1919: ‘The Interstate Expedition”

THE LINCOLN HIGHWAY FORUM

Vol. 1, No. 3—Spring 1994 - The Official Journal of the Lincoln Highway Association

1919: 'The Interstate Expedition” by Vaughn Smartt

The following article appeared in the August 1973 issue of Constructor, the magazine of the Associated General Contractors of America. Of the dozens of accounts we have read of this amazing enterprise, this is by far the best. It is reprinted with the permission of Constructor editor Bill Heavey. We also thank LHA director Beth Savage, who spent part of her Christmas vacation copying these Photographs from originals in the National Archives.

Editor Note After Ike: Not all statistics in this article are consistent with convoy reports

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The interstate highway system would probably have been built sooner or later, but the fact that it was built sooner is due in large measure to the military. More specifically, it happened because a military man who had some first-hand knowledge of the condition of the nation's roads was president when the Interstate Highway Act was passed by Congress in 1956.

The "U.S. System of Interstate and Defense Highways" was conceived and laid out by the Bureau of Public Roads in 1936, some twenty years before the Congress finally authorized it.

The military has always been in favor of good roads as a means of moving troops back and forth. During World War Il, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower and other American military officers were tremendously impressed by the German autobahns and the ease with which the Germans could move troops around on this network of super highways.

Writing in his book, At Ease—Stories I Tell to Friends, General Eisenhower said, “after seeing the autobahns of modern Germany and knowing the asset those highways were to the Germans, I decided, as president, to put an emphasis on this kind of road building. When we finally secured the necessary congressional approval, we started the 41,000 miles [since extended to 42,795 miles] of super highways that are already proving their worth. This was one of the things that I felt deeply about and I made it a personal and absolute decision to see that the nation would benefit by it."

Eisenhower gained his first knowledge of the condition of the nation's highways in 1919, when he accompanied an army convoy which left Washington on July 7, crossed the country and arrived in San Francisco Sept. 5, nearly two months later. He subsequently wrote that this convoy “started me thinking about good, two-lane highways, but Germany had made me see the wisdom of broader ribbons across the land."

The 1919 transcontinental army convoy had a Homeric flavor to it. The internal combustion engine was still in its infancy and was not as dependable as it is today. A transcontinental convoy had never been attempted before and the army, in fact, was not sure that it could be done. As it turned out, the convoy made the journey in slightly less than two months, only two days behind schedule. It traveled at an average speed of ten to fifteen miles an hour, covered about sixty miles a day, and, in all, clocked about 3,200 miles (After Ike eds, the real average speed was 6.07 mph).

The expedition had several objectives. The War Department wished to test several different types of equipment and it wished to give the drivers some experience. It wished to demonstrate the practicability of motor transportation and, in the dry language of officialism, it wanted to “demonstrate the necessity for the judicious expenditure of federal government appropriations in providing for the necessary highways.”

The convoy was seen as a contribution to the Good Roads movement and it also had a recruiting mission (though why the army should be recruiting in the summer of 1919 is hard to understand). Finally, it was to be an exhibition to the general public of the development of the motor vehicle for military purposes.

The convoy consisted of about sixty trucks, identified in army language as "Class B vehicles." Some of the trucks were equipped with pneumatic tires while others had solid rubber tires. Two trucks had been converted into ambulances and two others were made into rolling machine shops. There were about a half-dozen staff cars of different manufacture and an equal number of motorcycles, some equipped with sidecars. There was also an engineer unit and a couple of kitchen trailers. In all there were seventy-two vehicles and about 280 officers, observers, and enlisted men— all commanded by Lt. Col. Charles W. McClure.

The convoy started in Washington, moving north to Pennsylvania, then turning due west across Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. It would cross the Mississippi River at Clinton, Iowa, and then continue through Iowa, Nebraska, and southern Wyoming. The route then dipped down to Salt Lake City, turned west again across Nevada and dropped down the western slope of the Sierra Nevada to Sacramento and San Francisco.

During the course of the trip, the engineer unit remodeled or rebuilt entirely sixty-five bridges in order to accommodate the heavy trucks. On one occasion, fourteen bridges were rebuilt in a single day. The convoy was delayed for one day by heavy rains in North Platte, Nebr., which turned the road into a sea of gumbo.

