Galena Growth And Change

Galena Growth And Change. From Mining Trucks To Classic Cars Along Route 66. , Formerly, modern-day Galena was a wooded area of the Kansas Ozarks. By 1835, it was part of the Cherokee Neutral Lands, though Euro-Americans quickly settled the region after Kansas became a state in 1861. Sharing a border with slave-state Missouri, it was the site of bloody skirmishes during the Civil War. The railroad came in 1871, but it was not until lead sulfide ore deposits were discovered in 1876 that the Galena Mining and Smelting Company laid out the town. Called various names including "Cornwall,” "Short Creek,” and "Bonanza,” it finally incorporated in 1877, named after the abundant Galena lead ore. The mines brought prosperity to the region, and Galena's population swelled to over 10,000 by the turn of the 20th century., In 1926, Main Street was designated part of the famous Route 66. As more travelers came through, new gasoline stations, restaurants, and hotels opened. By 1929, Kansas Route 66 was fully paved. Despite this wealth, life was hard in the mines, resulting in several bloody United Mine Workers' strikes from 1935 to 1937, one of which required National Guard intervention. Galena remained an important mining town throughout World War II as part of the tri-state mining district of Missouri, Kansas, and Oklahoma contributing vital zinc and lead to wartime production., By the early 1970s, the mines were depleted and Interstate 44 bypassed Galena, cutting off the flow of traffic and contributing to the town's decline. Today, the classic brick buildings of an early 1900s city along the original Route 66 stand mostly as they have since the 1940s, though a recent resurgence of interest in Route 66 has led to new uses for some of the buildings., Empire City and Red Hot Street , Empire City, formerly located less than a mile north of Galena, was also a mining boom town. The two cities were connected by Red Hot Street, infamous for corrupt businesses including gambling and dancing halls, brothels, and saloons. Due to their proximity, the towns developed an intense rivalry, which took a serious turn in 1877 when Empire City decided to prevent its population from moving to Galena by building an eight-foot-high and one-mile long stockade. Armed guards further prevented the free flow of traffic, but a posse of Galenians assembled and burned the wall down. While it took 30 years for jealousy to subside, Empire City became part of the City of Galena in 1907., Pixar's Cars , Radiator Springs, a fictional town in the Disney Pixar movie Cars depopulated by the interstate bypass and decommissioning of Route 66, was based on towns like Galena. Faded advertising murals or "ghost writing." still visible on the sides of downtown buildings like the Front Street Garage, helped to influence the feel of the fictional town. More specifically, a 1951 International Harvester boom truck in town directly inspired the character "Tow Mater.” Today, it sits at Cars on the Route, a diner and souvenir shop in a restored 1934 Kan-O-Tex Service Station. Still featuring its vintage facade and gas pumps, the station includes a diner-style lunch counter in what was previously a service bay. The station sold an old regional brand of gasoline in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas, giving it its name, Kan-O-Tex, and logo, a sunflower behind a five-pointed star. When I-44 bypassed the town, the station went out of business until its restoration in 2007.