The small building at the corner of St. Louis and West Streets has gas pumps out front again. For 55 years before that, people climbed into a dentist's chair there. Before that, Mobil was on the sign. Before that, it was Texaco, in a different and smaller brick building that is no longer there.
Every change to 620 St. Louis Street matches a change to the road out front. The station opened one year after Route 66 did. It was rebuilt the year the road was repaved, and it stopped selling gas as the freeway that became I-55 finished pulling traffic away from downtown. Now it's a city-owned interpretive center, with an exhibit about 1926 in Edwardsville marking the road's 100th year. The City calendar lists the exhibit's final dates as this Thursday through Sunday, Nov. 5 to 8, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
The corner, decade by decade
The Great Rivers & Routes Tourism Bureau publishes a detailed history of the station. Laid out by date, it shows how closely the building has followed the road.
| Year | What happened at St. Louis and West | What was happening on the road |
|---|---|---|
| 1927 | Henry Springer opens Springer's Madison Oil Co., a small brick building with a canopy and two Texaco pumps | Route 66 had debuted the year before |
| 1936 | Renamed West End Service Station, run by Robert Smith and Ralph Ladd, selling Mobil products | The station advertises a newly installed hydraulic hoist and air pressure lubrication system |
| 1939 | Old building demolished and the current one built; reopens Aug. 5 | Route 66 through Edwardsville repaved, brick replaced with concrete |
| 1961 | Bought by Ralph Ellsworth, who runs Ralph's Mobil Service Station | Business grows enough that Ellsworth later moves to a bigger lot |
| 1964 | Bought by a local dentist, Dr. Robert Marks | The freeway bypass that became I-55 ends the Route 66 era in town |
| 2022 | City of Edwardsville buys it at public auction | Route 66 tourism grant money arrives |
| 2023 | Reopens in June as a Route 66 interpretive center | The road is now a heritage destination |
1939, the year the road rebuilt the station
The building most people picture at that corner went up because of road work. In 1939, the station closed while Route 66 through Edwardsville was repaved. The old brick road surface was broken up and replaced with concrete. The owners used the shutdown to tear down Springer's original building and put up a larger, more modern one, which is the building standing today. It reopened on Aug. 5, 1939, managed by Edwardsville residents Ralph and Earl Ladd.
The tourism bureau puts the corner in what it calls the stylish "West End" of Edwardsville. That phrase explains the name on the sign, which comes from where the station sat in town.
By the 1960s, business was strong enough to outgrow the lot. Ralph Ellsworth bought the station in 1961 and offered washing, greasing, brake work, tires, batteries and wheel balancing as well as fuel. He eventually moved his service station down West Street to a larger lot at Schwarz Street. Today the tourism bureau sends visitors to park at the Route 66 Shield near that same intersection.
1964, the year the road left
The road didn't leave all at once. Madison Historical's Route 66 in Madison County entry says a new freeway-style alignment that would become Interstate 55 bypassed Hamel and Edwardsville in the mid-1950s. By the mid-1960s, the four-lane bypass carried both the 66 and 55 numbers. The tourism bureau's history of the station says that in the summer of 1964, around the time I-55 bypassed Edwardsville and ended the Route 66 era, local dentist Dr. Robert Marks bought the building. For the next 55 years, a series of dentists practiced there. The same history says that gave "new meaning to the term 'filling station.'"
That long second life probably explains why so few people knew the building had ever been a gas station. It also kept the building standing. The tourism bureau calls it one of two original Route 66 service stations left in southwest Illinois. The other is Soulsby Service Station in Mount Olive. In June 2023, St. Louis Public Radio reported that the station was believed to be one of the last original Route 66 service stations for more than 60 miles.
2022, the year the road came back as history
Route 66 changed the building one more time, this time as a heritage attraction rather than a highway. The City of Edwardsville bought the property at public auction in the fall of 2022 and worked with the Great Rivers & Routes Tourism Bureau to turn it into a Route 66 historic site and visitor center.
A May 2024 tourism bureau release gives the numbers. The bureau received a $919,000 Route 66 grant in 2022 and used $460,000 of it to buy and retrofit the vacant building, which the release says had originally been slated for demolition. It reopened as an interpretive center in June 2023.
In that same release, Cory Jobe, president and CEO of Great Rivers & Routes, said that in the first year the station "welcomed Route 66 visitors from more than 20 countries and 25 states." For a building most drivers on St. Louis Street pass at 25 miles per hour, that is a much wider audience than the corner has ever drawn.
The inside of the building changes too. In 2024, the station hosted an exhibit on the Mississippi River Festival, held in Edwardsville from 1969 to 1980. It included original posters, publicity photos of headliners, vintage festival T-shirts and performance schedules, and it ran through September 2024. The 1926 exhibit is the centennial-year version of that rotating approach.
The 1926 Exhibit, and its last listed weekend
The City describes the exhibit as a trip back to 1926 in Edwardsville, the year Route 66 debuted with a path through town on its way from Chicago to Los Angeles. It covers the news, fashions, sports and happenings of that year in Edwardsville. It has been on the calendar since at least July 25.
It ties neatly to the building's own history. The exhibit looks at the town one year before Henry Springer put two Texaco pumps on this corner. Visitors stand in a 1939 building that exists because the road was repaved, looking at the year the road first arrived.
The City's November calendar shows these final dates for the exhibit, all from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.:
- Thursday, Nov. 5
- Friday, Nov. 6
- Saturday, Nov. 7
- Sunday, Nov. 8
The station's regular hours are Wednesday through Sunday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The 2023 reopening was described as a free attraction with interpretive panels, a gift shop and self-guided tours. The City's West End Service Station page is the place to check for anything new at the station after this weekend.
For parking, Great Rivers & Routes points visitors to three nearby spots:
- Hadley House, 708 S. St. Louis St.
- First Baptist Church, 534 St. Louis St.
- The Route 66 Shield, near West and Schwartz Streets
The centennial on the street this fall
The exhibit is the quietest part of a fall full of Route 66 events in town. On Oct. 29, the station hosted a free "Haunted Route 66" talk with speaker, author and paranormal investigator Luke Naliborski, who covered hauntings close to home and farther away. Two nights later, the Edwardsville/Glen Carbon Chamber of Commerce Halloween Parade went through downtown with the theme "Mother Road Memories," celebrating the centennial with entries built around classic Route 66 imagery. The route ran east on St. Louis Street and then north on North Main to High Street.
The next parade comes three days after the exhibit's last listed day. The City lists its Veterans Day Parade for Wednesday, Nov. 11, at 3 p.m. It heads south along North Main, west on Vandalia, and south on West Street to Lincoln Middle School. That's the same West Street that crosses St. Louis Street at the old station corner, and the same street Ralph Ellsworth followed when his business outgrew the lot in the 1960s.
For anyone curious about the wider history, Madison Historical, the online encyclopedia from SIUE, has an entry on Route 66 in Madison County covering the road's original alignment through Edwardsville.
Old corners like St. Louis and West are a big part of what makes a home in Edwardsville feel rooted, and our team enjoys learning the history behind the streets our clients live on. If you'd like to talk about this part of town, from the West End to North Main, Toni Lucas and Premier Realty Group by Toni would love to hear from you. Let's Connect.
