My Favorite Road
May 2025
I get that question a lot. It’s natural, since folks know I’ve driven every mile on the Missouri highway map.
To a Steelville Chamber of Commerce banquet I gushed that Highway 8 is a pretty ribbon through town, looping past Maramec Springs.
But my favorite?
Driving Highway 6 into the Green Hills toward a cherished Mexican restaurant in Milan, my car began squishing hundreds of apples strewn along the highway. Road apples. They make the Green Hills green. The advice of Harry Truman came to mind: “Never kick a fresh turd on a hot day.”
Sage advice. Fun road. But not my favorite.
A Rolla radio interviewer guessed that my favorite road might be Route 66.
“Love the Mother Road.” Alas, not my favorite.
I call Highway 36 The Avenue of the Greats. Nobody else does. That’s okay. In my mind, Highway 7 is the Tightwad Turnpike. Route 71 is Bushwhacker Boulevard. Don’t overlook the Cooter-Corder Corridor. And Highway 5 is the Fox Trotter.
There are so many great roads. And each road has its own soul. From Blues Alley (Highway 61) to the Blue Eye Byway (Route 86), the Route of the Canoes (Highway 19) and Little Swiss Parkway (Highway 143 past Sam A. Baker State Park).
The Baldknobber (Route 76 leaving Branson in either direction) offers spectacular views in spring and fall. The Toad Suck Trail (Highway 125 south to Arkansas) gets its name from its eventual destination: the Toad Suck Ferry across Bull Shoals Lake.
Some of those nicknames, I confess, are my own.
Cascading past Johnson’s Shut-Ins, looping around Taum Sauk Mountain, Highway 21 earns the appellation Ozark Trail. Running parallel to the Mighty Mississippi, The Great River Road along Highway 79 has spawned the Provenance Project with 50 Miles of Art.
Some roads have multiple personalities. Before it bore children west, the Mother Road was the Wire Road. The Avenue of the Saints changes character south of St. Louis, giving birth to Blues Alley. And take your pick, Highways 94 and 100 frame the Missouri River, and share the Lewis & Clark Trail.
All historic. But not my favorite.
My favorite road always will be Highway 17, for one special reason. The road winds south from Eugene, past the Tuscumbia graves of The Beverly Hillbillies creators Ruth and Paul Henning. It crosses the beautiful Osage River on a brand new bridge. Thanks, Obama. The road later joins the robust Roubidoux Creek through Waynesville, unfolding toward Houston, Missouri, home of Emmett Kelly, the world’s greatest clown. That’s a lot of fun and history. But that’s not why Highway 17 is my favorite road.
Long before it crosses my favorite Ozark stream (the upper Jack’s Fork), Highway 17 approaches the tiny Texas County town of Success, Missouri.
The Road to Success. My favorite road.
You Want Wisdom With That?
February 2025
From experience, I knew to honor the seating chart. The seating chart is not posted on the wall or the cash register or in the manager’s office. It’s in the habits of the seniors who come here every weekday at the same time and sit with the same friends in the same chairs at the same table.
Folks were eager to tell me about Ellington, stuff you might not hear at the Reynolds County Museum down the street. Robert, an affable chap at a table within earshot, told me about the industry in town. Boats and saws, mainly, reflecting the area’s predominant natural resources.
“If you’re going past Lake Wappapello, don’t miss Bullwinkle’s. You’ll find out about the airplane,” Robert laughed.
I thanked my hosts and left the warm security of the senior center for the surprises of the road, including Bullwinkle’s Bar with an airplane crashed straight down into the top of the roof. It was rigged, of course, but an effective attention getter.
To get to Bullwinkle’s we crossed the Castor River, crossed the Castor River again, crossed it again, and again and again. We crossed the Castor River so many times that I stopped to study my map. Turns out there are two Castor Rivers, at one point flowing within five miles of each other. Apparently, when engineers drained all this swampland, one Castor River became two.
Castor is French for beaver, and the beavers built dams all through this swampy region. Despite being the hardest working hydraulic engineers on the planet, beavers don’t get a paycheck, so they have a right to be the namesake of multiple waterways.
Henry Schoolcraft, the first chronicler of the Ozarks, had another name for the Castor. He called it Crooked Creek. It’s a simple name. One can understand why he preferred simple names. His wife’s name was Obabaamwewegiizhigokwe, which in her native Ojibwe language means “the sound that the stars make as they rush across the sky.” Henry called her Jane, which means “Jane.” I think I know why. Her mother, Ozhaguscodaywayquay, probably didn’t object, since she herself adopted the Anglo name Susan Johnson.
Despite his prominence in exploring Missouri’s Ozarks, I have yet to drive past a sign or a town or any place named Schoolcraft. He’s in good company, though, since there isn’t a Moses, Missouri or an Austin either. There’s no town named Yogi in Missouri, although there is a Jellystone Park. There’s no Shapley, no Blow, no Dice, no Wilder, no Sacagawea or Calamity. Ah, but there’s a Jane.
And Bullwinkle’s.