About this Book

Designed as a defense and commercial network to link Washington, D.C., with state capitals, the interstate highway system carries more traffic than anyone could have imagined fifty years ago. Lost today in the rush to get from point A to point B--with restaurants, hotels, and gas stations along the way more or less interchangeable from exit to exit--is the fact that these roads were laid down along ancient routes. These routes mirror the ancient footpaths and traces used by Native Americans and early settlers with route numbers replacing colorful descriptors, such that the Oregon Trail is now I-80, and travelers tracing portions of the Santa Fe Trail do so along I-25. The author tells stories of Davey Crockett, Horace Greely, and Charles Dickens, of women in hoop skirts, the search for eighteenth-century fast food, and nineteenth-century "truckers."