🔎 Start your learning adventure with Investigation Declaration

Why did westward expansion and Route 66 both point to St. Louis, and what’s it like to ride the cramped tram pods to the top of the Gateway Arch?

Scott and Jenn launch their Route 66 centennial series at Gateway Arch National Park, explaining how the 1803 Louisiana Purchase doubled the U.S. They cover St. Louis’s French trading-post origins, key museum highlights in the Arch’s underground visitor center, the Arch’s design and construction timeline.

They note park facts, share travel tips, and visit Carl’s Drive-In...giving you the perfect guide for your own road trip.

📍 Google Maps to the Arch

📍 Google Maps to Carls Drive-in on Route 66

🎥 Video version of this podcast

00:00 Riverside

01:37 Route 66 Series Kickoff

02:33 Why Start in St Louis

05:27 St Louis Origins

07:19 Lewis and Clark Mission

08:05 Louisiana Purchase Deal

10:54 Expedition Prep and Diplomacy

14:24 Corps of Discovery Journey

18:41 Building the Gateway Arch

20:41 Museum and Tram Ride

22:30 Dred Scott and Park Sites

24:32 How Route 66 Got Its Number

27:21 Travel Tips and Diner Stop

30:04 Arch Facts

31:15 Next Stop

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-------------------------------------------------------

🗺️ Plan Your Next Historic Road Trip with Us 🗺️

🚗 Download the History or Drive travel app

Turn your next road trip into an American history adventure. Discover nearby historic landmarks, battlefields, and hidden historic sites with easy, one-click driving directions—history travel right in the palm of your hand!

⭐ Enjoying the journey? Leave us a quick review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to help other history and travel lovers find the show!

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Behind you is the young bustling trading post of St. Louis.

Ahead lies thousands of miles of unmapped wilderness.

Thomas Jefferson turned to his secretary, Meriwether Lewis, who himself recruited William Clark along with 45 men to set out from this very riverbank to chase an elusive water route to the Pacific.

They didn't find the waterway, but they unlocked the continent.

They sparked the Oregon Trail and a century of westward momentum that permanently transformed the nation.

More than a century later, when engineers mapped out the legendary highway that would carry a new generation of dreamers from Chicago to California.

California Route 66.

St. Louis was a natural anchor point.

And rising 630ft above the riverfront stands the monument that honors it all, the gleaming stainless steel Gateway Arch.

Welcome to Talk with History.

One filmmaker, one historian leading history inspired world travels for the curious, the history lovers and the explorer in us all.

I'm your host, Scott, here with my wife and historian Jen.

Hello.

Today marks the official first stop in our Deep Dive series, exploring historic locations along the mother road.

As we celebrate 100 years of Route 66, we are starting right where westward expansion began.

Gateway Arch National park in St. Louis, Missouri.

We're taking you inside the arch's underground visitor center, following the trails mapped out by Lewis and Clark.

And we'll tell you what it's like riding those cramped little tram pods all the way to the top of the tallest arch in the world.

We'll also break down why St. Louis became the Gateway of the Nation, how Route 66 earned its iconic number, and why this city remains the perfect springboard for anyone heading west.

I'm Scott Benny.

So pack up your snacks and step into the tram.

We're exploring the gateway to the.

All right, Jim.

So we did our overview episode.

People listened to our episode from a week or two ago.

This was our official stop for route first.

First stop for Route 66.

Waiting.

As we mentioned before, we didn't start Chicago.

I couldn't quite get the time off because that's where Route 66 officially starts up in Chicago.

But we thought, hey, St. Louis isn't far from us.

It is kind of a perfect starting point.

If you can't make it all the way up to Chicago because it's St. Louis, it's the arch, Lewis and Clark and the Gateway to the west, 100%.

So, yeah, we We've been through Illinois, we've done Springfield with Lincoln's home and stuff.

And that's along Route 66.

We couldn't start in Chicago, but we really felt like this gateway.

St. Louis was a real good starting point to tell the story because Route 66 is really remembered as this mother road for the Dust bowl.

And this, this route that people traversed to build their dreams into the West.

And really people weren't really coming from Chicago during that time.

They were coming from the Midwest, they were coming from the Dust Bowl.

They were coming from areas where they couldn't farm anymore, it had gotten too dry.

And so they were picking up, they were migrating to California.

And so really when you think of the mother road, Grapes of wrath, they're not starting from Chicago, they're starting from this kind of Midwest area.

So it kind of fits with the story a little bit more.

Also kind of helped with us because we couldn't get the time off to go all the way to Chicago.