Crossing the Nevada desert, the convoy encountered a sand drift 300 feet high and three miles long. Every vehicle in the convoy had to be pushed or pulled through and it took the men eleven hours to make twelve miles. This accounted for the second day's delay in meeting the prearranged schedule.

It was only by chance that Eisenhower went along. At this time, he was a lieutenant colonel with the permanent rank of captain. He was stationed with the infant Tank Corps at Camp Meade, Maryland, and not very happy with his assignment, especially since there were no quarters on the post available for his wife and son. When he heard about plans for the convoy he wrote that he was "immediately excited." And he added, "I wanted to go along partly for a lark and partly to learn."

“To those who have known only concrete and macadam highways of gentle grades and engineered curves," he continued, "such a trip might seem humdrum. But it had never been attempted before and in those days we were not sure that it could be accomplished at all.”

In his view, Eisenhower wrote, “The trip would dramatize the need for better main highways. The use of army vehicles of almost all types would offer an opportunity for comparative tests. And many Americans would be able to see samples of equipment used in the war just concluded. Even a small Renault tank was to be carried along." In any case, Ike and a friend, Maj. Sereno Brett, were assigned to the truck train as observers from the Tank Corps.

An elaborate ceremony marked the start of the transcontinental expedition. The event was held at the "Zero Milestone," a pink granite marker on the Ellipse, just south of the White House grounds. Present were the secretary of war, Newton D. Baker; the chief of staff, Gen. Peyton March; a handful of general officers; several senators and representatives.

Each of them had something to say about the road pioneers. Secretary Baker had watched the long lines of vehicles leading up to the front lines in France during the closing days of World War I and he was keenly aware of the importance of motor transport to the army. He directed the convoy to "proceed by way of the Lincoln Highway overland to San Francisco without delay, etc., etc.

General Eisenhower commented wryly that "delays were to be the order of the day." He didn't think much of the drivers either.

He wrote, "The convoy had been literally thrown together and there was little discernible control. All the drivers had lengthy experience in driving trucks, but some of them, it turned out, had never handled anything more advanced than a Model T. Most colored the air with expressions in starting and stopping, that indicated a long association with teams of horses rather than internal combustion engines.”

General Eisenhower's account of the trip is considerably more colorful than the official reports turned in daily by the so-called morale (public relations) officer. Eisenhower wrote, "It took a week or ten days to achieve any kind of march discipline. Roads varied from average to non-existent. Even in the earliest days of the trip where the roads were usually paved, sometimes with concrete, we were well supplied with trouble."

The convoy left Washington on July 7 shortly before noon and immediately after the ceremony. It made Frederick, Md., that night about 6 P.M. and camped at the fairgrounds, having covered forty-six miles in seven and one-half hours. There was trouble after the first three hours. One of the kitchen trailers broke its coupling, the fan belt broke on one of the staff cars, and one of the big trucks had to be towed into the campgrounds with a broken magneto.

[The precise route of the caravan in relation to today's roads is unclear. Presumably it followed Constitution Avenue west to the river, and followed northwest to Wisconsin Avenue, which becomes Rockville Pike in Chevy Chase. By the time they were in Gaithersburg they were on the Frederick Road, paralleling the Dwight D. Eisenhower Highway. —ed.]

The second day, the convoy covered sixty-two miles in a little over ten hours and camped at Gettysburg. Lt. E. R. Jackson, the ordnance observer, was a meticulous recorder of all accidents and mishaps. This is how he described the second day:

“Departed Frederick, 7 A.M., fan adjustment let go on Class B [truck] 8:30 A.M. Unsafe covered wooden bridge, one mile south of Emmitsburg, reached at 9 A.M. Two hours delay due to unsafe and covered bridges too low for shop trucks, necessitating detours and fording. Engineers rendered valuable work in bridge inspection. Militor pulled Class B machine shop 10-ton truck out of mud on bad detour near Emmitsburg after two Macks in tandem had failed. Towed in another Class B with disabled magneto 12 miles over rough detour. Militor made Piney Mountain on third speed with tow . . . Mack trucks had difficulty making this grade in low gear. Packards were also lazy on hills. Mack machine shop truck damaged top on low bridge between Emmitsburg and Chambersburg. The roads were excellent with the exception of the two detours because of the unsafe bridge and repairs to the highway."

[The caravan probably took present U.S. 15 to the northeast in Frederick, and struck the Lincoln Highway in downtown Gettysburg. —ed.]

