An Introduction to Connecticut

Sometimes things just work out well. Fervent planning for my July trip to the northeast, an intended precursor to the larger Route 6 roadtrip, had resulted in a number of potential - and complex - plans during the long weekend. My best laid plan was to leave Philadelphia as quickly as possible by train for Providence, where I would stay for the night and, in the morning, rent a car. As my flight arrived at 1:10pm, I would just barely miss the 1:55pm train, and the next train was not until well after 3. I would also have to cut across the entire State of Connecticut and drive back in about a day in a half, just in order to accomplish my minimum US 6 goal. I would also have to deal with the fact that Providence features a large Independence Day fireworks event in their Downtown area, where I would have to stay, being without a car. Not a bad thing, but I really don't like the crowds behind those things. All I could imagine was being surrounded by 10,000 Peter Griffins in various states of drunkenness, worked up to a further frenzy by the flashing lights and loud noises.
But then, randomly, I just queried rental cars, one-way from Philadelphia to Boston. And they were cheaper than renting a car round-trip from Philadelphia. At least through Alamo. I've only had one previous experience with Alamo, in San Jose, California, where I was given one of the last cars on the lot, a Nissan Maxima (I had reserved an economy and a Maxima is considered a full-size) which had a significant amount of what appeared to be hail damage on the hood... Or somebody had parked it at the end of a driving range. I reserved an economy car again, so we'll see. But this opened a potentially wonderful part of the trip: driving from Port Jervis, New York to Providence, Rhode Island over two and a half days on the back roads of US 6.
Research has begun, and I'm already finding really fascinating things out about Connecticut, such as the "Heroin Town" phenomenon and Hotel Hooker (real name, although recently changed) in Willimantic; the controversial legacy of "Suicide 6" in the eastern part of the state; the Lock Museum of America, which is just down the road from the American Clock and Watch Museum, which itself is in the same town - Bristol - as the ESPN studios.
Yes, that ESPN. The Disney-owned cable television network's main studios and corporate headquarters are ever so randomly located in a small, suburban town in Connecticut. The old American intention, of course, is to visit any landmark you pass and I'm going to be very close to ESPN's studios. Very quickly though, I found out that it is not possible for Mr. Average Colin to plop up with the family truckster and be rewarded for his time with free group hospitality from smiling blonde interns and cheap Chinese-made gifts painted with corporate logos. This is not made clear by their official web site, but is stated on a very outdated appearing web page on the ESPN site, which oddly encourages you to check back in the case that "the policy changes." But, on ESPN's Yelp page (I was surprised that they have Yelp page at all), once you get past the reviews complaining of ESPN's "bias," there is a review where a cross-country traveling Yelper recently attempted to just drive up to the studios, and was turned away by security, who stated that there was no public tour or access.
This isn't the first time I've come across a clearly missed opportunity for customer-brand interaction. The Heinz corporate headquarters in Downtown Pittsburgh is one of several offices in their imposing building, and the only indication of their presence is a small, silver, logo-less nameplate in the lobby. Even in the food court in the building's basement, there is no due and proper homage to ketchup and condiments aside from the crumpled packets you find in any other food court. Instead, we drove across the river and took our pictures in view of the company's former and more industrial headquarters, which was actively being turned into lofts. But surely a company with as much presence as ESPN, and owned by the utmost expert in brand indoctrination through public interaction (Disney) can do better than this.
But the web site makes no indication of this. In exploring the web site though, I did find something very Disney, but also very strange. If you look for information about working at ESPN, you'll find a blog called "ESPN Front Row," and a posting called "The Lineup: Top 10 places Bristol ESPNers pass the time." #2 on the list is "ESPN: The Store." But, as a campus that's not accessible to the public, this means that it's a private store. This store is likely set up for visitors but, if it's truly where "ESPNers pass the time," then "ESPNers" are some sad bastards. I mean, when I worked for Pima County, if there was a "Pima County: The Store," then I would have not gone to it and would certainly have not purchased anything and given part of my paycheck back to my employer. My jobs in the past have given away branded schwag as either free gifts, or as license-free rewards, to employees. Something seems very off about the way ESPN is set up.

Another revelation has been that the Connecticut Sun, a relatively successful WNBA team, is one of only two teams in the league to not be associated with an NBA team, and is owned by a Native American tribe, the Mohegans. The same Native American tribe used as a base in the Family Guy episode, "The Son Also Draws," where Lois loses the family's money and car in bets at an Indian casino, but Peter is able to get it back by duping the "tribal elders" into believing he's a member of their tribe. It's an unfortunately racist episode of the show, but you don't really have to look too far to find other racist examples from that series.
Unfortunately, the Sun are, ironically, in Indiana the weekend I'm in Connecticut. And the Hartford minor league hockey team, sadly named the "Connecticut Whale" in reference to the long-gone Hartford Whalers (a full year before they moved, Bristol neighbor ESPN falsely reported that the team was moving to Nashville), are also out of town. I won't have much time in the area, so maybe this is for the best.

Finding 6

In my planning on a July trip to the northeast, one of the issues I've come across is actually finding the original route of US 6. Much of the route in Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts has been moved to freeways, plowing it through the major cities, and allowing drivers to reach its destinations - like Cape Cod - at high speeds. The idea of exploring both these high-speed and original, now back road options is most appealing. But with the latter, the challenge becomes finding that original, now back road option.
This is particularly the case in the cities, where the streets came long before the highway designations, and the original US 6 often snakes around town, at times splitting into different routes. The best I can do at this point is rely on historic maps.
One of the best resources for this is the David Rumsey Map Collection, a private collection of various historic digitized maps from around the world, most importantly (for my purposes) including an impressive and rather comprehensive collection of Shell Oil maps from the 1950's and '60's. This was the prime time for the federal highway system: after the idea of following numbers and not names became more accepted, but before the interstate highway system swallowed the original routes.

Section of a 1956 Shell Oil map of Massachusetts in Barnstable County, showing three parallel sections of US 6, including the then-proposed highway bypass through the center of the peninsula. Courtesy of the David Rumsey Map Collection.

The challenge is going to be finding and then following these different routes. Streets have changed names, some streets have outright been removed or repurposed, highways have been renumbered, and US 6 has been routed on several different interstate highways and several different freeway bypasses, resulting in the loss of the ability to simply follow signage.

The plan of action is to print out sections of these old maps, and write specific directions based on comparisons between them and current maps, showing how the streets are laid out now (which is an interesting study, in itself).

My goal for this July trip is to scope out different parts of this section of US 6. The fact is, I haven't even been on much of US 6 in the Northeast, so it will also involve covering a lot of new territory. Cape Cod, in particular, has always been high on my list of things to see in the US, and seeing the end points of the highway is really a top priority. I have seen both the former Long Beach and current Bishop, California end points, so seeing the eastern side is something that will be worth the drive to me.