And we've never been there.

We've never been.

We've driven through St. Louis, we've seen the art before, but we never stopped.

And we thought it would be a great place to take the kids.

We've neither of us had ever been up inside of it before.

We thought that would be cool to take the kids and do that.

And it really is super impressive when you drive upon it.

Well, and I was thinking about it too, growing up here in the United States.

You grow up, you learn about the states, you learn the states and capitals like I'm sure all people do in whatever country they're in.

Right.

But you see, I was thinking about it.

And if you see this kind of kid style, kid oriented maps of the United States, they'll always kind of put on certain historical, well known landmarks.

The Statue of Liberty, the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco.

The St. Louis Arch is almost always one of those things that you'll see on one of those kind of classic kid oriented United States maps because that's what it's known for.

That's kind of where the west starts.

That's why they call it the Gateway to the West.

Right.

You're going to be west of the Mississippi from there.

Yeah.

So it's the kickoff point for Lewis and Clark.

That's so symbolic.

And then the arc is made and it's from St. Louis.

And so it's funny when we talk about Louisville and St. Louis, they're both named for the kings of France.

Now St. Louis is named for the king, the ninth king.

So I talk about that a little bit, how this whole area, especially New Orleans.

New Orleans, right.

Is French, then Spanish, then French again, and then sold to America.

So you're going to see a lot of this French Spanish influence here.

You see a lot of that French influence because the fur trappers and the French are out there trapping the fur.

And so because this is really the condolence of two rivers meeting, the Missouri and the Mississippi, this is a great trading post.

Right.

Because people can travel.

Think of rivers as your natural highways, and so people use them to travel.

And the Mississippi we think of as like the major highway of America.

The Missouri is just 100 miles longer.

So when it comes, like people ask you, what's the longest river in America?

It's actually the Missouri.

It's 100 miles longer than the Mississippi.

I didn't know that.

But the Missouri feeds the Mississippi.

So this is what Lewis and Clark.

You know, I. I've done a lot of talks about them, and we'll do more because we have more coverage coming out.

They're gonna.

They get an idea of what's going on from these fur trappers.

They kind of get an idea of what's out there, but they don't really know what's out there.

Past Fort Mandan.

They don't really know what's out there.

Really.

Out west.

They know it's out north, but not really out west.

Merryweather Lewis begins by building this boat.

He's thinking, we're going to take this boat up the Missouri.

And people are like, what?

He's going to go against the current?

At first, yes.

That's why there's so many men in the Corps of Discoveries because they're pushing it against the current with these long poles.

And when they get to rapids that they can't overcome, they put it on the ground and drag it again.

45 Men dragging this keel boat along the side of the river and then put it back into the water.

He builds in Pittsburgh.

Then he'll take it down the Ohio all the way to St. Louis.

And that's where he meets Clark.

And Clark's been gathering the men just.

So I. I remember.

So Louisiana Purchase happens.

Thomas Jefferson, he goes to Meriwether Lewis.

Yes.

And says, go map this.

Go find a waterway out to basically the western coast, the Pacific Ocean.

I want to know what's out there.

Yeah.

So that's.

That's the big thing.

They're celebrating in at the national park is this 803 purchase.

And they're purchasing 800.

A little over 800,000 square miles.

$15 Million at first.

Jefferson just wants the port of New Orleans.

Oh, he wants them to go negotiate.

The port of New Orleans because that's what he knows.

Yeah.

And he wants to trade.

Yeah.

Right.

He's like, I want to.

I want to control this trading because it's not.

It's French owned.

Yeah.

And one of the things that I saw that I didn't realize at the time and it said it in the museum and I kind of showed a clip of it in the video because we made a video from inside the museum and then obviously we actually took video going all the way up to the top of the arch.

But it was at the time, it was the third busiest port in America.

Yeah.

Like in.

In those kind of United States at the time.

Yeah.

And so it's been under French rule, then it was under Spanish rule for a long time.

And the French just got it back through a negotiation.

Jefferson knows Napoleon Bonaparte is in a war and could probably use some funds.

He would like to buy that port.

It's a great way to trade and make money.

And Jefferson's thinking about the commerce of America.

So when he sends his men out to negotiate buying the port, Bonaparte says, do you just want a ton of land, too?

I didn't know that.

Yeah.

He.

Bonaparte realizes he can't police this.

He can't control it.

Can't control it.

It's.

It's a continent away.

He doesn't have the manpower to get out there.

So why not just sweeten the deal?

