by Earl Swift
[>] They spent ever-growing chunks...: John Chynoweth Burnham, "The Gasoline Tax and the Automobile Revolution," The Mississippi Valley Historical Review 48, no. 3 (December 1961).
[>] No wonder cars came...: "German Reichstag Member Analyzes American Motoring," NYT, October 18, 1925.
[>] They started simply...: Warren James Belasco, Americans on the Road: From Autocamp to Motel, 1910–1945 (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1980).
[>] "It is six in the afternoon...": James Agee, "The Great American Roadside," Fortune, September 1934.
[>] Consider the travails...: Francis Turner letter to his parents, dated January 19, 1933, supplied to me by Turner's daughter, Beverly Cooke.
[>] In 1924, the Bureau...: The Federal Aid Highway System Shown on a Map of the United States in 18 Sections (Washington, DC: Bureau of Public Roads, 1924).
[>] The surest source...: The Automobile Blue Book is described by E. B. White in Farewell to Model T/From Sea to Shining Sea (New York: The Little Bookroom, 2003).
[>] The trails were blazed...: Ezra L. Emery letter of November 12, 1923, to the U.S. Civil Service Commission (LHA file, Archives). Who, exactly, pioneered the auto trails' use of signature rings on telephone poles is unclear. As good a claim as any belongs to Emery, an early roads advocate in Wyoming.
[>] "One well-known route...": "Highway Officials Ready to Adopt Uniform Markings," NYT, May 31, 1925.
[>] AASHO followed the recommendation...: America's Highways; Mertz; the 1925 annual report of AASHO's executive secretary (Archives); "Nation and States Want Better Roads," NYT, March 1, 1925; and the James-Cron letter of February 21, 1967.
[>] At the joint board's first...: Mertz; the James-Cron letter; Richard Weingroff, "From Names to Numbers," at http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/infrastructure/numbers.cfm; and "Uniform Motor Road Marking for Main National Highways," NYT, May 3, 1925.
[>] Reconvened at the bureau's...: Mertz; Weingroff, "From Names to Numbers"; "Adopt National Road Signs," NYT, August 5, 1925; "Prepare to Designate 50,000 Miles of Road," NYT, August 6, 1925; and "Standard Signs Adopted for Federal Highways," TAC, October 1925.
[>] The assignment was a tough one...: James's authorship of the numbered system and his meetings with Fletcher and Sargent are recounted in his Cron letter.
[>] Privately, the association's...: Henry Joy letter to Austin Bement of June 29, 1927 (Bentley).
[>] When the secretary...: "[J]ardine Approves New Roads System," NYT, November 20, 1925; and "75,884 Miles in National Roads," NYT, November 22, 1925.
[>] Eastern highway officials...: "Too Many Roads as U.S. Highways," NYT, December 20, 1925; "Officials Plan Revision of United States Highways, NYT, December 27, 1925.
[>] And the governor of Kentucky...: Mertz; Weingroff, "From Names to Numbers."
[>] Henry Joy joked...: Joy letter of February 27, 1927, to Gael Hoag (Bentley).
[>] They're sprinkled all over ...: Richard E. Lingenfelter, Death Valley and the Amargosa: A Land of Illusion (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986); notes from my visit to the town site in July 2006.
[>] The Lincoln Highway's end...: The association's internal struggle over the road's final route in Utah and Nevada and its concurrent decision to disband are chronicled in letters filed in Henry Joy's papers at the Bentley.
[>] At a busy intersection...: "A Safety Intersection on the Lincoln Highway," TAC, January 1930.
[>] In September 1925...: Fisher biographies; "Carl G. Fisher Buys on Montauk Point," NYT, September 22, 1925; "Florida Resorts Boom Long Island," NYT, January 10, 1926.
[>] In February 1926...: "Buys 10,000 Acres at Montauk Point," NYT, February 26, 1926.
[>] But his opponent ...: Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974).
