by Andrew Alonzo | [email protected]
With a bronze-colored aluminum body wrapped in leather, gold rings around the handle, and a tip bearing the Olympic motto “Citius Altius Fortius” (“Faster, Higher, Stronger”), the 1984 Olympic torch was very special as it began its journey across the United States in the summer before the Los Angeles Games.
Today, a replica of this distinctive artifact is on display at the Mount San Antonio Gardens social center, amidst a Route 66 exhibit by local resident David Hiple.
Gardens resident Ann Stromberg owns the replica torch and the white uniform she wore 40 years ago, which reads “1984 Olympic Torch Relay Participant.”
“When we carried the torch, we actually passed the flame to the next runner,” Stromberg wrote in a text message on Wednesday evening. “Each runner got to keep their beautifully crafted torch.”
Residents of Mount San Antonio Gardens have created an exhibit about Route 66 that will be on display through August 12. Courier photo/Andrew Alonzo
According to local resident Lola Taylor, who is in charge of the display case, Stromberg’s one-mile torch relay took place on Monday, July 23, 1984, along a section of Route 66 that passed through Claremont.
After an 81-day journey through 33 states and the District of Columbia and with the help of 3,636 torchbearers, the torch arrived at the Memorial Coliseum in Los Angeles on July 28, 1984. Several runners carried it locally, including Stromberg. Passersby would have seen it on Arrow Highway and Walnut Avenue in 1984 before it turned south on Garey Avenue in Pomona, east on Holt Avenue, north on Indian Hill Boulevard, then east on Foothill Boulevard in Claremont to Euclid Avenue in Upland. The torch eventually made its way to Corona, Lake Elsinore, Wildomar, Murrieta and Rancho California, reaching Temecula that same evening.
Taylor said she is always excited when the Olympics begin.
“I think the discipline, the determination and the amazing talent that comes out in these Games … it’s been great,” Taylor said.
The Route 66 exhibition was created after a road trip by Hiple last year.
“I moved here from Hawaii last November,” Hiple said. “I had sold my apartment and the moving company said it would take them two months to load my furniture onto a ship and bring it to me, and I had no place to live. So I thought, ‘Well, I’ll just drive Route 66.'”
Hiple flew to Chicago in October, rented a car and spent a month exploring Route 66 before arriving at the Gardens.
As he was getting familiar with the campus, he saw the display case and decided to create an exhibit about his cross-country journey. With Taylor’s help, it was installed in May. The exhibit includes photographs of landmarks, postcards, a map and other ephemera. Alongside them are post-it notes with comments and stories from local residents about their own memories of the historic route. The stories range from moving cross-country with loved ones and pets to a story about a passerby who helped a local resident push a broken-down VW Bug off the highway.
Route 66 “is stuck in a lot of people’s minds,” Hiple said. “Everyone has memories of places they stopped along the way. I mean, it’s a legendary road.”
The Route 66 exhibit runs through Monday, August 12, after which Hiple will prepare for an upcoming trip to France.
The Route 66 exhibit is one of four currently on display at the Mount San Antonio Gardens Social Center. The others are “Peaches,” featuring art by illustrator Alice Simpson, ceramic art by the late Crispin Gonzalez, and “World War II,” featuring contributions from local veterans.
For more information, call (909) 624-5061.
