Thoughts during the apocalypse, Part Nine.

I have been blessed to grow up and live in a part of our nation that is steeped with historic significance. Massachusetts is the birthplace of the United States of America; my home town of Mansfield was founded as a community that held its first allegiance to England, breaking off from Norton and becoming a municipality of its own one year before the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

The Paul Revere statue and Old North

Church, off Hanover Street in Boston's 

North End, as photographed on Thursday.

And yet, sometimes I wonder if I have taken full advantage of the opportunity to soak in the lessons of our past. Yeah, I've been to Plymouth Rock. Who hasn't? But there aren't many other monuments of our colonial and revolutionary past that I've visited. I've been to Concord once in my life, and that was to cover a Mansfield High football game at Concord-Carlisle. I haven't walked the full extent of the Freedom Trail, or any part of it, for the expressed purpose of simply walking it. I haven't visited the Bunker Hill Monument, or Old Ironsides (at least not as an adult), or the Old North Church. And that statue of Paul Revere atop his horse, heading out from the Old North Church to warn the colonists of the redcoats' invasion? I had no clue where it was -- until Thursday, that is.

I drove into Boston around dinner time to pick up my takeout order from the restaurant owned by Mansfield native Jen Royle on Hanover Street (if you haven't been paying attention, it's called TABLE, and you can find a link to its new takeout menu on the left-hand side of this web page), and because of the ongoing coronavirus scare, there was plenty of on-street parking available within quick walking distance. So I drove past the restaurant, turned back around, found a spot on the opposite side of the street about an eighth of a mile away, and started walking.

As I did, something caught my attention and I stopped as if I had walked into a brick wall, transfixed by the sight to my left.

It was the Paul Revere Mall, in the middle of which was that well-known monument to the patriot that rode the countryside on that fateful night. And in the distance was the unmistakable spire of the Old North Church, where the lanterns were hung to alert Revere to the advance of the British troops.

Now, did I recognize it from a photo in a text book, or maybe something from a historical documentary?

Nope. It was from an old TV show from the 1960s.

When I was growing up, my favorite TV drama was an hour-long show that aired Friday nights on CBS called "Route 66." It was the tale of two young men, Tod Stiles (played by Martin Milner) and Buz Murdock (played by George Maharis), who traveled the nation's highways and byways in a 1961 Corvette convertible looking for love and adventure.

The Paul Revere statue and Old North

Church, in a still from a 1962 episode of

the CBS drama "Route 66."

It was a somewhat ambitious show for its time. "Route 66" ran from September 1960 to April 1964 and it was shot totally on location, and rarely on the original US 66 that ran from Chicago to Los Angeles. It tackled a lot of mature issues, some ahead of their time -- including in the final season, when actor Glenn Corbett, taking over the sidekick role from Maharis after a contract dispute, played US Army Special Forces veteran Linc Case, who had served as an advisor to South Vietnamese troops in that conflict (then in its infancy) and returned to his native Texas with a raging case of post-traumatic stress disorder -- although it wasn't known by that name at the time.

As with many episodic shows of that era, young actors that would go on to become Hollywood royalty (Robert Redford and Robert Duvall among them) would make their TV debuts on "Route 66" -- sometimes returning in different roles a few episodes later. And there was no shortage of episodes, as they'd shoot maybe 32 of them for each season. Sure, there were some quirks -- such as how the guys had new Corvettes every year (Chevrolet was the primary sponsor). But the show certainly kindled a love of travel in my pre-teen heart, which I still feel today.

As I mentioned before, "Route 66" was filmed all over the country. Several episodes where shot in the Boston area, including "To Walk with the Serpent," which aired on Jan. 5, 1962. It starred Dan O'Herlihy as John Westerbrook, an ultra-right-wing zealot who believed that immigration was the cause of American decline (sounds familiar, doesn't it?). Tod and Buz are tasked by FBI agents to infiltrate Westerbrook's hate group after a chance meeting at the Bunker Hill Monument, hoping to foil his plans for a terrorist act that will rally public sentiment to his cause.

The episode takes us in glorious black-and-white to several iconic landmarks -- the U.S.S. Constitution, Lexington Green, and climaxing on the Paul Revere Mall, where Westerbrook's minions have filled Paul Revere's tri-corner hat with plastic explosive amid hopes of detonating it during a political rally, causing massive loss of life.

Indeed, in a soliloquy delivered at the foot of the Revere statue before the climactic moment, Westerbrook decries the influx of immigrants that has somehow cheapened the American way of life. The camera pans around the mall to illustrate what he's saying -- and while you might expect a contemporary telling of this story to focus upon persons of color, a common complaint of hate groups today, in the camera lens of the 1960s the focus was upon individuals that appeared to be of Italian descent, immigrants and children of immigrants that have made the North End their home for generations. Different faces, same reprehensible premise.

It's during that scene that the camera briefly focuses solely upon the statue with the Old North Church in the background -- the same image I saw Thursday afternoon that stopped me in my tracks. I took a photo of what I saw -- and then found my DVDs of "Route 66" to take a snapshot of the very same scene from 1961, when it was filmed.

Needless to say, Tod and Buz and the FBI foiled the dastardly plot. Indeed, the guy who was going to shoot the plastic explosive was played by the same actor that played the sergeant in "Gomer Pyle, USMC" a few years later, Frank Sutton. And all the while, this took place just a few hundred yards from where Jen Royle would open her dream restaurant some 58 years later.

How about that. And yes, the short rib Bolognese was delicious.

Now, a few more thoughts along the road to the apocalypse:

** Rest in peace, Tony Calcia. If there was ever a Mr. North Attleboro, that was you.

** A new podcast is coming Monday, and it will hopefully whet the appetite of those that miss hockey on TV during the pandemic. My guest will be Bruins' TV play-by-play announcer Jack Edwards, and we talk about whether the NHL can return from its unplanned hiatus, what effect that might have on future seasons, and good broadcasting topics in general. Get it where you get your podcasts, or click on the links on this site.

** I have never seen more people out walking or running down my street than I have the last two days. And not all of them are social-distancing, either. Where were all these fitness gurus before the attack of the killer virus?

** By the way, I've decided that the next time I see a basketball team that can't play a lick of defense, I'm just going to say that they are social-distancing the other team.

** Farewell, Forbes Boulevard Starbucks, until three weeks from now -- I hope. I may be a raging homicidal maniac by the time your lattes are available to me again.

** Normally, my house is roughly on the glidepath for commercial aircraft landing at Logan Airport. Usually the planes are around 5,000-7,000 feet over my house. But the one thing I notice these days is how few of them are flying overhead. It really is like we've leaped backwards into 1962.

** If I weren't recording my podcasts, what would I be doing to pass the time? Well, I might be watching the woodchuck in my backyard. He's such a character, a really goofy guy. But what a set of ears on him -- I can't open the back door even in the slightest before he hears it and is off like a shot to the cover of his burrow.

And no, I have not seen him chuck wood.

See you tomorrow.