On the third day, the lieutenant's journal became repetitious. He wrote, "The convoy moved out at 6:30 A.M. One vehicle bent its steering wheel drag link by going into a ditch at 7:45, another was held up by a broken accelerator spring, and a third by a stuck exhaust valve which caused the truck to lose compression. It also had ignition trouble.”

"It was then ten in the morning. A Class B delayed by bad valve tappet. Ignition trouble on Packard. Class B lost starting crank pin and had to be pushed or towed to start motor. Another Class B had valve and magneto trouble. Considerable magneto trouble on various types of trucks. Encountered heavy grades and altitudes exceeding 2,200 ft. . . . “

In any case, the convoy made Bedford by nightfall and camped there. The convoy got an enthusiastic reception in Bedford. There were 2,000 people on hand, a band concert, dancing in the streets and the inevitable speeches.

For the moment the faulty ignitions, the broken magnetos, the sticky valve tappets, and the pesky fan belts were forgotten and everyone had a good time.

But Eisenhower was taking a gloomy view of the trip. He noted that in the first three days, the convoy had spent twenty-nine hours on the road and covered a distance of 165 miles for an average hourly speed of five and two-thirds miles an hour, which he observed "was not quite so good as even the slowest troop train.”

“Before we were through, however," he wrote, “there were times when the pace of our first three days would seem headlong. In some places, the heavy trucks broke through the surface of the road and we had to tow them out one by one with the Caterpillar tractor. Some days when we had counted on 60 or 70 or 100 miles, we would do three or four. Maintenance crews were constantly on the job to keep the vehicles running. They did good work, as I recall. We lost only two vehicles by accidents and one was beyond their help—it rolled down a mountain."

Eisenhower leaves off his detailed account after the convoy left Bedford and the narrative is picked up by the convoy's unidentified public relations officer who sent back a report each night. The fourth day, the convoy made Greensburg, Pa, covering a distance of about sixty-five miles. It encountered steep grades and heavy rains and dragged into Greensburg at 11 P.M. The machine shop truck mired down while fording a stream and had to be pulled out by the tractor.

They reached Pittsburgh the next day and received a warm welcome when they paraded through that city about midday. Traffic in downtown Pittsburgh was held up for six hours during the parade. Later in the day they crossed the Ohio state line and camped at East Palestine. They spent the weekend there and enjoyed the picnic given by Harvey Firestone at his estate in Columbiana for the officers and men of the convoy.

The next week the convoy made fairly good time through Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois over what was described as "good dirt roads.” It rumbled through Wooster, Bucyrus, Delphos, Fort Wayne, South Bend, and reached the outskirts of Chicago by the end of the week. The public relations officer reported that a tank truck crashed through a wooden bridge near Bucyrus and the engineers had to rebuild the bridge. By the time the convoy reached Chicago, it had been on the road for eleven days and covered 730 miles.

The third week; the convoy crossed the Mississippi River and encountered a new enemy—dust. The public relations officer reported very heavy dust and said at times it was impossible for the drivers to see more than twenty yards ahead. Dust lay on the road four to ten inches deep. It blinded the drivers and clogged the carburetors. But by the end of the week the convoy was in the tall corn country in the middle of Iowa.

[Bob Ausberger reports that the convoy abandoned the Lincoln Highway for some distance near Beaver, preferring a somewhat better road on the south side of the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad tracks. —ed.]

On August 1 the convoy reached the halfway mark at North Platte, Nebraska. It had covered 1,600 miles but the going was getting increasingly tougher. The roads were mostly sand, badly rutted, and narrow. The tires were wearing out and many had to be replaced. One truck skidded around a sharp turn and was so badly damaged it could not proceed.

West of North Platte the convoy ran into real trouble. The PR officer reported heavy rains had made the road “as slippery as ice." The trucks had to be angled across the steep crown to keep them on the road.

Twenty-five trucks skidded into the ditch and had to be pulled out. Where the road was not slippery, it had turned into gumbo and all but two of the motorcycles were "put out of action."

The convoy made twenty-five miles in nine hours. For ten miles the road ran through what was described as "quicksand." The trucks sank to their hubs and had to be pulled out by the tractor and by manpower straining at the wheels. The machine shop went through another bridge. A second bridge was damaged and a third had to be strengthened to prevent it from collapsing. The PR officer reported blown-out cylinder head gaskets, burned out bearings, and all sorts of mechanical trouble. Beyond Big Springs, the road was described as "wretched" and "almost impassable."

