Transportation
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The National Road connected east and west in the 1800s. George Washington proposed a route in the late 1700s to join the western frontier to the eastern seaboard, and Albert Gallatin, Secretary of the Treasury under Presidents Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, later promoted the idea. Congress authorized the road in 1806, work began in 1811, and in 1818 this first federally funded highway linked Cumberland, Maryland, to Wheeling, Virginia, while a privately funded road connected Baltimore with Cumberland. By 1839 the road extended more than 600 miles to Vandalia, Illinois. Although railroads eventually displaced it, the National Road's success set the stage for today's national highway system.
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Farmington, Pennsylvania · United States