[>] But aside from a small plot...: "Development Work at Montauk Point," NYT, November 7, 1926.
[>] Ah, but then came September 17...: "75 Reported Dead in Miami; Hurricane Sweeps Coast; 2,000 Buildings in Ruins; $100,000,000 Damage in City," and "Miami Beach Under 3 Feet of Water," NYT, September 19, 1926; "Hurricane Rages 9 Hours" and "Realty Boom Area in Path of Storm," NYT, September 20, 1926; Fisher biographies.
[>] Fisher hired a train...: "Realty Men Plan Florida Rebuilding," NYT, September 21, 1926; "Finds Relief Badly Needed," NYT, September 29, 1926.
[>] Lo, the bypass movement ...: The national conference recommendations are quoted in Harlean James, Land Planning in the United States for the City, State and Nation (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1926).
[>] Five years later ...: "By-Pass Highways," TAC, February 1929.
[>] Desperate, city planners ...: Daniel L. Turner, "The Detroit Super-Highway Project," TAC, April 1925; "Experts Advocate Super Highways," NYT, August 21, 1926; "Wider Roads for Traffic Relief," NYT, August 22, 1926; "Super-Highways Are Criticized," NYT, October 10, 1926; "Super-Highways," NYT, October 17, 1926; Roger L. Morrison, "Practical Means of Building Safety into Streets and Highways," TAC, November 1928; and Wyatt B. Brummitt, "The Superhighway," TAC, January 1929.
[>] He belonged to a circle ...: Lewis Mumford, Sketches from Life: The Autobiography of Lewis Mumford (New York: Beacon Books, 1983); Donald L. Miller, Lewis Mumford: A Life (New York: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1989); and Robert Wojtowicz, Lewis Mumford and American Modernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).
[>] The modern metropolis ...: Flink, The Automobile Age; Kenneth T. Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985); Sam Bass Warner Jr., Streetcar Suburbs (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1962) and The Urban Wilderness (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972).
[>] What was needed ...: Mumford, Sketches from Life; Miller, Lewis Mumford: A Life.
[>] In 1924, MacKaye and company ...: Ibid.
[>] A small, one-family ...: Display advertisement, NYT of May 2, 1926.
[>] With the success of Sunnyside Gardens ...: Mumford, Sketches from Life; Miller, Lewis Mumford; Wojtowicz, Lewis Mumford and American Modernism.
[>] As the American City observed ...: Henry M. Propper, "Construction Work Now Under Way on the 'Town for the Motor Age,'" TAC, October 1928.
[>] MacKaye's New Republic piece ...: MacKaye, "The Townless Highway," The New Republic, March 12, 1930; "Townless Highways," TAC, May 1930.
[>] When journalist Walter Prichard Eaton ...: Eaton, "Saving New England," Atlantic Monthly, May 1930. For more on the pox of roadside development, see "Highways for Your Mile-a-Minute Car," Popular Science, March 1932; and Jonathan Daniels, "The Smearing of U.S. 1," The Nation, June 21, 1941.
[>] The roadside clutter ...: Ray Lyman Wilbur radio address, published as "Must Our Fine Highways Be Bordered by Bewildering Signs, Tawdry Buildings, Weeds, Waste Paper and Old Cans?" in TAC, July 1929.
[>] "They are not needed...": Walter E. Burton, "Beautiful Roadsides," Scientific American, July 1930.
[>] It also coincided...: Edward M. Bassett, "The Freeway—A New Kind of Thoroughfare," TAC, February 1930. See also Weingroff, "Edward M. Bassett, the Man Who Gave Us 'Freeway,'" at http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/infrastructure/freeway.cfm.
[>] While MacKaye labored...: Fritz Malcher, "Abolishing Street Traffic Intersections without Grade Separation: A Study of Highway Planning and Traffic Control to Meet the Needs of the Motor Age," TAC, September and October 1929; "The Steadyflow System," TAC, August 1930. See also Douglas Adams, "Norman Bel Geddes and Streamlined Spaces," Journal of Architectural Education 30, no. 1 (September 1976).