Make it a little bit more money and you get all the land that we're supposed to have as well.

So it was basically like an impulse buy.

Yeah.

It was like losing the rest of the United States was an impulse buy or impulse sell.

And what's funny too, is like, you know, historians debate today.

Does.

Does the president have the power to do this?

And legally, no.

But he did it anyway.

Right.

And it was one of the best things that ever happened to America because it doubles our size.

And so he buys it.

1803.

We've taken you to New Orleans to the cabildo where the paperwork comes in and it's official.

And we take you to that where that room where that happened.

Then he looks to his secretary, Mary Weather Lewis.

Now, we've talked a little bit about Mary Rather Lewis, especially in the video about his end and what really happened.

So Meriwether Lewis grew up around Thomas Jefferson.

They know each other.

Their families were, we're close.

Lewis is well educated, just like Jefferson is well educated.

And so he tells him, can you go out and see what we bought?

So he gives him a quick, you know, a cram session.

Here's some maps of what we know.

Here's some, here's how you draw animals.

This is how you trap animals.

Send them back to me.

This is how you cut pieces of foliage and leaves.

Send those back to me.

And just take as much information as you can.

Because wasn't that one of the big like points of value aside from mapping it and kind of figuring out how to get to the ocean?

But one of the, one of the big things that contributed towards just a lot of, you know, parts of our society at the time was all his drawings and notes and all that stuff.

Yes, that he did.

Because this was a 2ish year.

It's two years.

Two years.

So he also teaches him how to navigate with a sexton.

A little bit of medical.

Like you're going to be alone with these guys and they're going to be get sick.

So here's some medical advice.

Food.

This is how you hunt.

This is how you clean something.

We're going to give you some of this soup that you can make when you're starving.

And, and here's a lot of ammunition.

Here's a lot of gunpowder.

You're going to take this air rifle with you.

And he gives him a ton of ribbons and medals.

Because when you meet these American Indians, because you are going to meet natives out there, they're now technically Americans and their new chief is Thomas Jefferson.

So I'm going to give you a ton of medals with Thomas Jefferson's face.

They can hand him out so you.

Can hand him out.

You're different.

You're being diplomatic here as well.

Welcome to America.

You now belong to us.

I didn't know that.

Let's find out who's out here.

And so we give some pretty ribbons and things to trade like that.

And when we talk more about Lewis and Clark, when we talk more about what their stops along the way, we have videos coming about that.

I'll tell you how the American Indians felt about that.

Yeah, you know, like they.

I don't want no ribbon.

I want your gun, I want your ax, I want your sword.

Like they're not dumb.

Right?

And this is not the first time meeting Europeans.

Like the people have been trading with them and they know what they have.

But Meriwether Lewis and Clark really feel like these ribbons and these medals are like.

And you see examples of them at the gateway.

Art.

Oh that's, that's cool.

So they are gathering.

Wasn't it like a couple tons of provisions?

It's like 30 tons.

That's crazy.

So 30 tons, right?

Like just a quick reminder to, to people what how much a ton is.

That's £2,000.

Like that's a lot of provisions that they're toting along all the way.

So they, they do all of that.

They set off and we kind of know, you know, obviously what the end result is.

But like I said, like this is why they get 45 men.

And I, I also talk a little bit about how much people wanted to be a part of the Corps of Discovery.

So Merryweather Lewis does his cram session, has his boat built in Pittsburgh, buys a dog, right.

And, and then he asks his good friend who was really a great officer and very diplomatic and at one point kind of helped Meriwether Lewis through some issues he was having in the military was William Clark.

And William Clark is not as educated as Lewis.

So if you ever read Clark's diaries, like he misspells ocean 10 times, he spells Sacajawir's name 17 different time ways.

Like he's just not as educated as Lewis.

But together they're a great team.

And even though Meriwether Lewis is the actual captain and Clark is technically the first lieutenant, he refers to him as Captain Clark and makes the men refer to him as Captain Clark because he wants to be seen as equals in this.

Interesting.

So he goes to St. Louis Clark and he starts to recruit the core of discovery.

And like I talked about, these are able bodied, strong men.

Have experience hunting, have experience fishing, have ex.

Maybe some experience meeting the natives out there as well.

Because when you can't get the boat up river with rapids and things like that, you're going to put ropes on it and you guys are going to pull it beside the river.

So 45 able bodied strong men, 30 tons.

And so that's why it's so important that they choose these men to do this.

But they kick off from this location and they kick off from this location because the whole goal is to find a trading water route, make money, right?

