Victorville History - D Street/Route 66 Traditional Cache

U.S. Highway 66

The miracle of the early twentieth century was the construction of a vast network of highways that gave automobiles a place to go. The development took more than a century to happen. At first, highway building was a local venture and roads were marked and maintained by booster groups supported through individual donations. It was 1925 before the country adopted a plan for a national highway system and almost 15 years later before those highways were paved coast to coast. U.S. Highway 66 was a product of the grassroots movement for better roads and was one of the main arteries of the 1926 National Highway System. It was a highway which grew to become a symbol for the American people's heritage of travel and their legacy of bettering themselves by moving west. Unlike other national highways, Route 66 did not follow a single trade route established by generations of travel. It traversed sections of several old trails at its eastern and western ends, but it cut out on its own through the young state of Oklahoma and covered a lot of empty space before it finally reached California. The Route began in Chicago and continued through the prairie land of Northern Illinois, south across the Mississippi River, the corner of Kansas, Oklahoma City, and the Pan Handle of Texas, the barren plains of New Mexico and on from Amboy to Barstow, to Victorville, ending up at the Will Rogers Highway near Santa Monica. Old Route 66 (National Trails Highway) extends through Oro Grande, into Victorville and continues up 7th Street to what is now known as Interstate 15.

The Halstead Building/The First National Bank:

The First National Bank opened on May 26, 1917, on a telegraphic charter for Washington D.C. It was first located on 6th Street in the building which was the Old Coco Cabinet Shop (the only building available at the time) until the new building at 6th and "D" Street was completed in 1918. For security, it had an electric vault and a large manganese safe. An old man and his dog slept in the bank each night, which was heated by a coal oil stove. There were 186 depositors from a population of 750. Elton Goble, co-founder and first president of the Victor Valley Board of Realtors, was the cashier from 1917 until 1922. The bank remained at the same location until its failure in about 1931.

The Barrel House

The Barrel House was built in 1914 of cinder block and cement from the Oro Grande cement plant. In the early days it was a restaurant and jewelry store; in 1933 it became the Barrel House Liquor Store.