How an Arizona highway inspired the lyrics to one of Gordon Lightfoot's most popular songs

One of Gordon Lightfoot’s biggest singles owes its title to a road sign that happened to catch the Canadian songwriter’s eye as he drove along State Route 74 in the northern part of metro Phoenix.

“Carefree Highway" was the second single from Lightfoot’s “Sundown” album, a 1974 release that topped the U.S. album chart.

The title track topped Billboard’s Hot 100. “Carefree Highway” peaked at No. 10, with both songs hitting No. 1 on Billboard’s Easy Listening chart.

The singer, who died May 1 at 84, recalled the inspiration for the title in an interview with Crawdaddy a year after the single hit.

“I thought it would make a good title for a song,” he said. “I wrote it down, put it in my suitcase and it stayed there for eight months.”

There’s a video on YouTube of him introducing “Carefree Highway” live in Reno, Nevada, where he says, “I used to write things down on pieces of paper while traveling around. You know, I’d write down a line or a title. And this one almost got left in the glove compartment of a car in Phoenix, Arizona.”

She was the Female Elvis: How a Phoenix rockabilly teen made the cover of Bob Dylan's book

'Carefree Highway' isn't actually about that Arizona highway

But the song isn't about that specific strip of Arizona highway.

It’s a state of mind with Lightfoot “picking up the pieces of my sweet shattered dream” while haunted by the memory of a former flame, although he also tells us, “I'll be damned if I recall her face.”

In the chorus, he laments the way that carefree highway “let me slip away on you.”

Different Drum: How a pop song written by one of the Monkees made Linda Ronstadt a star

Who was Ann in 'Carefree Highway'?

In that interview with Crawdaddy, Lightfoot talked about the inspiration for the woman in that song, a girlfriend he had at 22.

Her name was also Ann.

“I can still give you her last name but I’m not going to,” he said.

The writer added, “It pleases him that nobody is ever going to know everything.”

Lightfoot also shared his memories of “Carefree Highway” in the liner notes to “Songbook,” a career retrospective released in 1999 on Rhino Records.

“There was a real Ann,” he wrote. “It reaches way back to a time when I was about 20 or so. It's one of those situations where you meet that one woman who knocks you out and then leaves you standing there and says she's on her way.”

He heard from Ann after a concert at Massey Hall in Toronto many years later, Lightfoot added.

“She stopped by to say hello,” Lightfoot wrote. “I don't think she knew that she is the one the song was about, and I wasn't about to tell her.”

Do not miss these events: Best things to do in metro Phoenix this weekend involve spandex, capes and cowboy hats

Is there a real Carefree Highway?

As for that fateful stretch of road, Carefree Highway — officially designated State Route 74 in Arizona — was commissioned in 1964 and stretches for 30 miles from U.S. 60 just south of Wickenburg to Interstate 17 in north Phoenix. It serves as a bypass around the oft-congested stretches of U.S. 60 through the northwest suburbs of the Valley.

Reach the reporter at ed.masley@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-4495. Follow him on Twitter @EdMasley.

Support local journalism. Subscribe to azcentral.com today.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Why did Gordon Lightfoot write 'Carefree Highway'? Here's his answer