Hop in: We're taking a pop culture road trip on Route 66

A "Route 66" sign is painted on the asphalt near Amboy in the Mojave Desert in California on Feb.27, 2019.

Eric Baradat/AFP via Getty Images hide caption Route 66 is celebrating 100 years of being the country's most famous highway, an icon of American culture.As it passes through eight states — from Chicago to Santa Monica, Calif.— its charm is all about driving on the open road, through the plains and prairies, canyons and deserts.

Past big cities, cow towns and ghost towns, stopping at roadside motels, retro diners and kitschy tourist traps.The iconic road from Chicago to California is celebrating its 100th anniversary.Follow along with the history of the "Mother Road" and efforts to save and honor it today.Like every good road trip, Route 66 has a soundtrack — starting with the famous anthem sung by Nat King Cole (and later, his daughter Natalie).If you ever plan to motor West/ travel my way, take the highway that's the best/ Get your kicks on Route 66…Bobby Troup, then an aspiring songwriter and jazz pianist, wrote that 1946 song during a road trip he took to California.

Over the years, many others have recorded their own versions, including Bing Crosby and the Andrew Sisters.It winds from Chicago to L.A/More than 2,000 miles all the way/Get your kicks on Route 66…The famous thoroughfare was created in 1926, and three years later, the Depression hit, followed by the Dust Bowl — when drought and dust storms devastated farmland.A family in Pittsburg County, Okla., is forced to leave their home in June 1938 due to a serious drought in the region.

Dorothea Lange/Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images hide caption "The Dust Bowl drove thousands of families away from their farms in the Midwest...