The Lincoln Highway
In 1913, foreseeing the automobile's impact on American life, Carl Fisher conceived and was instrumental in the planning, development, and construction of the Lincoln Highway, the first road across America, which connected New York City to San Francisco. Fisher estimated the highway, an improved, hard-surfaced road stretching almost 3,400 miles (5,500 km), would cost ten million dollars. Fellow industrialists Frank Seiberling and Henry Bourne Joy helped Fisher with their promotional skills, together creating the Lincoln Highway Association. Much of the highway was paid for by contributions from automobile manufacturers and suppliers, a policy bitterly opposed by Henry Ford.
Former U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt and Thomas A. Edison, both friends of Fisher, sent checks, as well as the current President Woodrow Wilson, who has been noted as the first U.S. President to make frequent-use of an automobile for what was described as stress-relief relaxation rides.
In 1919, as World War I was ending, the U.S. Army undertook its first transcontinental motor convoy along the Lincoln Highway. One of the young Army officers was Dwight David Eisenhower, then a Lt. Colonel, who credited the experience when supporting construction of the Interstate Highway System when he became President of the United States in 1952.
Read more about this topic: Carl G. Fisher
Famous quotes containing the words lincoln and/or highway:
“Allow me to assure you, that suspicion and jealousy never did help any man in any situation.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“In one notable instance, where the United States Army and a hundred years of persuasion failed, a highway has succeeded. The Seminole Indians surrendered to the Tamiami Trail. From the Everglades the remnants of this race emerged, soon after the trail was built, to set up their palm-thatched villages along the road and to hoist tribal flags as a lure to passing motorists.”
—For the State of Florida, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)