My grandparents left their home in Southeast Missouri and moved to St. Louis to seek their fortune working in the shoe factory. Thus it was that my parents made the trip to visit my grandparents in St. Louis at least two or three times each year.

U.S. Highway 61 was a narrow, winding road that ran through the middle of every small town along the way. This was long before the interstate highways were built. Dad always figured he had made good time if he completed the trip in less than three and a half hours.

There is a joke going around today that people from Southeast Missouri think they are in St. Louis when they drive past the Arnold water tower.

We had a better marker to tell us when we had reached the big city. When the road expanded to four lanes just south of Crystal City. We called it "The Fourlane."

Mother was afraid of the Fourlane. "Slow down, be careful," she was forever admonishing our dad. Dad loved the Fourlane. He would boast to our grandparents how no one passed him for the entire length of The Fourlane.

The Fourlane was a marvelous sight to behold. The first thing that caught our eye was the way it wound around the great Grecian columns of the First Baptist Church in Festus.

Just north of Herculaneum, we would gape in amazement at the Old Rock House that was said to be haunted and part of the Underground Railroad that tunneled escaping slaves to freedom.

Who could ever forget the Kohler City Flea Market, where they had a wooden barrel with used false teeth. People would try on the teeth until they found a pair that gave them a comfortable fit. Yes, that is a true fact.

Some adventurous souls preferred to veer off and take Telegraph Road into the city. Not us. We were "Fourlaners" all the way.

I seem to recall a Western Tack Store that had a full-sized statue of a horse standing out front. That horse told us we were nearing the city. Alas, like Poe's Raven, the horse statue is nevermore.

I clearly remember the traffic stoplight at Butler Hill Road. That was the spot where we knew we were in the city. From that point onward, everything had a big city, urban look to it.

There was Dohack's Restaurant on the corner of Lemay Ferry Road and Lindbergh Boulevard. They were famous for their delicious Jack Salmon dinners.

A little farther north was the South Twin Drive-Inn movie theater. They said it could handle a thousand cars. It sat where there is now a Dierberg's Shopping Plaza.

Cusanelli's, the historic old restaurant formerly known as The Eight Mile House, located near Bayless Avenue, marked the end of The Fourlane. Beyond that, the grand highway seemed to disappear into a grid work of city streets. Dad always took Virginia Avenue up to Jefferson, and somehow managed to find his way to our grandparents' home.

Life takes some funny turns. We never know what fate and chance might bring to us. Who could ever have imagined that one day, many years after those wonderful trips, I would now live almost within throwing distance of that stoplight at Butler Hill Road.

Ronald Launius is retired. He enjoys roaming the countryside in search of history, meeting interesting people and adding to his postcard collection.