The National Road crossed six states from Baltimore, Maryland, to East St. Louis, Illinois, fulfilling the ambitions of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson for an all-weather route across the Allegheny Mountains linking the Eastern Seaboard with the Midwest. Conceived by Albert Gallatin, Secretary of the Treasury under Thomas Jefferson, and authorized by Congress in 1806, it became the nation’s first federally funded interstate highway and opened the West to the movement of people and goods. Construction began in 1811 at Cumberland, Maryland, extending an earlier route from Baltimore; by 1818 it reached the Ohio River, by 1833 it was completed to Columbus, Ohio, and by 1850 it extended west to Vandalia, Illinois. The road was an engineering marvel, with graceful stone arch bridges over streams and rivers and inns and taverns built to serve travelers, and many of those bridges and buildings still survive in towns along the route. Much of the historic road remains part of U.S. Route 40, though some original segments are no longer used as highways, and its longest section lies in Ohio, running 227 miles from Bridgeport east to the Indiana state line west.

Photo: Rev. Ronald Irick

Photo: Rev. Ronald Irick

Photo: Rev. Ronald Irick

Photo: Rev. Ronald Irick

Norwich, Ohio · USA