Route 66 Centennial Grants Flow to Oklahoma Towns – While $1M Goes to Marketing

For a grant writer, the day you find out if your project gets a thumbs-up or down is pure adrenaline. It’s Christmas Eve for dreamers—the validation of months of work, and starry-eyed hope for what your project could do, or the gut-punch that sends you back to the drawing board.

Since last Thursday’s grant day meeting, the Oklahoma Project 66 Grant Commission has been making 38 of those contacts. Ten projects got the thumbs up; the rest will try again or seek funding elsewhere. For towns along the Mother Road, these grants—$5.5 million awarded this round—are lifelines to small business success ahead of Route 66’s 2026 centennial and beyond.

Luther knows the drill. It’s already won three grants: the now-completed “Visit Luther” sign applied for by the Town of Luther, plus ongoing work by the non-profit applicants, the Threatt Filling Station and Tillman Cemetery. But this round, the biggest winner wasn’t located in a city or town —it was the state’s unfunded Oklahoma Route 66 Centennial Commission, which snagged $1.4 million (20% of total funding) to be administered by the Tulsa Community Foundation.

The Luther Register attended last week’s meeting, where approvals were announced verbally without any documentation being provided. After follow-up requests to an Open Records request to the Oklahoma Department of Commerce, which receives a portion of the grant’s appropriation, the grant awardees’ list arrived in the LRN inbox on Wednesday afternoon.

The Big-Ticket Items Awarded to the 66 Centennial Commission

• $1 million: For a “national and international marketing blitz” to promote Route 66 tourism. (Note: No details yet on whether Oklahoma media will see any of these ad dollars.)
• $406,000: To install six-foot Route 66 shield monuments in all Oklahoma Route 66 communities and districts, wrapped in local artwork.

The Brick-and-Mortar, Sculpture, Trash Bag, and Eagles Nest Winners

1. Davenport ($30,000): A monument to the town’s Route 66 past and future.
2. Canute ($695,000): Restoring the Hi-De-Hi Diner into a “Village Hub” with domino-playing storytellers, plus reviving the Cotton Boll Motel neon sign.
3. Claremore Museum of History ($504,267): Transforming land once owned by Will Rogers’ father into an expanded tribute to Rogers, Patti Page, Oklahoma!’s “Surrey with the Fringe on Top,” and Andy Payne’s jersey worn when he won the cross-country foot race on Route 66.
4. Bristow Historical Society ($774,677): Relocating and relighting the 102-foot Chrysler Tower, the tallest freestanding neon sign on Route 66.
5. West OK Co-Op ($968,000): A 400-foot double-sided art structure over Clinton’s 1926 Route 66 strip.
6. Uncommon Ground Sculpture Park (Edmond, $300,000): A 37-foot “Eagle’s Nest” climbing sculpture made from oil pipe.
7. Rivers Edge Arts Society (Sayre, $50,000): A 30-foot Route 66 shield inside a giant horseshoe.
8. Elk City Chamber ($211,250): Lighting up Rig #114 as a tourist attraction.
9. The Church Studio (Tulsa, $292,894): A massive metal egg replicating Leon Russell’s Shelter Records logo.
10. Keep Oklahoma Beautiful ($175,000): A statewide border-to-border initiative for beautification, litter remediation, education, and environmental projects. 

Does that make you want to plan a Route 66 trip in Oklahoma next year? Maybe it should be part of Oklahoma History classes! Some of these projects may be completed by then, along with the other projects announced in Rounds One and Two, including Midpoint Corridor projects of a splash pad in Wellston and neon signs in Stroud. Even if the timing doesn’t jive with competitive bids, construction delays, supply chain issues, and other Murphy’s Law obstacles, Route 66 will still be around long after the centennial. And it will still beckon everyone to take the Great American Road Trip right through Oklahoma!

The Ones That Got Away

The Luther Historical Society’s bid to renovate a Main Street veterans’ memorial space scored mid-pack with its grant proposal but missed funding, again. Arcadia also struck out. With $200,000 left unspent, plus additional infusions from state coffers, the next competitive grant round opens August 15 with awards expected in November, just weeks before the Route 66 centennial begins.

The Ripple Effect:
Since the “Visit Luther” sign appeared on Route 66, downtown merchants are seeing the effects of “following the arrow” on the sign. Merchants report increased foot traffic, curious travelers snapping photos, and locals lingering longer. 

The Proof:

• Third Saturday Markets: Kicking off on May 17, these summer markets will highlight shops, street vendors, maybe live music, and lots of energetic fun.
• Luther Business Alliance: Spearheaded by Cindy Harris (of Main Street’s CD Harris Designs), this new coalition aims to harness the momentum—think collaborative promotions, beautification projects, and planning events like the Luther Pecan Festival held in November (a big announcement about PFest is coming soon!). 
• Soap Box Derby (May 31) by the Luther Fire Department and Opus Entertainment.
• Midpoint Corridor Road Rally (June 7) between Edmond and Sapulpa
• Just wait until the electricity work with OGE is complete to permanently light up the sign. The nighttime version of the Visit Luther sign is even more glorious and begs for evening dance parties and sunset picnics! 

“World, meet our Mother Road glow-up!”
Oklahoma’s betting big on a centennial facelift—neon, monuments, ad campaigns—to cement its claim as Route 66’s best stretch between Chicago and Santa Monica.

Fields Youngblood Water Well Drilling