1910's Business and the Economy | National Old Trails Road: Ocean to Ocean Highway

Pamphlet, Maps

By: Charles Henry Davis

Date: 1914

Source: Davis, Charles Henry. National Old Trails Road: Ocean to Ocean Highway. Washington, D.C.: National Highways Association, 1914.

About the Author: Charles Henry Davis (1865–1951), a civil engineer and manufacturer of road machinery, founded the National Highways Association in 1912. A prominent campaigner for improved roads, Davis advocated a federally coordinated system of national highways at a time when most roads were still locally financed, maintained, and administered.

Introduction

Even as a nationally coordinated railroad network appeared in the late nineteenth century, American public roads remained under the control of the most local of governmental units. Towns were subdivided into countless road districts, with locally appointed "pathmasters" responsible for the maintenance of short...