You're fast. The fastest there ever was, some folks say. Maybe the fastest there ever will be. They say those things for a reason: Because they're true. You are the fastest, and you don't mind showing the world what you've got. And so it is that you find yourself atop a pair of hot steel rails, racing ahead at full throttle, the countryside a blur, the wind as loud as thunder... And it happens, so quickly that you'll never piece together exactly what caused it. One moment you're moving so fast that nothing in this world could stop you, and the next, you've crashed into the side of an Alabama truck stop. This is the story of the Derailed Diner. It's the story of how roads end and trains leave the rails, suddenly without warning, leaving nothing wreckage behind. But it's also the story of how life goes on. It's the story of how we pick up the pieces and put them back together, as best we know how, taking that wreckage and assembling it into something new. Something beautiful. Something amazing. It's the story of the roads of America, asphalt ribbons winding through city and country. It's the story of how those roads carried a Nebraska girl named Karen and an Arkansas boy named Jim Brown to meet in the Missouri middle and fall in love. After they married, the Browns operated travel centers and other businesses from the Midwest to the Deep South, including the Oasis Travel Center in Robertsdale, Alabama, which they were allowed to purchase in 1996 despite lingering suspicions about their Yankeehood. But in 2000, life got derailed. Jim died suddenly, leaving Karen to pick up the pieces and carry on alone. As she did, she started putting her own unique stamp on her properties, always striving to try something different, something new. And so, when the opportunity arose to remodel the Oasis Travel Center, Karen's mind began to wander toward novel ideas for the restaurant, and it hit her: It's a travel center. It's not just about food, it's about the journey. It's about celebrating the endless roads, and remembering the wheels that turn to make America happen. See, Karen wasn't looking for a cookie-cutter truck stop restaurant that was indistinguishable from a million others at any given interstate off-ramp. She wanted a property that would amaze... a place people would want to visit again and again, and not just for the food. Sure, it would be a diner with the classic, home-style cooking craved by every traveler, from local families to tourists to—yes—truck drivers. But more than that, it would be a destination telling the story of a journey: a story about the dirt roads, railroad tracks, and asphalt highways that have, throughout our history, moved Americans from Point A to Point B. And so, based on a vision scrawled on the back of a napkin, the Derailed Diner was born: an unforgettable, one-of-a-kind eatery that offers delicious Southern-style food made with fresh ingredients and farmer's market produce, served in—get this!—a dining room carefully constructed to look like train cars that collided with a truck stop. Karen searched far and wide for craftsmen who could pull off a stunt like this, and she thinks you'll agree that the ones she found pulled it off amazingly. This is the story of the Derailed Diner. It's also the story of life. Highways end. Trains derail. But life goes on. Wheels keep turning. And if you'll follow them, they can take you somewhere really, really cool.