Gribblenation

It's been 25 years since three smart-ass kids, still in college or just out of college, decided to put together a website called Gribblenation . It was a loose collection of my own, Doug's, and Brian's websites and interests.  Now, 25 years later, we're still around. Over the years, our site has evolved.  Some ideas stuck, while others fizzled, and some never took off.  Life, kids, work, grad school, and everything else ended some things but opened many other doors that I don't think any of us thought were possible 25 years ago. It amazes me how many have been around to watch us (somewhat) grow up, grow up with us, or even now, discover us.  It is certainly not the most organized or sharpest-looking site, but we have a lot of fun doing it. When we resurrected the name Gribblenation in 2019 , it marked a new direction for us.  The idea of "every road tells a story" remains our key focus.  It is very easy to describe the "What, When, and Where," bu...

 For over a decade, gribblenation was home to All Things NC! Our look at the stories of the roads and places in the Tar Heel State. After over a decade since I last updated the site - I've brought back the All Things NC! Index at Gribblenation. All Things NC!  is Gribblenation's detailed look at the stories and histories behind North Carolina's nearly 78,000 miles of highways and byways.  Here, you can take a virtual drive of the Blue Ridge Parkway, learn how Interstate 40 made it to Wilmington, discover an old general store, or find out how that funny-named town you just drove past got its name. https://www.gribblenation.org/p/north-carolina.html Stay tuned as there are updates to come!

On January 17, 2021, Gribblenation is proud to celebrate its 20th anniversary, starting with its humble beginnings as gribblenation.com as a joint venture between Adam Prince, Brian LeBlanc and Doug Kerr  We've been expanding on the experiences ever since, because after all, every road tells a story. From the sign galleries and state highway end scavenger hunts of yore, to state feature pages, Flickr, the Sure Why Not blog (which expanded to the gribblenation.org of today) and now Facebook , Instagram and the Gribblenation Roadcast podcast on Anchor.fm. While some of the Gribblenation contributors have changed over the years, it's always been fun sharing the stories of the roads in which we travel. With Tom and Dan contributing articles to Gribblenation these days along with Adam and Doug, we get to tell stories and show off what we've seen from coast to coast. Adam and Doug recently looked back on the past 20 years with an episode on the podcast as well. You can check i...

  We made it to 2021! Congratulations! We at Gribblenation are excited to announce another avenue of communication and storytelling for you to enjoy and indulge in. The Gribblenation Roadcast is a new podcast that we've been developing that will help tell the stories of the roads, the road trips and the people who drive on roads. We'll also have episodes about topics that are near and dear to us. Podcast episodes may feature one or more than one of the folks that bring you Gribblenation content and blog articles. Sometimes, we may have some friends of the blog as guests on the podcast as well. The Gribblenation Roadcast podcast can be found on anchor.fm at https://anchor.fm/gribblenation/ . The podcast is also available on Spotify and we plan on making the podcast available on Apple Podcasts and Google Podcasts within the next week. Here is a link to our first podcast, which is a short message from Doug, about 10 minutes in length.

  We want to thank our fans and readers of Gribblenation for your support during the past year. 2020 has been a challenging year for most. While not everything we hoped to see or travel to went as planned, we made the most of it and still have a lot of fun exploring and sharing our stories with you. Thank you for your continued support of our blog , our Facebook page (now with over 2000 likes!) and our Instagram account . It has been a great 2020, with such things like the recent addition of a new columnist Dan Murphy, who also runs the popular roadwaywiz channel on YouTube, learning about possible alternate routes for I-77 in Closing the Gap - How Interstate 77 in North Carolina and Virginia Came To Be , visited the glorified highway stopover in Breezewood, Pennsylvania , checking out some great drives in the Sierras, such as Horseshoe Meadows Road; former California State Route 190 and the legacy of the Lone Pine-Porterville High Sierra Road and Onion Valley Road; former Ca...

We have a new gateway page here at Gribblenation - Travel New England.  This hopefully will allow for some easier navigation of our New England Features.  It's a simple listing for now, but it's a start and hopefully we will incorporate more gateway's for specific themes in the future. The direct link to the Gateway Page is: https://www.gribblenation.org/p/travel-new-england.html

On Sunday, April 26, 2020, the folks who bring you Gribblenation (Adam, Doug and Tom) had the opportunity to sit down for a roundtable interview and conversation with the host of the Roadwaywiz YouTube channel. During the two hour conversation, you'll have the opportunity to learn about the history of the Gribblenation site (it'll be 20 years strong in January 2021) and find out a few things about the folks who manage Gribblenation. This was a fun interview to take part in. The video can be viewed by clicking on the play button below.

Happy Holidays, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Solstice, Season's Greetings, Merry Christmas, Happy Boxing Day, Joyous Kwanzaa, Happy New Year and a Festivus for the rest of us! Whichever holidays you decide to celebrate, or not celebrate, we here at Gribblenation want to wish you and yours the best and happiest holiday possible, whether you are hitting the road or staying at home. We also want to thank our fans and readers of Gribblenation, which now total over 1000 likes on Facebook alone. Thank you for your continued support of our blog , our Facebook page and our Instagram account . It has been a great 2019, with such things like the addition of our account on Instagram, being picked up by the San Juan Bautista Historical Society for a feature on Rocks Road/Old Legislative Route 22 , articles for Old CA 120/140 Yosemite Entrance Road , the battle to build the I-95 bypass through Fayetteville, North Carolina , and going back to the future with “Where the Hell is Hill Valley US 8/U...

