Route 66 at 100: The Native American story behind the US's most famous highway

Stretching from Chicago to Santa Monica, the road passes through Native lands for much of its length – yet Indigenous voices have long been overlooked. Now, First Nation communities are reclaiming their place along the Mother Road, reshaping how travellers understand and experience the legendary highway.

In a low-rise strip mall in suburban Tulsa, the scent of sizzling bison drifts from the kitchen each time the door swings open. Inside Nātv – a quietly radical restaurant that opened in 2022 – sprigs of native grass from the Great Plains, juniper berries and sunchokes line the slate-grey walls. Across the table from me, chef Jacque Siegfried, who is of Shawnee descent, reflects on the culinary gap she's trying to bridge. "It's still really hard to find Native American restaurants around here," she says, her navy-and-purple hair swept into a high topknot.

We're just a couple of miles from Route 66, the most iconic of American roads, which turns 100 this year. But instead of searching for vintage diners and neon signs, I've come to follow the route west from Oklahoma to New Mexico and see it through a different lens – one shaped by the Indigenous communities that have long existed alongside it.

More than half of Route 66 passes through or runs alongside self-governed Native American lands, sometimes called Indian Country. Yet Indigenous-owned businesses remain strikingly rare along the route.  

That gap is what led Siegfried to open Nātv. Drawing on her classical French culinary training and her Shawnee heritage, she crafts refined dishes that "bring Indigenous food and local ingredients to the forefront", she says, as the low hum of the traffic carries in from the nearby highway.

She sets down a steaming bowl of stew, paired with a round of pillowy fry bread. The dish features ingredients from the "Three Sisters" planting method – an Indigenous approach in which corn, beans and squash are grown together in a system that sustains the soil as well as the people who rely on it.

"This kind of growing is a big part of our culinary history," she says. "We lost a lot of our foodways, and it takes work to reclaim them."

A different journey along Route 66

Historically, the potential for Indigenous tourism along Route 66 has been overlooked. But that's beginning to change. With a James Beard nomination to her name, Siegfried is helping bring her ancestral cuisine into the spotlight – and onto road-trip itineraries.

Drive the 2,448-mile (3940 km) route from the skyscrapers of Chicago to the Santa Monica Pier near Los Angeles, and you'll soon encounter nods to Indigenous culture: a tepee-shaped curio shop; soaring concrete totem poles; carved wooden chief statues waving to passing cars.

But while these kitschy mid-century landmarks reference Indigenous imagery, they rarely centre the voices of the 25 tribal nations the route passes through. In response, a growing movement is seeking to correct these stereotypes and offer more authentic cultural experiences for........

© BBC