Wilt
Gold Member
I found this post of mine, which had been posted on POTN, and I felt that the content should not be lost to posterity, so I am posting its content here. Others can post 'the way things were' on other areas, including photography-related nostalgia!
My mother-in-law just passed away, at 98 (in 2018)...three months short of achieving 99. Born in 1919...
It has been said that 1900, 8,000 cars were in the nation and 10 miles of paved roads. In 1904 only one-sixth of rural public roads had any kind of surfacing. By 1919, the Bureau of Public Roads had spent only about a half million of the $75 million allotted, and only 12 and a half miles of roads had been constructed.In 1919 Lt. Col. Dwight Eisenhower took a military motor convoy across country, from Washington DC to San Francisco. The convoy could only average about 40-60 miles each day, and that was in the eastern part of the country where the 'cross country highway' existed. Nevertheless it took 7.5 hours to travel 46 miles in MD. Another day, it took 10.5 hours to travel 62 miles. From about Indiana to California the paved roads stopped. Some days they covered only 15 miles in 7.5 hours. On some days, they covered as little as three miles. It took 62 days in total, and many of them were 'successful' only by virtue of the military towing vehicles and 250+ enlisted men in the convoy. The caravan had traversed 3,242 miles through 11 states in 62 days, an average of 52 miles per day.
During the 1920s and 1930s, the federal funding for improving rural roads increased. By 1935, more than a third of rural roads were surfaced, and many were paved with concrete and asphalt for motor traffic.