They want to find a route from the Pacific Ocean into leading into the Missouri that'll lead into that great trading port of New Orleans, right.

This is Thomas Jefferson's whole goal like trade money.

And so go out and find Me that route, Lewis and Clark, because I know the water's coming from somewhere.

Look at how wide and big this river is.

It.

It must be coming from the ocean.

Find me that route.

So that's their whole purpose in doing this.

So they kick off from that location, and they're going to start to take the river north.

Uh, they're going to hit Fort Mandan.

So in.

That's where they'll pick up Sacagawea.

Um, they realize after some encounters with Native Americans, it might be smart to have a Native American with us that actually can speak the language, because the men that they've been recruiting that say they can speak the language don't really speak it as well as they claim to have.

And then when they head west from there is when they're really in uncharted territory.

And for the longest time, they try to take the rivers.

And what's neat about that map they had on the ground there at.

At the visitor center.

At the visitor center is it shows you their route and the river.

They try.

They try to take the rivers until basically they start.

And they realize as they go through the Bitterroot Mountains, which are part of the Rocky Mountains, there is no water.

Right?

Yeah.

And that's when they realize, too, that they can't take no boats.

That's when they have to trade for horses.

And they trade for horses with Sacagawea's original tribe, the Shoshone, and she.

They're able to get horses there, and they're able to get the horses up over the Bitter Root Mountains.

And then they make it all the way to the Pacific.

When they first hit Fort Mandan, they'll send the keelboat back, and they'll send about 10 men, 12 men to.

To sail the kill boat bat.

And that's when they send back the first specimens to Thomas Jefferson.

So that's when they send back some birds and things they've caught and.

And foliage.

And if you ever go to Monticello, like we have, if you walk into the foyer, the opening of Monticello, in that whole foyer is all those specimens that Lewis and Clark sent back to Thomas Jefferson.

I didn't realize that's what those were from.

Yeah, and those are the actual things,.

Like, because they probably preserved them and stuffed them and all the stuff.

And so that's when he starts to learn about what is out there.

That's cool.

So we actually have a video from Monticello, but they didn't let us film Inside.

So we have pictures of that.

We have, we have, we do have pictures.

So that, I mean that's kind of the Lewis and Clark.

Right.

They are a core piece of Americana of American history.

You know, the exploration, the new chances.

Right.

They're recruiting these young, able bodied men because promises of wealth and, and discovering new things and all the stuff.

Right.

All the stuff that, and that's, that was kind of one of the ways we, we, we've oriented the video from the St. Louis Arch was this is, this is a starting point.

Right.

Both people during the Dust bowl, they were.

That's kind of getting out west from the, from the Midwest, getting out of this area, going off to California, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, they're starting there and they're, that's where the core of discovery starts.

So this, this whole arch, which I think was built in the 70s, 60s, 60s and you'll talk about that.

It was kind of in honor of all of this westward expansion, discovery and all the things that come from that.

So that's why this, this park became a thing.

Yeah, I mean that's what.

It's to commemorate the Louisiana Purchase, it's to commemorate the first westerners and that, that promise a manifest destiny like the American dream.

And it takes a while for them to kind of.

The architect who wins the competition is Euro Centerine and he wins his competition with the plans for this ark to be placed and on the banks of the river, kind of like you're walking through a gateway, like here's your opening to the west.

And what's neat is it's kind of built in a way that it looks like there's equal architectural pressure on everything and you can travel up to the top of it.

That's pretty cool.

Okay.

It's a long process.

But what's neat about it and what we did is you can take an elevator to the top now it's 630ft and you get Views on both sides of the arch.

And even when we sat in the elevator, which is like seats for five.

Yeah.

Like, you don't stand, you sit down in these little seats.

It feels very almost kind of like.

It's like a carousel.

Yeah, that's what it feels like.

Like a, like a, like a Ferris wheel.

Like that's what it feels like.

You're sitting inside of one of those little plastic, almost like old school Disney rides or something like that.

And so it just.

Just so people know, you don't really.

You see the arch, but you don't see the museum because the museum's actually underground.

So the museum is underneath the arch.

And so you actually walk underground into the museum.

And the reason we're talking about Lewis and Clark so much is because that's the vast majority of the museum.

Right, the museum, once you get down there, you actually see maps in the floor of the rivers and where they went.

And we show that in the video they show, they talk a lot, all about the time in Louisiana Purchase and Lewis and Clark and that it's great for kids and families and all that stuff.

And then if you want to, you can get a ticket from this underground museum that's under the grass that you see underneath the arch.

