annual Route 66 Festival at the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge was held on October 3 in St. Louis, and I was one of the featured speakers at the event.
My husband and I had to take “the scenic route” to St. Louis, via Route 61, in order to pick up Volume II of Ghostly Tales of Route 66, which was hot off the presses on Friday. This second volume in the trilogy documenting ghostly tales along the Mother Road has one story that revisits the Hanging Judge of Fort Smith, Arkansas, a precursor to Route 66, as outlined in the history of the road (p. 17).
Many of the stories were told me during the November 15, 2008 Ghost Tour at Fort El Reno, Oklahoma. Those include “Fort El Reno, Communing with the Spirits,” which tells the story of a very weird occurrence that happened to me during the four to five-hour tour; “The Buffalo Soldier of Fort El Reno, Oklahoma”; “The Mysterious Major of Fort El Reno”; and “The Strychnine Specter of Fort El Reno, Oklahoma.”
After the Oklahoma stories, the book moves on to the Texas Panhandle, New Mexico, and ends at the Arizona border. The final book in the trilogy will pick up in Arizona and take the readers through California, documenting stories told me as I traveled the route.
Pictured here are some pictures of the 70 vintage automobiles that were parked on the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge during the Antique Auto Contest. There were vendors…including the man with the seventy-pound pumpkins! (He was selling them at 40 cents a pound.)
After trying out the AmericInn Casino nearby, we all were thankful that, although it was cooler than last year’s Festival, there was no rain. A good time was had by all.