[>] "Imagine a city...": Malcher, "A Traffic Planner Imagines a City," TAC, February 1931.
[>] Malcher set out to fuse ...: Malcher, "Express Highways Combined with the 'Steadyflow' System," TAC, January 1931.
[>] McClintock had come to see...: "Unfit for Modern Motor Traffic," Fortune, August 1936; "Streamlining the Highways," Popular Mechanics, July 1939.
[>] Right behind McClintock...: Robert Whitten, "Facilitating Traffic and Preventing Blight by Spacious Planning of Express Highways, TAC, Augus
t 1931.
[>] The same month...: MacKaye and Mumford, "Townless Highways for the Motorist," Harper's, August 1931.
[>] Thomas MacDonald was beginning ...: Transcript of 1971 interview of longtime bureau officer E. H. "Ted" Holmes by Michael Lash, provided to me by the FHWA's Richard Weingroff; and America's Highways.
[>] The Bureau of Public Roads had been enthusiastic ...: Bruce E. Seely, "The Scientific Mystique in Engineering: Highway Research at the Bureau of Public Roads, 1918–1940," Technology and Culture 25, no. 4 (October 1984). See also MacDonald, "Highway Transport—a Field for Engineers," The Professional Engineer, March 1922; MacDonald and Fairbank, "Federal Aid as a Road Building Policy: What Is It and What Has It Accomplished?"; and speeches MacDonald delivered to the New York Institute of Consulting Engineers on October 13, 1920, and the American Road Builders Association on February 9, 1921 (THM).
[>] MacDonald had been among ...: MacDonald, "Thirtieth Anniversary of the Highway Research Board," an address delivered on January 10, 1951 (THM).
[>] In the wake of his victory ...: Thomas MacDonald, "Highway Transport—A Field for Engineers," Professional Engineer, March 1922.
[>] The first such studies ...: J. Gordon McKay, "Highway Transportation," Annals 116 (November 1924); Thomas MacDonald, "The Practical Application of Highway Transport Surveys to a State Highway System," address to 1930 AASHO annual meeting (THM); Mertz.
[>] The Chief entrusted ...: David C. Oliver, "In the Shadow of a Giant: H. S. Fairbank and Development of the Highway Planning Process," Transportation Quarterly, October 1991; D. C. Greer, "Presentation of First 'Thomas H. MacDonald Award' to Herbert'S. Fairbank," American Highways, January 1958; and America's Highways.
[>] Now, while MacKaye and Mumford ...: Mark H. Rose, Interstate: Express Highway Politics, 1941–1956 (Lawrence, KS: Regents Press of Kansas, 1979); Thomas MacDonald, "Adjusting the Highway Viewpoint to 1932 Conditions," Highway Engineer and Contractor, February 1932; Mertz; and Weingroff, "Clearly Vicious as a Matter of Policy."
[>] The surveys involved...: "The U.S. Highway System," Fortune, June 1941; MacDonald, "For Better Roads," Scientific American, June 1940; Oliver, "In the Shadow of a Giant"; Henry A. Wallace, "Great Southern Progress to Follow Road Survey," Southern Highway Journal, June 1937; Seely, "The Scientific Mystique in Engineering"; Mertz; and America's Highways.
[>] Bess fell ill...: "Mrs. M'Donald Succumbs; Wife of Road Chief," Washington Post, August 7, 1935; 2009 interview with Lynda Weidinger.
[>] Besides Fairbank...: Joyce N. Ritter, "Thomas H. MacDonald and Charles D. Curtiss," APWA Reporter, October 1979; America's Highways.
[>] And there was Caroline...: Employment jacket of Caroline Fuller (Carrie Fuller in her early career at BPR), obtained through Richard Weingroff from the National Archives' personnel records depository in St. Louis.
[>] He wandered for weeks...: MacDonald travel diaries (THM).