The engineers had to build a corduroy road about sixty feet long to cross a dry sand ford. At Kimball, one of the trucks caught fire, though the PR officer never said what the outcome of this was. When the tired and worn-out crew pulled into Cheyenne, the men were greeted by cowpunchers and the 16th U.S. Cavalry. Also there was a movie company on location and the men goggled at Fred Stone and Viola Dana, movie stars of a bygone era.

The convoy rolled on across the southern part of Wyoming, stopping at Laramie, Medicine Bow, Rawlins, Tipton Station, and Fort Bridger. The PR officer noted that the roads were, in fact, only trails in fair condition and made of natural gravel and sand. Near Medicine Bow, the engineers had to reinforce twelve bridges before the convoy could move ahead. The road from Rawlins to Tipton Station was "desolate and monotonous with clouds of dust." He reported the convoy "rolled, tumbled, rocked and tossed over an abandoned rail-road single track grade with holes of varying depths and size."

On into Utah the roads improved and were reported as "good," but there were still complaints about the dust choking the carburetors. It was in Nevada that the convoy had its worst experience. On the last fifty-mile run from Fallon to Carson City the convoy ran into a huge sand drift and every vehicle had to be pushed or pulled through it. It took the convoy twenty hours to make this fifty miles. Two tank trucks sank in the sand to a depth of five feet, requiring a major excavation to get them out. They hauled in railroad ties and built sections of a corduroy road. The drivers were subjected to extreme heat and water was rationed. Wind-driven sand almost blinded the drivers, and the trails were narrow, crooked, and steep. It was miserable, but the convoy moved doggedly on and finally reached Carson City, where they were greeted by the governor and other state officials. On top of all their other troubles, the men had to listen to another series of speeches.

Crossing the Sierra Nevada the convoy encountered its steepest roads. The grade ran over seventeen percent in some cases and the vehicles crawled over the mountains to Myers, California. From there they rolled on down to Placerville and Sacramento, where they were again greeted by high state officials. The journey from Sacramento to Stockton, Oakland, and San Francisco was a piece of cake. Eisenhower reported California had the best roads they'd seen. But Lieutenant Jackson noted that even though this was the best section of the Lincoln Highway, "two Rikers and a Packard broke fan belts. Class B trucks had broken spark plug porcelain, broken fan belts, and brakes which required adjustment. Indian motorcycle broke control wire."

Eisenhower reported that "the last of our troubles were over except for the final speeches. We were met east of Oakland by city officials and the fire department, were escorted through the flag-festooned streets, with whistles blowing around the bay. There were electrical and fireworks displays."

And he concluded, "The trip had been difficult, tiring, and fun. I think that every officer in the convoy had recommended in his report that efforts should be made to get our people interested in producing better roads."

Just what did the army think it had accomplished by the convoy? In its official report, the War Department said the trip "forcibly demonstrated several lessons of the utmost and far reaching importance.”

“The necessity for a comprehensive system of national highways, including transcontinental or through routes east and west, north and south, is real and urgent as a commercial asset to further colonize and develop the sparsely settled sections of the country, and finally as a defensive military necessity.”

"Second, that the existing roads and bridges, especially in the sparsely settled sections of the middle and western states, are absolutely incapable of meeting the present-day traffic requirements.”

"The road problems of the Middle and Western states are national rather than local problems, as these states . . . have only a sparse population which cannot possibly undertake the needed highway improvement work which is of greater importance to the country as a whole than to the individual states."

The War Department stated the case for the development by the federal government of an interstate highway system. But the report collected dust in the War Department's files for the next thirty-five years. It is significant that when the interstate system was finally approved in 1956, it came during the administration of one of the army officers who accompanied this pioneering journey.

America's 42,795-mile, $129-billion interstate highway system was dedicated to the memory of President Dwight D. Eisenhower on Oct. 15, 1990, by an act of Congress, when Public Law 101-427 changed the official name of the network to The Dwight D. Eisenhower System of Interstate and Defense Highways. The action recognized the tremendous vision and leadership of President Eisenhower, who guided to reality the concept of a national system of high-speed highways connecting all the major population, industrial, and agricultural areas of the United States.—ed.

Posted with the permission of the Lincoln Highway Association (2024).