Anybody who shares my fascination with the arcana of highway routes, end points, signage and so forth (don’t all y’all raise your hands at once) probably fetched up, as I did, on a brief item in Wednesday’s paper (click here for a fuller version).
It seems that road signs with the numbers 6-6-6 have become a target for thieves, vandals, cultists, or perhaps self-appointed exorcists of the asphalt.
This all relates to the theory, held by some, that three sixes comprise a number with an unhealthily Satanic appeal. So, evidently, when a road sign carries the three accursed digits, noble souls step forward to spirit it away. (Are they thereby getting on the devil’s enemies’ list?)
Our story referred to incidents in New Jersey, where “66.6” mileposts have disappeared. But that put me in mind of the controversy over U.S. Route 666. In keeping with the numbering system for federal highways, that was a branch road off old U.S. 66, the fabled highway that used to link Chicago and Los Angeles before it was supplanted by interstates. (Route 66 has made a comeback with designation as a historic road, but that’s fodder for another day.)
Anyway, there used to be a U.S. 666, running between Utah and Arizona. It was redesignated in 2003 after the government could no longer take the heat from those who thought its highway-to-hell numerology was unseemly. Also, it seems that "666" signs were being stolen faster than they could be replaced.
One of the best time-wasting devices I’ve found is a site where the alignments and end points of all U.S. highways are explored to a level of detail calculated to satisfy the most obsessive road geek, which is by definition what anyone who winds up on such a site is called. The photos of highway terminus points, showing appropriate signs, are especially addictive. (One of my favorites is a shot of the last southbound U.S. 421 shield, along with an “END” sign, where the pavement runs out in the sands below Fort Fisher.)
Follow this link, and you can read about the U.S. 666 controversy and see lots of photos. Now, get back to work.
Comments
U.S. 80
Wed, 10/08/2008 - 07:15 — Anonymous (not verified)Lord help me, I thought we were the only highway geeks hereabouts. I've been in love with numbered highways since I drove U.S. 80 from Savannah to El Paso - and back - while a soldier in the early 1960s. Little known bit of trivia. U.S. 80 through Dallas - there was no bypass - followed the same route as the Kennedy motorcade. It was a weird experience to be be driving along only to see the Texas School Book Depository looming straight ahead, then make a left and see the white fence at the back of Dealy Plaza and the railroad overpass ahead.
Last summer we drove hundreds miles of Route 66 in Illinois, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and crossed the same bridge the fictional Joads did into California. Kingman to Oatman, Ariz was the absolutely most terrifying segment of our 50,000-plus miles last year.
And did I tell you about driving original US 301 to Florida, coming back via U.S. 1.
A pox on your Interstates.
Cranky Old Guy