A Route 66 Association of Missouri board member said the city of Springfield, Missouri, plans to reassemble one of the demolished cabins of the Lurvey’s Court motel to serve as a visitors center at the Birthplace of Route 66 Park.
KY3 in Springfield had some of the details:
“The idea is to make a visitors center out of that cabin,” says David Eslick, a board member of the Route 66 Association of Missouri.
Forty pallets are currently being preserved of the sandstone. With Route 66 visitations picking up, the pressure is on to get that done along with the rest of the park.
Eslick said the city wants the rebuild done by 2026, which would be Route 66’s centennial. As usual, funding remains an issue for the project getting started.
The long-closed Lurvey’s Court cabins in Springfield were torn down last summer after a concerted effort by preservationists to clean up the abandoned property and let the cabins stand. The property’s owner showed little interest in preserving it.
The city had declared the property a danger and a nuisance in early 2019.
According to the Birthplace of Route 66 Festival’s points of interest page, the motel was erected in 1928 by Burt and Irene Lurvey when they moved the cabins from nearby Strafford, Missouri. The cabins became rental units during the 1970s.
(Image of Lurvey’s Motel, aka Lurvey’s Court, in Springfield, Missouri, in 2019 after cleanup via Facebook)
Thank You
Those sandstone buildings are beautiful. Glad to hear they will be rebuilding one.