The "Mother Road" of the American West, Route 66, is celebrating its 100th birthday with celebrations across the U.S. from Springfield, Missouri, to Albuquerque to Flagstaff, Arizona. The road, which spans nearly 2,500 miles, connects Chicago to Santa Monica, California and remains a popular tourist attraction today. It was introduced in 1926 and became a popular route for people migrating to the West during the Dust Bowl era and the Great Depression, with the nickname “the Mother Road” by John Steinbeck. In 1938, it became the first highway to be paved and transitioned into a tourist destination following World War II. The end of Route 66's heyday came in 1956, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Federal-Aid Highway Act establishing the Interstate Highway System. Despite being decommissioned as a highway, portions of the road have since been added to the National Register of Historic Places and still popular tourist attractions.