Black-owned businesses along Route 66 have the unique opportunity to earn thousands in grant money to establish or build onto their businesses.
The Route 66 Road Ahead Partnership, a coalition of state Route 66 associations, is offering $50,000 to provide direct grants to help Black-owned or operated businesses and attractions, research and programs on the historic road.
“We’re always hoping to get the word out, so more people have the opportunity to apply,” Bill Thomas, chairman of Route 66 Ahead said. “It’s not just preserving the history of Route 66, but this is also an opportunity to help sustain the businesses that already exist.”
The Road Ahead was awarded $250,000 by American Express to provide direct grants as part of the Road Ahead’s 100th anniversary of the historic route. The lump sum of $250,000 has been divided to cover annual rounds of grants which started in 2022 and will stretch to 2026.
This year, 10 awards up to $5,000 each will be available for Black businesses which qualify for the grant and match the intention behind it.
Eligible businesses must be:
- At least 51% Black owned-operated.
- Physically located on the Route 66 or in a community nearby.
- Employ fewer than 20 full-time employees.
- Are a registered business entity in good standing in the state.
- Be locally owned franchise with less than five locations.
Applications for the grant must be made by July 14 on roadahead.route66centennial.org under the Black Experiences Grant Program.
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The Road Ahead grants have already impacted Springfield. In 2022, the Route History Museum on East Cook received funds from the Partnership. The funds helped pave the way for the museum’s virtual reality showcasing Black experiences on the road.
“We received that grant from The Road Ahead to really be able to provide T-shirts,” Route History co-CEO Stacy Grundy said. “To pay staff to go out into community organizations – and training kids to be junior historians.”
Two years ago, the Route 66 Road Ahead approved a grant to the Route History Junior Historian Project with Route History for $7,500. The one-year project aimed to help provide paper and pen classes to classrooms to better understand the history of the route for Black Americans and guides like the Green Book.
Route History, which was established in 2019, aims to tell the stories of those Black travelers on the road through the continent.
“Driving Route 66 a lot of Black people were part of the great migration when millions of Black people were leaving the south to go to the north for different jobs,” Grundy said. “We started developing the junior historian program because we replied to a lot of history people didn’t know and wanted to really educate the youth.”
After ending the program, Route History worked with the City of Springfield to create a virtual reality experience using VR headsets for all ages to sit behind the wheel during the Jim Crow era on the road to better understand Black struggles during the period.
The road from Chicago to California that runs through Springfield still operates and is coming up on its 100-year anniversary in 2026. The Black Experiences grant is only one of the multiple grants available for businesses to succeed, other grants like the Extraordinary Women micro-grant and Economic Development grant both offer several thousand in award funds.
Claire Grant writes about business, growth and development and other news topics for The State Journal-Register. She can be reached at CLGrant@gannett.com; and on X (Formerly known as Twitter): @Claire_Granted