Roadside R&R
It was the summer of 2007 when I made the move from Southern California to Austin. Not long after I arrived, I began receiving photography assignments, some of which would take me all over the Lone Star State.
At some point during my first two years of traveling Texas, I started noticing roadside rest stops. I wish I could remember the exact one that did it for me; I think it happened after subconsciously seeing a few of them. I glimpsed one and thought, “That would be a great photo.”
I was drawn to the minimalist scene — a modest little structure set out on a beautiful landscape — and the midcentury architecture. Coming home from an assignment, I sat down at my computer, distracted by the thought of photographing the vintage rest stops I’d just seen.
Had anyone already photographed rest stops? And what did other stops out there look like? I Googled. To my horror, I was met with news article after article detailing the demise of rest stops all over the country.
Left Outside Fort Stockton, Texas, along I-10, I took what wound up being the only photo in the book to include a person and/or animal. The University of Texas mascot, Bevo XIV, and his handlers were on their way back from playing in the Rose Bowl in California. About the time we were finishing up the design on the book, we learned of Bevo XIV’s passing from bovine leukemia. We moved this photo to the final page as a memorial to him. Right Some of my favorite stops are those that draw on the regional culture and history of the area. I love how the designers of this stop near Winona, Texas, on I-20, used the oil derrick, an icon of this oil-rich area, to draw travelers off the highway for a rest among the whimsy.
Threatened Bit of History
During the height of the recent recession, states were cutting expenses wherever they could, and highway rest stops were the first to go. Some were closed only temporarily, but others were simply demolished. I scrolled to an article about Texas, clicked the link, and was struck by the image of a rest stop whose roofline took the shape of long horns. Along the walls of the structure was painted a huge Texas flag.
It was an amazing example of Americana. I was dismayed to read how the rest stop was characterized as “a breeding ground for crime” and shocked to see that it was slated for demolition. That very weekend I jumped in the car and made the drive to Flower Mound, near Fort Worth. I got a great shot and headed home. A few weeks later I was back in the area on assignment, and returned to visit. It was gone.
A big orange barricade blocked the entrance ramp, the concrete structures had been knocked down and hauled away, and the ground where these shelters had stood for decades was smoothed over as if they’d never existed. I immediately felt an urgency to photograph as many rest stops as I could before they were gone forever.
Companion on the Journey
It’s pretty tough to find a friend willing to take off work to drive around looking for rest stops, and my mother was worried about my going alone. So I invited her to tag along. I spent a few days mapping out a rough itinerary for us, the first trip taking us mostly through New Mexico and into West Texas. We headed south from my parents’ house in Pagosa Springs, Colo., then drove pretty much every highway in New Mexico.
There’s something about road trips that makes them ripe for spontaneous events and adventures. We were faced with surprises — a herd of wild javelina running through a shot — and inevitabilities, like sheltering from a sudden summer thunderstorm and running on empty, nearly out of gas. My favorite rest stops were the abandoned ones, and I had to beg my mom to jump the fences with me.
Left This is one of the last picnic tables in Monument Valley, Arizona. The rest were demolished so that a hotel overlooking the valley could be built. This table is located in a pull-off, offering a great view of “The Mittens” rock formations in the background. Right The rest stop at White Sands National Monument in New Mexico was my favorite location. The picnic tables are iconic, straight out of the ’60s, and the landscape is like no place else on earth. It was a hot summer day at sunset, and a thunderstorm had just rolled through, so hardly anyone was around.
Website to Magazine to Book
A couple of years into the project, and a hundred rest stops or so later, things really began to take shape. By then I’d realized that rest stops were more than just toilets and tables, and that this was more than just a photo series. I dreamed of the project becoming a book.
I’d been holding the images close to my chest and became excited to start getting them out there. I posted about 20 of my favorites on my website. Within months, I started getting inquiries. In May 2013 my family and I traveled to the Grand Canyon and took the overnight mule trip to the bottom, to Phantom Ranch, well out of range of cell service. On our way back up the trail, my phone made a little ding. It was an email from the New York Times Magazine, want- ing to run a feature on the rest stops.
Upon publication of that piece, I began getting emails from people all over the country, Baby Boomers mostly, wanting to share their memories of their times at rest stops. The response revealed to me something much deeper in the American consciousness and further enforced my idea of the book. I never imagined that these funny little rest stops I was drawn to would evoke so much interest from the American public.
My hope is that The Last Stop cultivates an interest in the often-overlooked beauty and significance of rest stops in the American travel experience, and maybe even encourages preservation of those that remain — in Texas and beyond.