[>] In 1936...: MacDonald travel diaries; Mertz.
[>] Even by today's standards...: Paul F. Griffin, "Blueprint for Autobahn, USA," Scientific Monthly, June 1954; and Edward Dimendberg, "The Will to Motorization: Cinema, Highways, and Modernity: For Wolf Donner, in Memoriam," October 73 (Summer 1995).
[>] The Chief admired...: MacDonald's typed 1938 diary from the Eighth International Road Congress (THM).
[>] But the Chief saw little...: MacDonald, "Contrasting United States and European Practices in Road Development," speech delivered December 5, 1938, at AASHO's annual meeting in Dallas (THM); MacDonald's testimony before the Senate Subcommittee on Banking and Currency on February 24, 1938 (transcript, THM).
[>] Descended from highways...: Roger Shaw, "Mars Motors East," Current History, February 1939.
[>] As Time pointed out...: "Hitler Hobby," Time, February 27, 1939.
[>] Still, Hitler's highways...: "Memorandum on Super-Highways," National Highway Users Conference, February 19, 1938 (THM); MacDonald letter to Federal Emergency Relief Administration, October 24, 1934 (THM). The THM papers also include the proposals of various big thinkers inspired by the German highways—among them, the "U.S. Monumental Highway System" proposed by'S. William Knoblock of Phoenix, the 1930 New York & New England Motorways project of Lester P. Barlow, and others.
[>] Their meeting included...: The Chief's meeting with FDR was referred to in a February 7, 1938, morning press conference, a summary of which is part of THM. The president told reporters, the document says, that MacDonald "was coming in to see him today to discuss 'through national highways,' which are his 'favorite subject,' civil and military highway needs, and the problem of excess condemnation." Richard Weingroff places the meeting on the following day, based on press clippings.
[>] As Fairbank put it...: Fairbank memo of March 5, 1938, to the Chief (THM).
[>] Titled Toll Roads and Free Roads ...: Toll Roads and Free Roads (House Doc. 272; 76th Congress, 1st session); a March 20, 1939, digest of the report prepared for the White House (THM); and H. E. Hilts, "Planning the Interregional Highway System," Highway Research Board: Proceedings of the Twentieth Annual Meeting (Washington, DC: HRB, 1940).
[>] Among those praising...: Miller McClintock letter of May 5, 1939, to Pyke Johnson, copied to the Chief (Archives).
[>] The man receiving...: Roland Marchand, "The Designers Go to the Fair II: Norman Bel Geddes, the General Motors 'Futurama,' and the Visit to the Factory Transformed," Design Issues 8, no. 2 (Spring 1992); Robert Coombs, "Norman Bel Geddes: Highways and Horizons," Perspecta 13 (1971); Paul Mason Fotsch, "The Building of a Superhighway Future at the New York World's Fair," Cultural Critique 48 (Spring 2001); "Tomorrow's America Modeled in 'Futurama,'" Popular Mechanics, July 1939; Dimendberg, "The Will to Motorization"; Douglas Adams, "Norman Bel Geddes and Streamlined Spaces."
[>] You were then directed...: Quotes from the narration are from the Futurama script (THM).
[>] Bel Geddes described...: Robert Coombs, "Norman Bel Geddes: Highways and Horizons"; Marchand, "The Designers Go to the Fair II."
[>] They could step into a full-scale...: Official Guide Book of the New York World's Fair 1939 (New York: Exposition Publications, 1939).
[>] Among their critics...: "Rebuilding Our Cities: Parasitic Modes of Life Must Go, Lewis Mumford Argues," Newsweek, April 18, 1938; Time, April 18, 1938.
[>] "Mr. Geddes is a great magician...": Mumford, "The Sky Line," The New Yorker, July 29, 1939.
[>] The Chief wasn't impressed...: Mark'S. Foster, From Streetcar to Superhighway: American City Planners and Urban Transportation, 1900–1940 (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1981); conversations and e-mail exchanges with Richard Weingroff.
