The Route Controversy: The "Racer's Route" vs The "Bakersfield Route"

By Warren Beath

In 2005 and the fiftieth anniversary of James Dean's death a debate arose over whether Dean took a route alternate to the one that had been recounted in books and magazines for over fifty years--and it was no accident that the question arose only after many of the principals who could  easily have resolved it were dead. Did Dean take Highway 166 to Blackwell's Corner after he was ticketed, or did he go through Bakersfield?

Highway 166 cuts west from south of Mettler and intersects 33 to the town of Maricopa where it cuts north to Taft and then on for desolate miles to the intersection with Highway 46 (466 in Jimmy's day) at Blackwells' Corner. It is a two-lane road through the oil fields of Kern County.

Highway 99 goes north from the 166 cutoff and in 1955 it went through the town of Bakersfield before swinging northwest seventeen miles to the intersection with 466.

In researching my first book I had several interviews with Bill Hickman who drove Dean's station wagon pulling the race car trailer on the fatal day, and who was ticketed for speeding along with Dean just south of the 166 cutoff to Taft. He also had been the source of last-day accounts for several previous biographies on Dean.

He never mentioned  a route other than the one north on Highway 99 through Bakersfield and then west on Highway 466. He never indicated they considered any other route through Bakersfield. In fact when I asked him whether he had ever been through Bakersfield before September 30, 1955, he answered. "Yes I used to go there to race midget racers." Rolf Wuetherich who was in the seat next to Dean testified that they went through Bakersfield and north to the fatal Highway 466.

 Above is a period-correct view of Dean's road through Bakersfield. The white car is a 1956 Chevrolet. This is the view Dean had. Notice there are very little traffic signals.

The mileage of the two routes is nearly identical. For those who believe Dean took the Taft route, the reason cited is that Dean wanted to avoid Bakersfield because he would not have wanted to drive through the center of town and do all the downshifting for lights.

But this exaggerates the actual situation. Highway 99 skirted the east side of Bakersfield and it was a typical Fifties "motel row". From city limit to city limit, it would have taken only a matter of minutes to pass through Bakersfield on a wide and comfortable multi-lane swath to the broad curve west out of town.

Vintage view of the last stretch of U.S. 99 Dean traveled on that day before the 466

Fortunately the inquest provides other confirmation of Dean's route. Though it was a skewed investigation in many ways the interrogators did take pains to establish what route was taken on September 30, 1955--irrelevant as that was to the question of who was at fault in the accident. 

Officer Hunter was asked the location where he ticketed Dean and he indentifies it as the point where an alternate route cuts across to Taft and then north to Blackwell's Corner. He is asked if he saw which route Dean took and testifies he saw him go north towards Bakersfield:

Q: Do you remember where the stop was made?

A: It was at Mettler Station which is 22 miles out of Bakersfield, at the turn for 33 off 99.

Q: Where does 33 go?

A: It leaves that point, goes through Taft and north.

Q: Did you see this car leave?

A: Yes I did.

Q: Which route did he take?

A: He went north on 99 through Bakersfield. (italics mine)

Today Officer Hunter is over eighty years old, and does not recall seeing which route Dean took. His youthful recollections under oath at the time of the event are invaluable. 

If that's not enough evidence, Rolf Wuetherich is also questioned directly about the route they took that day and it is also Bakersfield.

Q: The next thing we want to ask you, do you remember the police officer giving James Dean the ticket, that is the citation?

A: Yes.

Q: Do you remember approximately what time that was?

A: 3:30 or a quarter to 4.

Q: Ask him where it was(?)

A: Right in before we entered Bakersfield.

Q: Would you ask him now the route did you take after that. Where did you go immediately after getting the ticket?

A: (caps mine) THEY CONTINUED ON 99--THEY WENT INTO BAKERSFIELD. THEY WENT THROUGH BAKERSFIELD ON 99 AND UNTIL THEY CAME TO 466. AND THEN TURNED OFF TO THE LEFT ON 466.

Q: Thank you. Next ask him does he remember the approximate speed they were driving after they got out of Bakersfield.

 And  later

Q: Ask him does he remember any time at all on the road this side of Bakersfield at which he estimates the speed to have been at any time more than 65?

And later  

Q: At any time this side of Bakersfield was the speed more than 65?

Rolf never corrects the impression that the Spyder went through  Bakersfield.

The inquest testimony closes the case.

Growing up in the Central Valley as I did, there were two routes to the town of Visalia thirty miles away. The back route on a two-lane rural road was considered by some a shortcut, and to others a bottleneck because trucks would block your lane until Visalia.

Writer Jack Douglas was headed to the race that day. He wrote about seeing Dean earlier in the day and that "we all had our favorite routes to Salinas." Some might have prefered to take the cutoff through Taft because it was wide-open spaces. Others might prefer the two-lane highway.

Douglas himself went through Bakersfield and describes Dean passing him on 466. He came upon the accident just as the ambulance was leaving. According to the inquest and Officer on the scene, Tripke's testimony--and his accident report--he arrived at 6:20P.M. and just as the injured were being loaded and the ambulance left. Estimating that the accident happened at five-forty-five, if Douglas was thirty minutes behind Dean there was no way Dean could have passed him between Blackwell's and the accident site. He must have  passed him on Highway 466 on a stretch between Bakersfield and Blackwell's Corner.

If Dean had passed Douglas at the point of Blackwell's Corner--the farthest point the Taft theory would permit--and Douglas was driving sixty miles an hour, Dean would have to be driving about thirty miles a minute for Douglas to arrive at the accident scene thirty minutes later.

Bruce Kessler took the racer's shortcut through Taft that day, and he said he assumed Dean took the same route. But he is the best witness to dismiss the possibility Dean took the shortcut. Kessler arrived at Blackwell's before Dean. Unless he had been there a very long time, he would have had to have either seen Dean being ticketed prior to the turnoff--at which point he would have passed Dean--, or passed the Spyder on Highway 33.

But he never passed the Spyder.

He neither saw Dean being ticketed, nor passed him on 33. The explanation is, Dean had already bypassed the cutoff and was heading on into Bakersfield before Kessler turned east onto 33.

Rolf is asked at his deposition whether to his knowledge Dean had ever driven on that road before. Rolf's interpreter replies "It was not unknown to Dean, but unknown to Wuetherich."

Dean may well have chosen the route he did that day because it was the route he knew and was comfortable with. Dean had driven 99 through Bakersfield a mere five months earlier when he participated in the Minter Field Sports Car Meet. In fact the route he took on September 30, 1955 took him past the site of that earlier race some twelve miles north of town.

Dean had never raced in Salinas but he had raced in Bakersfield. There is no evidence that anyone advised Dean on a route other than his friend Bill Hickman, who had also been to Bakersfield frequently and would know that passing through town was no big deal even if you are in a hurry.

Both Dean and Hickman had some familarity with Bakersfield and so would have had their own first-hand assessments of the experience of taking the 99 route through Bakersfield with its half-dozen stoplights. They would have found the inconvenience exaggerated if not negligible. There was also the offsetting advantage of being able to pass slower traffic by using passing lanes.

It has been theorized that Dean's racing friends told him about the alternate route on highway 33. 

Dean's decision to race in Salinas was last-minute. The letter from the doctor who gave him the qualifying physical is dated September 27, and Dean was too late to be included in the racing program. It is probable that, busy as he was, he had limited contact with other racers prior to setting off.

It is very possible Dean never heard of the "Racers Shortcut".

WB