Route 66, Glendora to Rancho Cucamonga

On January 10, I found myself in Glendora, CA looking at an Eames-inspired Selig Lounge Chair and ottoman.  After initially declining the chair due to some cracks in the leather, the seller responded with an attractive lower price, to which I counteroffered, and he accepted. 

After a clean up (not shown here), I'm pretty pleased with my purchase. 

After loading up my new possession, I decided to spend a few hours exploring Foothill Boulevard, which had been known decades earlier as Route 66.

My wife and I had explored sections of Route 66 from the Rialto area through New Mexico the previous summer, but I had never really seen the sections closer in to Los Angeles.  Given my fascination with anything old, abandoned, and decrepit, I was hoping to see empty shells of buildings with faded signage and hints of sunnier times.  But as most of the towns I passed through were still heavily populated, I instead saw more evidence of businesses having been removed and replaced with modern strip malls and businesses.  So where I didn't see any forgotten properties, and I did see lots and lots of restaurants and businesses that had obviously been built during the highway's heyday, and had been operating in some form or another since that time. 




 The 20th Century Motor Lodge in Glendora was a perfect example of this - likely built before the 210 or 110 had been built, this motel seems to have been operating since the 50s or 60s. 




It still looks very much the same today.   Just a guess, but most of the guests appeared not to be road-weary travelers, but more of the long-term variety. 





 Signage was very mid-century and in good repair.  Pool was clean and functional.  Maid service carts were present with fresh towels and sheets.







I drove East, looking for more relics that I could hopefully easily connect with photos from decades before.  While I saw several older businesses lining the road in each town, I didn't see any that I could find much history on.

La Paloma Restaurant is a great example of a Route 66-era business..  Originally opened as Wilson's Restaurant, it has been operating since 1966.







Over and over again, I saw several small mom-and-pop type businesses.  Long before Autozone, O'Reilly, and Kragen, there were small auto parts stores like this.

 Early drive-thru businesses dotted the highway. 

One I was not familiar with was the drive-thru mini-mart:  freezers and refrigerators like you would see in a 7-11 were next to your car as you drove in. 
  
There are quite a few restaurants on Foothill that have been open for decades.  The Magic Lamp restaurant has been operating since 1955.

The Golden Spur has been open since 1918. 




The Sycamore Inn has a history going back to the 1800s.  The current building has been the restaurant's location since 1920 .









I was surprised to find a go-cart manufacturer's building, complete with sign!  After some research, I found out that K & P Manufacturing has been in business here since the early 1960s. 






After about 3 hours of driving up and down Foothill, I finally got bored with the stop and go traffic and had seen enough 90's mini-malls for the day.  Like travelers decades before, I decided to skip all of the local attractions, businesses, and stoplights, get on the 210, and head directly towards my destination in Los Angeles at freeway speeds.