Ghost Towns of Route 66 Author: Jim Hinckley Kerrick James | Language: English | ISBN:
B00504S56C | Format: EPUB
Ghost Towns of Route 66 Description
Ghost towns lie all along the Mother Road. The quintessential boom-and-bust highway of the American West, Route 66 once hosted a thriving array of boomtowns built around oil mines, railroad stops, cattle ranches, resorts, stagecoach stops, and gold mines. Join Route 66 expert Jim Hinckley as he tours more than 25 ghost towns, rich in stories and history, complemented by gorgeous sepia-tone and color photography by Kerrick James. Also includes directions and travel tips for your ghost-town explorations along Route 66.
Explore the beauty and nostalgia of these abandoned communities along America’s favorite highway!
- File Size: 6879 KB
- Print Length: 160 pages
- Publisher: Voyageur Press; First edition (June 9, 2011)
- Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
- Language: English
- ASIN: B00504S56C
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #394,835 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #78
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Travel > United States > Regions > Midwest
- #78
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Travel > United States > Regions > Midwest
I have awaited this book's release for months, and on the day it came out--June 6, 2011--I finally bought the one copy at my local bookstore (you know the ones we still have to support or they'll be gone like Route 66). I was NOT disappointed. "Ghost Towns of Route 66" is crammed with gorgeous photos, and not just the small playing-card size that too many R66 books try to get away with. No, these are usually large, and most are in color. The author writes concise and interesting notes about the scenes (Hinckley and James have collaborated on other projects before this one, and they work well together), and the book shows a great knowledge of the subject without being dense with minutiae. What I've found most enjoyable in the 24 hours I've had this book (remember, it just came out yesterday) is reading it alongside my laptop and exploring each site online for more photos and information (if I had one critique of the book it'd be that I want MORE of it--double the pages, and more stories of the sites--can we have a Volume 2?). I mean, come on, it combines ghost towns and Route 66--you can't lose! There are a LOT of books that print photos of the R66 kitsch, but this one gives you the sense that you may be seeing parts of Route 66 that won't last much longer, and the author/photographer are capturing treasures that are slipping away. I love Route 66, and I love ghost town photo books, but this book is superior to the gazillion other rushed Route 66 "product" souvenir books.
By WichacpiHoskila
VINE VOICE
The first thing that I noticed when I first flipped through Ghost Towns was the attractive layout. It makes you want to go deeper into the book. Writer Jim Hinckley and photographer Kerrick James and their layout team have done an excellent job of melding content and visuals. The current and vintage photographs provide a good addition to Hinckley's writing on the current and historical aspects of Route 66.
The book is organized with chapters on each of the eight Route 66 states in geographical order. Ghost towns were created by road changes, economic woes, and, as in Times Beach, Mo, environmental issues. Although the book focuses on what is no more along the route, there are also glimpses of life and renewal. In his writing, Hinckley pays homage to earlier books about locations on Route 66, so the reader gets a good overview of other Route 66 writing and resources. I am sure that readers familiar with certain areas will think one area should have been covered and another area not covered, but, overall, Hinckley's research provides a good panorama of the road that was.
Things that I liked:
*Great photos and integration with text
*When You Go boxes throughout the book that give directional information
*Don't Miss shield graphics that describe just that
*Bits of local history that enrich the reader's knowledge of Route 66
*Suggestions for further reading at the end of the book
*A nice index
Overall, I find the book a good combination of history and visuals for the reader that should create interest in Route 66.
By writeronthego
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