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In Arizona, a fading Route 66 motel hides a story of the Navajo Code Talkers

Philip Johnston used his Route 66 motel as a base to recruit over 400 Navajo men who transmitted unbreakable coded messages for the U.S. Marines in WWII, saving lives in the Pacific.

Summary by Chicago Tribune
FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — The El Pueblo Motor Inn, or what’s left of it anyway, sits vacant behind a chain-link fence along Route 66, its stucco walls clad in weathered sheets of construction tarp. At first glance, the nearly 90-year-old motel appears to be another crumbling relic from the famed highway’s early years as a bustling thoroughfare for hundreds of thousands of Americans traveling between Los Angeles and Chicago. But this isn’t just a fading…

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Chicago Tribune broke the news in Chicago, United States on Tuesday, November 11, 2025.
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