Iowa Roads (1937)

When writing my latest novel, the thing that struck me the most was the amount of time my characters spent in cars. The Middle West (using the 1930s term here) is so spread out. An automobile is a necessity. Then or now.

By the late 1920s, nearly 1 out of 3 people owned an automobile in Iowa.¹ A bond initiative in the 1920s kept the expansion of paving roads a possibility throughout the Great Depression.² Making getting from point A to point B that much easier (Safer is for a different post). However, building roads was one thing maintaining them was another. Many cash-strapped counties had difficulty keeping up with maintenance.³

With the increase of car traffic on Iowa roads, crime followed. Ola Babcock Miller, was Iowa’s first woman secretary of state, elected in 1932. One of her champion projects was pushing the legislature to pass a law creating an agency to monitor state road traffic. In 1935 the legislature formed the Iowa Highway Patrol.⁴

Per a 1936 Iowa travel map⁵, there were a lot of U.S. and Iowa highways available in 1937. Here are a few I’m highlighting:

US Highways

• Highway 6: Runs east and west and is considered the longest highway created in the U.S. It cuts through the south-central portion of Iowa. While it reached coast to coast in 1937, not all of it was paved.⁶
• Highway 65: Runs north and south. Originally christened Jefferson Highway until the number system superseded the name in 1926. This road ran from Louisiana all the way to Minnesota. The road used a viaduct cutting over railroad lines located on 7th street in Des Moines, Iowa, before moving north out of town.⁷

State Highways

• Iowa State Highway 7: Was decommissioned in 1939 and replaced with US Highway 32. In its infancy, the only section paved was at Johnston Station (now Johnston, Iowa) to Des Moines. By the end of the 1930s, it stretched east to west across the state.⁸
• Iowa State Highway 60: Was decommissioned in 1969. It connected towns in north central Iowa with Des Moines.⁹

Sources:

1. ^{“Peverills and the Automobile 1906-1952.” Amherst College Digital Collection. Accessed: 7 November 2023.} ↩︎
2. ^{Thompson, William. Transportation in Iowa. Iowa: Iowa Department of Transportation, 1989, p. 155.} ↩︎
3. ^{Ibid, p. 180.} ↩︎
4. ^{Nebbe, Charity. “History of the Iowa State Patrol.” Iowa Public Radio. 23 July 2014. Accessed: 10 November 2023. Location: https://www.iowapublicradio.org/show/talk-of-iowa/2014-07-23/history-of-the-iowa-state-patrol. I would recommend a visit to the Iowa Gold Star Museum where one wing is devoted to the history of the Iowa State Patrol.} ↩︎
5. ^{“Iowa Highway Map, 1936.” Ames, Iowa: Iowa State Highway Commission, 1936. Accessed: 10 November 2023. The WPA Guide to Iowa is also a good source, especially their “Travel” chapters which highlight which paved roads to take for touring the state.} ↩︎
6. ^{“Historic U.S. Route 6.” Travel Iowa. 2023. Weingroff, Richard F. “U.S. 6 – The Grand Army of the Republic Highway.” Highway History, U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Commission. 27 June 2017. Accessed: 10 November 2023.} ↩︎
7. ^{Henry, Jr., Lyell D. The Jefferson Highway. Iowa: University of Iowa Press, 2016, pp. 129-138.} ↩︎
8. ^{Hancock, Jason. “Iowa Highways: 1 to 9.” Iowa Highways. 3 June 2023. Accessed: 10 November 2023.} ↩︎
9. _{Ibid. “Iowa Highways: 60 to 69.” Iowa Highways. 3 June 2023. Accessed: 17 May 2021.} ↩︎