We have some quick and exciting news to share with everyone. Gribblenation now has an Instagram account, which can be found at https://www.instagram.com/gribblenation/ . You can also find us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/gribblenation /, on Twitter at https://twitter.com/gribblenation/ and of course, on this trusty blog page at http://www.gribblenation.org/ . As for the photo, it's just a really neat photo of the Iceland's Ring Road near the Hvalfjörður Tunnel that I took a few years ago.

So we've decided to bring the old name back.  In the upcoming weeks, we're going to be updating the logo, organizing a few feature landing pages, and more.  The site will continue to be focused on our blog/magazine features that we are doing today - but with possibly a few added touches. It'll take awhile - because life happens - but over the past year or so  - I've been thinking and talking to Doug and others on the idea of resurrecting the old gribblenation name for the blog.  And well, I finally made that jump tonight. So stay tuned - there's a lot of ideas and possibilities - let's see where this road takes us, shall we.

I've always considered the old gribblenation website and the roadgeeking hobby as a whole as an evolving research paper.  Of course now this blog takes the place of the old website.  The premise is that every road has a story - some are more interesting than others - and it's our job to find it out.  One of the bigger mysteries for me was the stub end of the US 40 Expressway just outside of Brownsville, Pennsylvania that sat there for nearly four decades. Well last week, I had a blog comment with new information about where that never built highway was to go and what happened to it. "According to the 25 Mar 1975 The Evening Standard (Uniontown PA): Proposed construction of a four-lane roadway (Route 40) from the Grindstone Rd. to Uniontown has been held up due to an Environmental Impact Statement and changes necessitated by the Brier Hill "new town" project falling through. A public hearing should be held ...

Yes, we're experimenting with a new look - I like the dynamic views for the blog - and I am partial to either sidebar, classic or magazine.  Give it a try...let me know what you like and what we should add or change! We can always go back to the old look...but it never hurts to change things up now and then

I was able to get through all of my New England photos from the past 6 months or so, spending the last few weeks uploading what I have for Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont. Here's the links to those collections for your enjoyment. CT - http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157607561048312/ MA - http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157607253434712/ NH - http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157607251994954/ VT - http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157607252483558/ I also uploaded some photos from my recent trip into Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Virginia (for the 2nd ICC meet). MD - http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157622760590627/ NJ - http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157622937824688/ PA - http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157607613959654/ VA - http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157622038789435/ Currently, I'm sorting...

Nothing major...just working in photos as I have time.  Starting to get through photos that have been sent to me in 2010 and I am sure I have some older ones hanging around somewhere. Pennsylvania: Keystone Town Markers - Seven more keystones added: Antes Creek, Beallsville, Cowansville, Georgetown, Industry, McEwensville, and Templeton.  Many thanks to Mike Natale and Jim Carn for their photos. West Virginia: Some Corridor H construction photos from the Scherr area sent in by Sherman Cahal.

They're small updates but I've been able to add some new website material this week.  And considering the last time I updated was in January, updates twice in a month is an earth shattering event. Pennsylvania: Two more Keystones added to the PA Keystone Town Marker project.  Ron Stafford sent in shots of Dixonville and Rossiter in Indiana County West Virginia : New Corridor H information (pretty much from items discussed here on the blog) New information and a photo from Jennings Starcher on former WV Route 56 .

Yes, a website update.  Certainly a rare occurrence these days.  But I've been working on the PA Keystone Town Markers Project over the weekend and added over 24 new photos (even some from myself!) Thanks to Jim Carn, Bennett Buchanan, and Brian Reynolds for their photos.

You may have noticed that the number of posts here at the blog have diminished since August.  The reason?  Well, I'm in the process of buying a new home, and the past four-six weeks have been rather hectic.  (And it's been hectic in transportation news along the East Coast as well!) We close on the 7th, so hopefully in a few weeks when we're settled and the study is completed, there will be more blog posts on the way!

I am happy to announce my completion of uploading my New York State road photo collection onto Flickr (which is a lie, since I am always taking new photos and uploading them). But here's over 100,000 of those photos, now easily available on my Flickr page. Enjoy! http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157623626537541/ Also, if you want to check out my complete collection of photos, including road photos from various parts of the United States and Canada, go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/ .

Jim Carn of the Pine Creek Preservation Association sent along another restored PA Keystone Marker. Little Pine Creek: Here's the original taken by David Brunot . Now for the restored sign. Looks pretty sharp! Nathaniel Guest continues to work on creating a preservation trust for Pennsylvania Keystones. The trust will assist Pennsylvania municipalities in repairing, restoring, or replacing a current or lost marker. He is currently working on designing a website that local municipalities can access to learn more on what they can do and what resources are available to them for the markers. While we're at it, I started working through a bunch of PA Keystones on the website. So far I have added/update 10 markers. They include the towns of Leechburg , New Centreville , Lexington, Wilson, Forest City, Waterville , and Roaring Branch. The Keystones also served as geological guides for rivers, creeks, and streams - three of the keystones added were for them. Tunkhannock Creek...

I just uploaded my road and sign photos from a recent trip to Arizona. I am still in the process of uploading my non-road photos to my Flickr account Enjoy! http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/collections/72157623192320574/