Wagon Wheel: Oldest Motel Still Running on Route 66
Missouri
The Wagon Wheel Motel in Cuba, Missouri holds a specific distinction: it is the oldest continuously operating motel on Route Sixty-Six. Robert and Margaret Martin built the first stone cabins in the mid nineteen thirties using rock carried to the site by local farmers. Architect Leo Friesenhan worked in Tudor Revival style.
The name came later. In nineteen forty-seven, a designer named John Mathis sketched the iconic wagon wheel neon sign at his kitchen table, the sign prompted the shift from calling the units cabins to calling them a motel. The complex was added to the National Register of Historic Places in two thousand three.
When it fell into serious disrepair, Connie Echols bought the property in two thousand nine and spent years restoring it. Travelers have been pulling off the Mother Road here for nearly ninety years.
