Chapter 5 THE AUTOMOBILE AGE BEGINS, 1890-1930 - Colorado ...

Drive was part of the Great North and South Highway. Drivers in Colorado Springs burned a
“Dusty Roads” effigy in honor of the opening of the 73-mile stretch (Christensen, et. al. 1987:
51).
It took a while before the impact of the Model T opened the nation’s roads to all classes of
drivers. After initial distrust of the auto as a rich-man’s toy, rural Coloradoans improved their
standard of living after deciding to go behind the wheel. In 1919, after almost a decade of state
statistic keeping, the publication of the State Highway Commission saw a correlation between
the automobile and agriculture:
“The biggest advance made by any industry in this state in the past decade has
been in agriculture; road building, perhaps, stands second. The former has been
the result of bringing under cultivation hundreds of thousands of acres of fertile
land in nearly all sections of the state and of the introduction of better methods in
eastern Colorado. The latter has been largely the result of the agricultural growth
of the state, for new and better highways have been required to transport the
immensely increased products of our farms to market” (Colorado Highways
Bulletin, July 1919: 14).
Final
CDOT Historic Highway Context
5-24