Right.

So if you're walking underneath, you know, in that arch, you're actually walking on top of the museum.

Then you can take one of these trams and you travel kind of in this.

You travel right up the arch and.

And inside of it, Inside of it.

And it's neat because once you get in there, you get to, they.

They leave clear glass.

It's not like you're in this, you can't see anything.

You can actually see out the clear glass.

And so you can see the stairs and the little workstations and all that scaffolding and all the way to the top is 630ft.

Yeah.

And what's neat, like you said, is the museum is 140,000 square ft. You don't see.

It's all that grass area that you're walking on by the arch is underneath is that museum.

And it's actually the smallest national park in the United States.

I didn't know that.

It's about 190 acres and that's less than 2% the size of the next smallest, which is Hot Springs National Park.

So when you go and visit it is the smallest national park.

In America.

But it's celebrating that story of Westwood expansion.

Now, part of the park is the old courthouse, and that's where the Dred Scott case originated.

Yeah, we didn't go in there.

We didn't go in there.

We didn't get to tell that story.

We've talked a little bit about Dred Scott in New Orleans.

Dred Scott was the case where an African American went to court, and it was a landmark decision by the Supreme Court that they held that the United States Constitution did not extend American citizenship to people of black African descent.

And so therefore they could not enjoy the rights and privileges under the Constitution.

Constitution.

So it was a bad case.

Dred Scott represents that case.

He will end up in New Orleans, and his tombstone is there.

And that's what we see at the Cabildo when you're there at the Cabildo, the same place where the papers for the Louisiana Purchase came to.

Yeah.

And when I think JD Actually did a video on the Dred Scott case from St. Louis, because he lives a little bit closer there than we do.

And the reason I know that is because I remember seeing it in our History or Drive app.

So if you guys are curious and you're in that St. Louis area.

Right.

Obviously, we will have our video and, you know, from the Arch.

But if you open up our app and you allow it to, you know, look at your location, it'll show you any other historic spots that we have mapped or JD has mapped or whatever that's been to and made a video from in the app.

And so I remember he did a couple things in St. Louis.

So it's not just the Arch.

There's a few things out there.

Right.

There's history everywhere.

So if you guys are curious, you can go to historyordrive.com and check that out and you can watch some of his videos, you know, on.

That in St. Louis.

I just wanted to mention it because it is part of the national park there.

We didn't get a chance to visit it because we're really.

We were centering this as Route 66.

Plus we had a very tight schedule to adhere to.

We did.

And so we had to, like, spend, like, two hours at the arch and then get back on the road.

And that's why we're celebrating the hundred years of it and how it gets its name.

So this was really cool.

And you didn't tell me about this ahead of time until I was like filming it.

And it was, I thought it was kind of a fun shot because you're sitting on the grass.

You're sitting on top of the museum.

Right?

Because you can every.

Anybody can go out and walk in the grass underneath the arch.

And the arch is massive.

Right.

So I took some video shots.

I even got my long lens out and kind of got pictures, video of the.

The windows from up there that you can look out over the city or over the.

Over the river when you're in the arch.

But tell us about how Route 66 got its name, because I thought that was just kind of an interesting fun fact that you could probably throw out at a dinner party.

So you have to realize this road doesn't really go north, south, and it's not really going east west.

It's coming from Chicago to Los Angeles.

Now.

It's the first paved road across America.

But it doesn't really fit into the interstate numbering system that's used.

Right.

We know our even numbers are really going east, west.

Yeah.

The 40, the 10.

And they move up as they go higher in elevation or in latitude or they go up a number.

Right.

10 Is along the bottom 80.

You know, like you go up in numbers.

Think of the odd numbers, but with the fives going north, south.

Right.

So Interstate 5 is in California.

Interstate 95 is along the east coast.

And the numbers fill in that way.

So you don't really have either of those happening when you go Chicago and then hit St. Louis and then head out west.

So they had first proposed 60, but it wasn't really working because it again, you have that little notch that's going north, south, and they're like, well, maybe 62.

But they didn't think that sounded as appealing.

It sounds a little second rate.

And so officially, Oklahoma highway official noted 66 thought it sounded cool and easy to remember and it felt catchy.

And so they went with 66 because it's not quite odd or even.

It's kind of in between there and it's neat and it's connecting like a north, south, east, west.

And it's kind of unique and one of its own.

So that's where it's getting its name.

Yeah, I just thought that was really kind of just a fun tidbit about Route 66.

Is it?

It wasn't fully east, west, it wasn't fully north, south.

