Eureka

About Eureka Missouri

Facts, Trivia and useful information

Elevation: 456 ft (139 m). Population 10,189 (2010).
Time zone: Central (CST): UTC minus 6 hours. Summer (DST) CDT (UTC-5).

Eureka is a city located on the western edge of St. Louis County, on the 1932-1977 alignment of Route 66 in the central-eastern Missouri. (Map of Eureka).

History of Eureka

Eastern Missouri has been inhabited since the end of the last Ice Age some ten thousand years ago. More recently, its Native American inhabitants were members of an Algonquin nation known who called themselves "Illiniwek" which meant "men" in their language. They were hunter-gatherers who also grew crops of squash, corn and beans

Explorers from the French Canadian colony reached the area in 1683 and claimed it for France, naming it after their king Louis XIV (Louisiana). They called the natives using a deformed form of their name: "Illinois". Later during the Seven Year War, France lost the territory to Spain, and the Spanish explored the area and set up some settlements.

What would become the city St. Louis was settled in 1764 by Laclede and Chouteau, followed by Carondelet in 1767, Florissiant (then St. Ferdinand) in 1785. Then, in 1800 Napoleon recovered the territory from Spain but needing cash for his war against Britain, sold it in 1803 to the U.S. In the new territory, St.Louis incorporated as a municipality in 1809. The Territory of Missouri was established in 1812, and it achieved statehood in 1821. St. Louis became a city the following year.

During the 1830s, the Illinois people were forcibly relocated together with all the other Natives that had in the past lived east of the Mississippi, to reservations in what is now Oklahoma. This opened the way to white settlers in the region.

A Missouri Pacific Railroad camp set up there in 1853 was, of course named Eureka and in 1858 the town was platted. The post office opened in 1860 and was named Eureka.

The town was a small farming community next to the Meramec River and when a new paved alignment for Route 66 was built through it in 1932, it provided some services to travelers using it. Eureka incorporated as a city in 1954.

Where to Lodge in Eureka, Missouri

Accommodation and hotels near Eureka

More Lodging near Eureka along Route 66

More motels and Hotels close to Eureka

Weather in Eureka

Eureka has four well marked seasons. It is located in the area where humid continental climate shifts towards a humid subtropical climate, so summers are hot and humid while winters are cold. It gets cold Arctic air and hot damp tropical air from the Gulf of Mexico. Spring is wet and may have extreme weather (tornados, thunderstorms and even winter storms). Fall is sunny and less humid, with mild weather.

The average high in winter (Jan) is a cool 39.9°F (4.4°C) while the average low is a chilly 23.7°F (-4.6°C). The summer (Jul) average high is 89.1°F (31.7°C) and the average low is 71°F (21.7°C).

Rain is on average 41 in. (1.041 mm) with the rainiest months being May through July with over 4.1 in monthly (104 mm). Snow falls between Nov. and Apr., with a total snowfall of 17.8 in. (45 cm). Relative humitiy ranges averages 69.7% and is fairly stable year round.

Tornado risk

Eureka is located in Missouri's "Tornado Alley" and St. Louis County is struck by some 7 tornados every year.

Tornado Risk: read more about Tornado Risk along Route66.
 

Getting to Eureka

Reach the town using historic Route 66 or along MO-100, and also via Interstate I-44 that links it with Pacific, St. Clair, Rolla and Springfield to the west and with St. Louis in the east. US 63 runs through Rolla to the west and US 50 passes just to the north of the town (with I-44). I-55, I-70 and I-64 go through St. Louis too.

Route 66 Sights in Eureka

Landmarks and Places to See

Route 66 on Meramec River

• In Eureka
• Tours & Itineraries
• Parks and outdoors

Eureka and its Route 66 attractions

Eureka next to the Route 66 State Park, has a U.S. 66 Phillips 1960s Gas station and the Former Phil's Bar-B-Cue.
Other attractions include the Black Madonna Shrine, the Endangered Wolf Center, Hidden Valley Ski Resort and the Six Flags Amusement Park

Historic context, the classic Route 66 in Eureka

The WPA travel guide "Missouri, a guide to the "Show Me" state" published in 1941 tells the story about the origin of its odd name, and of the nearby "Camp Wyman", 3 mi. away for underprivileged children and mothers, established in 1897.

Jack DeVere Rittenhouse in his "A Guide Book to Highway 66" published in 1946, also mentioned it; after Sylvan Beach, the only place he mentions east of Eureka and that from there, westwards into Eureka the higway "... is a pretty, semi-rural route, well paved". Eureka had 663 residents at that time and had "gas" it was "A small community established before the Civil War". No reference to hotels, motels or local attractions.

Sights in Eureka

There are some local attractions which are not related to Route 66, but can be of interest to some travelers:

Route 66 Attractions

There were several buildings on the original alignment, along both Central Ave. and N Virginia Ave. on the south side of Route 66, but these were razed when first four-lane alignment was built in the 1950s was replaced by a much wider roadbed for I-44 (1968)- Only some buildings survived on the north side of that important junction with Hwy. 109 and they can be seen in the following "Then & now" set of images:

1956 photo and today's view are very similar look at Drake's real estate gabled roof on the right side of the image, which is identical and the red brick Tudor Castle-style Rockwood School Disrict Admin Annex building in the central part. What has changed is the overpass. At that time route 66 was a four-lane divided highway but with no space between east and westbound lanes. I-44 on the other hand has a wide space separating the lanes. This views looking north on N Central Ave.

Phillips 1960s Gas Station

19 W 5th St, Eureka. Just past the overpass.

Phillips Petroleum Co. standardized their gas stations across the country in the 1960s, adopting a "gull-wing" canopy held up at the narrow tip by a pole designed to look like an oil derrick. Atop the pole was their revolving sign. This is one of those stations.

