Before Route 66: The National Old Trails Road Across the Mojave
by C. V. Wooster · October 5, 2026 · 4 min read
When people picture Route 66 in the Mojave, they picture 1950s neon and tail fins. But the road through what was then called Newberry is older than its famous number. Before 1926, the route across the desert was part of the National Old Trails Road, an early cross-country auto trail stitched together from older wagon roads, railroad service roads, and local tracks. Understanding that older road helps explain why Route 66 ran where it did, and why the interstate later chose a different line.
A road named for older trails
In the 1910s, the United States had no national system of numbered highways. Long-distance drivers followed "auto trails," routes promoted by private associations that marked them with painted poles, signs, and printed guides. The Lincoln Highway is the most famous of these. The National Old Trails Road was another.
Its promoters tied it to the historic trails of the American past, including the Cumberland Road (the old National Road), the Boonslick Road, and the Santa Fe Trail. The name was meant to signal that this was not just a road but a story about westward travel. The route ran from the East Coast to Los Angeles, and in the Southwest it followed the line of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway closely, because that is where the towns, water, and repair shops were.
A Newberry Springs history compiled for the town's own site notes that when Route 66 was designated in 1926, it used the National Old Trails alignment from about Las Vegas, New Mexico, to Los Angeles, including the road through Newberry. In other words, the desert section of Route 66 did not start as a new road. It was a new name and a new shield on a road that drivers already knew.
A future president as booster
One of the road's best-known supporters was Harry S. Truman, then a county judge in Jackson County, Missouri. Truman served as president of the National Old Trails Road Association in the 1920s. He traveled the route, promoted road improvements, and helped push one of the association's most visible projects.
The Madonna of the Trail
That project was a series of twelve identical statues placed along the National Old Trails Road by the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution. Each "Madonna of the Trail" shows a pioneer mother in a bonnet, holding a baby and with a young son at her side. They were dedicated in 1928 and 1929, one in each of twelve states the road crossed.
The California statue stands in Upland, at the western end of the old road near Los Angeles. If you are driving the old route from the desert toward the coast, it is a fitting place to stop and think about who the road was built to honor. The statue is about families moving west, not about speed or tourism. That is a reminder that this corridor was a working road long before it was a nostalgic one.
Following the railroad and the water
Across the Mojave, the National Old Trails Road and later Route 66 tracked the railroad for good reason. Steam locomotives needed water and service at regular intervals, so the railroad built sidings and small stations across the desert. Those stops became the first towns: Daggett, Newberry, Ludlow, Bagdad, Amboy, Cadiz, Essex, Goffs, and Needles among them.
A driver in 1915 or 1925 needed the same things the trains did: water, fuel, food, and repairs. The towns along the tracks were the only places to find them. So the auto road ran from one rail stop to the next. That pattern is still visible today if you drive the old alignment. The road curves where the tracks curve and passes the foundations of buildings that served both.
From auto trail to U.S. 66
By the mid-1920s, the patchwork of private trail associations had become confusing. Different groups claimed overlapping routes, and markings were inconsistent. State highway officials and the federal Bureau of Public Roads created a national system of numbered highways to replace the named trails. That plan was approved on November 11, 1926, and it included U.S. 66 from Chicago to Los Angeles.
The numbered system did not build new roads right away. It organized existing ones under a uniform scheme of signs and numbers. Through much of the desert, U.S. 66 simply took over the National Old Trails alignment. Paving, realignments, and bridges came over the following years.
Why the interstate did not follow
The National Old Trails Road made sense for a world of short trips between rail towns. The interstate planners of the 1950s and 1960s had different goals: high speed, long distance, no cross traffic, and no stops except at interchanges. Following the railroad's curves from town to town did not serve those goals.
So in places, Interstate 40 took a new line across the desert. In others, it ran parallel to the old road, close enough to cut across the driveways and side roads that had always connected to it. That is the setting for Mrs. Orcutt's Driveway. A track that had joined a road older than its own number suddenly faced a freeway that did not need it.
Seeing the old road today
In San Bernardino County, much of the old alignment is signed as the National Trails Highway, a name that echoes the older trail. Driving it, you are on a road that has carried wagons, Model Ts, Dust Bowl migrants, vacationers, and truckers. Check road conditions before you go, since parts of the eastern section have closed for long repairs, and carry plenty of water.
And if you stop near Newberry Springs, remember that the homes along the old road are private. Enjoy the view from public roads.
Route 66 history · The centennial · Newberry Springs · Buy the book