So they came to a middle ground.

And again, I just thought that was fun because that's where we're starting for our.

I mean, we've got like 10 episodes, I think, coming up about Route 66 and historic spots along the way because there is so much fun stuff along there.

Now some travel tips for you.

If you're going there, you can park near the national park pretty easily.

They don't have parking designated for the national park.

No, but there's one that's like next to one of the hotels.

And honestly, like you're downtown so you, if you can find a street parking spot, you can do that.

But there's a parking garage there and you can just plug it into Google Maps.

It's actually pretty easy.

And I think Even on the St. Louis Arch website, I think they have some recommendations on where you can park.

We found a parking garage, made it very easy to walk over.

Yeah, it was like two blocks, very easy.

And then after that, if you want to go to a ball game, you're actually not far from the.

Their major league ballpark right there.

So.

So there is some, there is some downtown stuff if you want to do that.

We ended up staying slightly outside of town for our hotel.

But we ate at like a classic Route 66 diner along the way, which was pretty cool.

And you found it.

Yeah.

So we ate at Carl's Drive in.

And we ate there because I wanted to eat at these diners along Route 66.

And because Route 66 is going through St. Louis and it has its designated route through St. Louis, I wanted to eat at a diner along the area.

And what's great is this place stays open a little later to 7:30pm so for us getting done about five at the Gateway Arch, a lot of these diners along Route 66 keep the diner hours and close like 5:30ish.

But this came, stayed open till 7:30.

So it worked out for us to get over there.

Now Carl's Drive in it, it's small and they have burgers and stuff and people were kind of getting in and, and sitting and on these booths and it worked pretty easy.

People there were great.

They had real root beer.

Yeah, like their, their real root beer or a W root beer or something like that.

It was.

Or ibc.

It was IBC root beer.

That was kind of one of their things.

And I think it's been featured on like some of these typical shows like you know, Diner strives and Dives or something like that.

Yes.

So it's not the full hundred years of Route 66.

It's pretty old, but it's pretty old.

And so if you're looking for a diner along the route which is going to have the shields because you'd be looking for those 66 shields everywhere you go, that'll let you know you're on Route 66.

You can sit there.

Other diners, you can buy T shirts and stuff.

And they were really great and really great root beer.

Root beer floats.

And it's Route 66.

So we saw those T shirts there.

But your typical, you know, hamburgers, French fries.

Yeah, I don't know if they had some hot dogs or something like that.

So it was good.

It was, it was a good little spot.

It was fun.

It was, you know, kind of had that classic feel to it.

Yeah.

And just a couple more things about the arch.

It's Missouri's tallest accessible structure.

It's the world, world's tallest arch.

That was cool.

And it's built and dedicated to the American people.

So we really thought what a great way to kick off our Route 66 voyage is with this whole idea of Lewis and Clark kicking off the second half of buying America and commemorating that.

Climbing up in that getting, seeing that the kids had a blast going up there.

It's kind of like angled.

Like the arch has an angle to it.

So when you get up there, this kind of like angle, you're kind of.

Looking out over, you're not looking straight out.

You kind of look over and down.

It's very interesting.

Yeah.

So if you're afraid of heights, I don't recommend going up there.

Or if you're claustrophobic because the elevators are pretty tight and it's only five people.

So if there's six people in your party, you might want to split three and three or something like that because that's only seats for five in those elevators.

But I'm glad we started off from there because the kids enjoyed it.

Yeah, it was cool and it was cool.

As you step out of the tram at the base of the arch and look back up at the 630ft of gleaming stainless steel, you realize this structure isn't just a feat of mid century engineering.

It's a monument to the spirit of discovery.

From Lewis and Clark pushing their keelboat up the Missouri river into the unknown to millions of everyday families pointing their headlights west on Route 66.

St. Louis has always been the threshold where ambition turns into adventure.

This is only mile one of our centennial trek.

Next week we leave the riverbanks of St. Louis behind and head deeper down the highway into Missouri, stopping at the historic hideout of America's most notorious outlaw duo, Bonnie and Clyde.

Make sure to subscribe and follow the show so you don't miss a single stop as we drive from the Gateway Arch all the way to the California coast.

We'll talk to you next time.

Thank you.

Hello, this has been a Walk With History production.

Talk With History is created and hosted by me, Scott Benny.

Episode researched by Jennifer Benny.

Check out the show notes for links and references mentioned in this episode.

Talk with History is supported by our [email protected] make sure you hit that follow button and that podcast player and we'll talk to you.