The Lincoln Highway was the first transcontinental hard-surface roadway in the United States, stretching 3,384 miles through twelve states from New York City to San Francisco. Planned in 1913 by the Lincoln Highway Association, it predated the Federal Highway System, later came under the jurisdiction of state highway commissions along the route, and was completed fourteen months after it began. The project started with four seedling miles, and the first passed this site, where a one-mile section ten feet wide was paved with concrete in October 1914. The Malta seedling mile, formerly a dirt and gravel road, became one of the first experiments in using concrete to create a better road surface. Because concrete was experimental and public highway officials resisted it at the time, completion of the highway depended on private enterprise and strong local sponsorship, for which DeKalb County sponsors provided the model. The durability of the new material was demonstrated by the original surface still being in use about twenty years after the roadway first opened.