Detroit Auto Show partners with Route 66: 100th anniversary
Convoy of vintage cars celebrating with cross-country meetups in 2026
A cross-country drive along Route 66, stretching from California to Illinois, will kick off the 2026 Detroit Auto Show, Shifting Gears has learned.
The event will involve car enthusiasts, historians and everyday people who want to experience “The Drive Home” 100th anniversary celebration of the famous highway that American families have traveled for generations.
Organizers are planning to leave Santa Monica on January 3 , arriving at Jackson Boulevard and Adams Street in downtown Chicago on January 11. From there, the group will drive to the Motor City to open the 10-day auto show at Huntington Place in downtown Detroit.
The event, coordinated by America’s Automotive Trust based in Tacoma, Washington, and the National Route 66 Centennial Commission, is designed to celebrate Detroit and its role in connecting all parts of America.
Up to nine vintage cars will make the drive and be displayed at the Detroit Auto Show, organizers revealed.
“We’re going to focus on 1960s cars and vehicles that can make the long, tough journey in the winter so we don’t have to worry about potential breakdowns,” David Madeira, CEO of America’s Automotive Trust, told me. “We’re going to emphasize the Big 3. There will be Ford, Chevy and Chrysler.”
Madeira, a Rhode Island native, developed strong ties with Detroiters two decades ago when he first reached out to create America’s Car Museum in Tacoma. He mentioned support from Rod Alberts, godfather of the Detroit Auto Show, and Bob Lutz, the longtime General Motors executive previously affiliated with Ford and Chrysler.
Sharing the spotlight with Detroit is a personal mission for Madeira. The 100th anniversary celebration seemed like a perfect fit.
Honoring the past, celebrating the present
“It looks like we’re going to include a ‘65 Ford Country Squire Station Wagon,” he said. “I want to remind people that this is the great family vacation. My dad had one and we drove around America and followed Route 66 in 1964, when I was 14.”
Madeira approached Sam Klemet, who just took over as executive director of the Detroit Auto Show, with the idea.
“He got it instantly,” Madeira said. “We’re trying to preserve and honor the past and celebrate the present, to get people out driving their cars and enjoying life. We want to call attention to the importance of Detroit, still.”
There’s no better way to spotlight Detroit’s car culture than getting people behind the wheel with stops in towns across America for two weeks, Klemet said. “It’s only fitting that The Drive Home ends here, the auto capital of the world, where the automotive industry continues to push the boundaries of innovation.”
In the past, Route 66 trips have begun in Tacoma, Boston, Orlando and Houston. But this big one will be spotlighting everything from passion to restoration. Car culture enthusiasts usually join for pieces of the drive along the way, as meetups are promoted in advance on social media and websites operated by America’s Automotive Trust.
‘Now the highway is a destination’
Next year, some people will fly out west for the kickoff, including Klemet, and others will make the whole journey.
“People think the Santa Monica Pier is the end point but it’s really Mel’s Diner,” Madeira said. “In our very first year, we had a guy drive the whole way with us. But a lot of people will drive for an hour or a day. Anybody can come on the caravan. You get to hang out at all the stops and have fun.”
While Route 66 will forever have a presence in pop culture, the highway was actually decommissioned in 1985, noted Matt Anderson, curator of transportation at The Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation in Dearborn, Michigan.
“Still, it lingers in the popular imagination,” Anderson said, because of books and movies and songs and TV shows. “It’s a way to go back in time. Back in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s, these were routes to get places. Now the highway is a destination in and of itself.”
Moments created by Steinbeck and Nat King Cole
Nat King Cole recorded the lyrics “Get your kicks on Route 66” in 1946, after John Steinbeck won the Pulitzer Prize for his 1939 novel “The Grapes of Wrath.”
In the 1940 film adaptation, actor Henry Fonda played the patriarch of the Joad family, traveling from Oklahoma seeking a better life after their farm was seized by the bank. Oscars went to supporting actress Jane Darwell and director John Ford.
Two decades later, the TV show “Route 66” spotlighted the adventures of two men in a Chevrolet Corvette convertible.
“Detroit was never on Route 66, because it ended in Chicago. But the Route 66 celebration does speak to Detroit’s role in popular culture and automotive culture. The connections between Detroit and Chicago are longstanding,” Anderson said.
“It speaks to Route 66’s role as ‘America’s Main Street’ that Tacoma and Detroit are a part of this centennial celebration – even though neither was on the actual highway!”
Putting a plan together to go
Having traveled Route 66 in the past, Sergio Rodriguez said he will join the celebration drive if he can get time off work. Rodriguez, 44, of Chesapeake, Virginia, a U.S. Army veteran who works as a military contractor, is a car enthusiast who has traveled to Detroit in the past for special events.
He drove Route 66 from St. Louis, Missouri, to Barstow, California, in 2015 after finishing a project at Fort Leonard Wood. And, later, in 2024.
“I took seven days cruising Route 66. I would totally do that drive again,” he told me. “The vibe is all about history. You get to see some pretty old buildings and scenes. It’s pretty cool knowing that Route 66 is the road of all roads in the USA. It’s where it all began.”
During the Dust Bowl era of the 1930s, Route 66 was the primary route for migrants heading west. Travel continued during World War II because California offered opportunities, said the U.S. Department of Transportation on its historical page.
Preserving history to enjoy now
Route 66 was the first highway to be completely paved in 1938 because of the efforts of the U.S. Highway 66 Association. It became a safe route for moving military equipment.
By the 1950s and 1960s, Route 66 had evolved into a major tourist destination. Small shops and restaurants popped up throughout America, catering to adventurers.
Steinbeck referred to Route 66 as “the mother road.”
Historic features along the route were restored after President Bill Clinton signed the National Route 66 Preservation Bill in 1999 that provided for $10 million in matching fund grants. Later, in 2008, the World Monuments Fund listed Route 66 on its Watch List of 100 Most Endangered Sites.
“It spans the heart of America, symbolizing mobility, freedom, and pursuit of the American Dream,” according to the National Park Service website. “Route 66 is of national significance as a symbol of our transportation history and the impact of the automobile.”
Information about the cross-country trek is available at https://www.americasautomotivetrust.org/thedrivehome
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Oh boy. Another trip back….. even for me. While attending graduate school at Illinois State University in 1971, my wife and I lived on the East (I believe) side of route 66 in Bloomington, Illinois. Actually, I had a one day job roofing right off Route 66 in January 1972 and after nearly freezing to death I quit. When you’re up three floors up and your hearing trucks rumble down 66, it’s quite scary for a rookie like me. My wife worked at a preschool center there also off-road 66 but on the other side (west?). We traveled route 66 frequently and often times to either St. Louis or Chicago. It’s really nice to see your story because it’s important to our country and us.
Thanks for writing.
PEACE
Gregg Wilczynski