While most of my friends were buying houses and raising families in the 1970’s, I was seeing the U.S.A. in a Volkswagen bus that I had customized to be a comfy home away from home.
I had globetrotted in previous years and realized upon my return that I knew more about the Far East than East L.A., so I set out on a year-on, year-off exploration of the contiguous 48 states.
I’d seen Hawaii and Alaska traveling to and from Japan, and except for Kentucky and Montana, ended up driving through the other 46 states courtesy of the marvelous Interstate Highway System, which celebrates its 51st anniversary this week.
The system was the brainchild of President Eisenhower, who argued that the U.S. needed a first-rate national road system for military transportation in the event of war with the Soviet Union.
War never came, of course, at least not with the Red Menace. But the system — officially known as The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways — kept growing and today includes 47,000 miles of highway, 14,750 interchanges, 55,500 bridges and 104 tunnels. But no traffic lights.
The interstates’ impact on America — and my peripatetic travels — was profound.
From the interstates grew suburbs, service stations, motels and strip malls, not to mention the recreational vehicle and O.J. Simpson low-speed police chase.
There also have been downsides: It could mean a death sentence for a rural burg if the interstate passed it by, most famously the necklace of towns along legendary U.S. Route 66 from Chicago to Los Angeles. The highways were nearly a death blow for America’s decrepit public transportation system. Gridlock entered the nation’s vocabulary and stayed. And all those service stations, motels and strip malls are not exactly eye candy.
All that said, I have many fond memories of my travels on America’s interstates, and most especially on the highways and byways and interesting places and people that the interstates took me to.
Here are a few . . .
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