Now it is Assured Automotive, a car repair shop, but it has kept the main office, garage and canopy intact. It is Pictured above, at the top of this page.

There are several of them on US 66, see the Vinita Phillips Gull Wing in Oklahoma or the Santa Fe 66 Gull Wing in New Mexico.

Close by, in East St. Louis Illinois, there are two more: here and and Here

On the next block, to your right is another building, a former Restaurant known as Phil's Bar-B-Cue:

Former Phil's Bar-B-Cue

114 West 5th St. Eureka

The building with a semi-cylindrical shape like a large sized quonset hut, was a restaurant which has closed recently. It had been open as Phil's since the mid 1980s, but must have been some sort of diner before that. This is its Street View. It was surveyed in the Maura Johnson and John F. Bradbury, Route 66 Association of Missouri. 1993, "Architectural ⁄ Historical Inventory Survey. Route 66 in Missouri".

Key Cafe -originally at Villa Ridge- neon sign; now at Route 66 State Park, Best Western Hotels

Tours & Itineraries

Head west to visit neighboring Pacific to the west or head east into St. Louis or drive (west and then east) along the old 1926-32 Route 66 into Saint Louis through Gray Summit.

National and State Parks

Route 66 State Park

Site of the former town of Times Beach

3.4 miles east of Eureka along I-44 (Map with Directions.

Created in what used to be Times Beach a town on the Meramec River which had to be urgently evacuated and condemned, due to contamination with dioxin. The buildings were razed and the soil decontaminated. Now it is the "Route 66 State Park" which apart from it historic bridge and outdoors also has a visitor center with a historical display area complete with Route 66 memorabilia (like the neon sign from Key’s Twin Bridge Gas Station and Cafe shown in the picture), set in the former 1935 Bridghead Inn on the Old Route 66.

Read more at the Park's Website and visit our Times Beach page which tells you the whole story in depth.

Old Route 66 in Eureka

Deer and buffalo opened the first trail through the woods along the Meramec River into the Ozark highlands thousands of years ago. Later they were used by Illinois and Osage Natives and then by the French and Spanish trappers and explorers. During the 1850s there were cart trails linking St. Louis with Eureka and were used to build the railroad. The main state higway from St. Louis to the state capital in Jefferson City ran to the north of Eureka along what is now MO-100 (and then west on present US 50).

When cars became more popular during the 1910s, those roads, which were suitable for carts but not for cars were improved: State Higways (#14 and#100) were built, including bridges and better road surfaces. In 1926 Route 66 was aligned along both of these highways and had a paved surface from St. Louis to Gray Summit.

From Eureka to Allenton

Then, in 1932 a more southern course was built for Route 66, between St. Louis and Gray Summit, this new alignment went through Pacific and was a paved road. The former alignment became US 50 until the 1950s.

It is a short 3.4 mile drive along Route 66 to Allenton, this is its Map with Directions, just head west along Old Route 66 from Exit 264 to Exit 261 and there take BL-44 to Allenton.

As you can see in the Map above, we have colored the different segments of the old alignment as follows: the original alignment from 1926 to 1932 from St. Louis to Gray Summit runs north of Eureka, and is shown in Orange. The original 1926 - 1950s alignment west of Gray Summit and the 1932 to 1950s alignment east of that town, including the road through Eureka are shown in Pale Blue. Red shows where you must drive on the Interstate as the old segments are cut by it. Blue shows the original parts of Route 66's 1932-77 roadbed that can still be driven but are not located on the Pale Blue road, they end in dead ends and the Black segments show the orginal but now gone parts of the old road.

1933 Map of Route 66 from Villa Ridge to St. Louis, Missouri, notice that US 50 runs along the former 1926-32 US 66 alignment which is now MO-100 and Route 66 runs along its present course, through Eureka which appears next to the US 66 shield- lower left part of the map.

1933 Map of Route 66 from Villa Ridge to St. Louis, Missouri, by Missouri Highway Map Archive

1950s: Four Lane Freeway

By the early 1940s Route 66 was congested and the heavy traffic made it unsafe. Rittenhouse mentions in 1946: "From here (Gray Summit) into St. Louis, US 66 has three or more lanes.". In the early 1950 most of the original road was bypassed by a new four-lane divided dual carriageway highway which replaced the old US 66. The 1954 USGS map of Eureka shows a three-lane Route 66 running eastwards to the Meramec River, through Times Beach and then, after the bridge, it became a four-lane road through Ranken. To the west, it continued as a four-lane road from Central Ave. up to the western tip of town, where it becomes a 3-lane road again up to Allenton.

The state petitioned in 1962 to have the Interstate renamed as I-66 instead of I-44, but this was denied by the AASHTO because the number "66" had already been used elsewhere.

1965 New roadbed

The old four lane US-66 ⁄ I-44 Freeway was improved again in Missouri after 1965, and the old US 66 was upgraded to Interstate standards. The 1968 USGS map shows how the highway had become a divided highway east of Eureka but, it split at Times Beach: with the westbound lanes following the old 1932 alignment from what is now Exit 266 west up to almost reaching Votaw Rd. The two eastbound lanes were new, and they are part of modern I-44. A new bridge was built to carry it across the meramec River. Times Beach at that time was a thriving community. By 1972 the whole of Route 66 had been replaced by the Interstate system. In 1974 it was decided that US Hwy 66 between Joplin and Chicago be eliminated, but his was delayed until I-55 in Illinois was completely brought up to Interstate standards. In 1977 the US 66 shields and signs were removed.

Sources

The Ramsay Place Names File

Jack DeVere Rittenhouse, (1946). A Guide Book to Highway 66.

Banner image: Dead Man's Curve, Laguna New Mexico by Perla Eichenblat.