[>] Perhaps sensitive...: Knudsen quoted in a July 20, 1938, GM news release. He reiterated the point in releases of April 19 and May 30, 1939 (THM).
[>] When he was called on to speak...: MacDonald speech of November 2, 1939, at New York's Terrace Club (THM).
[>] The state surveyed the line...: Mertz; "Speeders' Dream," Newsweek, May 6, 1940; "Railroadbed Highway," Scientific American, May 1940; undated pamphlet produced by the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (THM).
[>] There was a catch ...: Charles L. Dearing, "Turnpike Authorities in the United States," Law and Contemporary Problems 26, no. 4 (Autumn 1961).
[>] Ten thousand men ...: "New Superhighway Tunnels the Alleghenies," Popular Science, September 1940; "Dream Drained," Time, October 4, 1937; "A Road to Match Today's Car," Popular Mechanics, March 1941; F. E. Wood and Paul F. Griffin, "Blueprint for Autobahn, USA," Scientific Monthly, June 1954.
[>] He was bothered only by the toll ...: "The Case Against Toll Roads," TAC, July 1947; MacDonald letter of April 22, 1947, to the Manchester (NH) Sunday News, made available to me by Richard Weingroff.
[>] The company was a prototype ...: Flink; John A. Jakle and Keith A. Sculle, Fast Food: Roadside Restaurants in the Automobile Age (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999); and http://www.hojoland.com/.
[>] Other chains sproute
d ...: Earl Swift, "Stuck on Stuckey's," (Norfolk) Virginian-Pilot, July 25, 2004.
[>] That month, the president appointed ...: MacDonald letter to FDR dated April 17, 1941 (Archives).
[>] The new panel ...: Louis Ward Kemp, "Aesthetes and Engineers: The Occupational Ideology of Highway Design," Technology and Culture 27, no. 4 (October 1986).
[>] It would span ...: "Data on Proposed Report to the President Prepared by the Staff for Consideration by the National Interregional Highway Committee, Fourth Meeting" (Archives).
[>] Motorists on the interregional system ...: Interregional Highways (House Doc. 379, 78th Congress, 2nd Session); conversations and e-mail exchanges with Richard Weingroff; Mertz; America's Highways; Rose, Interstate: Express Highway Politics, 1941–1956; Kemp, "Aesthetes and Engineers"; Oliver, "In the Shadow of a Giant"; H. E. Hilts, "Cooperation Is Essential in Building a National System of Interregional Highways," 1944 (Archives); "Chart Presentation of Design Standards Proposed in the Report on Interregional Highways," 1945 (Archives); "Report Explaining Recommended Standards for Interregional Highways," undated (Archives); V. T. Boughton, "Highways After the War," Scientific American, July 1944; Jean Ackermann, "You'll Like the Road Ahead," Popular Science, June 1944; Paul W. Kearney, "Iowa 'Roads Scholar' Plans for Postwar Highways to Put U.S. Back on Wheels," Indianapolis Star, June 25, 1944; and "Build Expressways Through Slum Areas," TAC, November 1951. The Chief's "We can't afford them" quote is from William Carter, "Roads Tomorrow," Holiday, March 1946.
[>] Fairbank again did most, if not all ...: Interregional Highways; Mertz; Carey Longmire, "Green Light Ahead," Collier's, December 29, 1945. That BPR intended the system to enter cities from the start is clear from its own documents. This refutes a stubborn myth about the interstates: that they were conceived as rural highways first and foremost, and that cities were added to win support from mayors and businessmen and, ultimately, the members of Congress who would supply the money to build them. Both Toll Roads and Free Roads and Interregional Highways devoted considerable attention to the system's urban stretches, and the Chief's first known reference to urban highway problems occurred decades earlier, in his December 6, 1922, annual address to AASHO (Mertz); for the following three decades, he and Fairbank were unwavering in their push for urbanizing the federal highway program.