building the american landscape - Univerza v Novi Gorici

72]. The Philadelphia and Lancaster Turnpike 185 (1795), 62 miles long, was the first
paved road in the United States. This road, like many others built later, was run by a
private company. Paying roads had bridges and toll houses, and were organised
with precise tariffs, applied according to the different types of transport and the
journey covered. They were used either by the Conestoga wagons, a typical
German means of transport, pulled by oxen or horses, or by the prairie schooners, a
smaller version more suitable for crossing into the prairies [Figures 82‐84]. “[…]
most of the transportation of the plains and the Great American Desert was done
by ox‐teams. These were run in trains of ten to fifty or sixty teams, the teams
consisting usually of five to seven yokes of oxen and lead and trail wagons built for
the purpose” 186 .
The turnpike system was inspired by some similar experiments already carried out
in England, where they had shown they could guarantee the feasibility and
economic success of the enterprise. The first large road constructed by the Federal
government was the Cumberland Road 187 , from Cumberland, Maryland to Vandalia,
Illinois. Construction began in 1811, and ended due to the panic of 1837. President
Jefferson authorised the road project in 1806 and thirty years later it remained
partially incomplete. The road ran for a total of 620 miles to connect the River
Potomac with the River Ohio. This road had military origins, as the original route of
1755 nicknamed Braddock Road was built according to an idea of the English
general, Edward Braddock and his aide‐de‐camp, George Washington, during an
expedition against the Indians and the French. However, the military route was little
more than a path. Numerous distinctive constructions were built along the
Cumberland Road, such as toll houses, mile markers, inns/hotels, as well as
important infrastructures, such as the Casselman Bridge, Grantsville, Maryland, an
arched masonry bridge, or in 1849, the 310 metre‐long Wheeling Suspension
Bridge, which made it the longest suspension bridge in the world. The Wheeling
185 See LANDIS, Charles, The first Long Turnpike in the United States, Lancaster, The New Era Printing
Company, 1917; WITMER, A. Exton, The Old Turnpike, Lanacaster, Reprinted from The New Era, 1897
186 See HOOKER, William Francis, The Prairie Schooner, Chicago, Saul Brothers, 1918, p. 29
187 See HULBERT, Archer Butler, The Cumberland Road, (Historic Highways of America Vol. N. 10),
Cleveland, Ohio, The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1904; RAITZ, Karl B. (ed.), The National Road,
Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University, 1996
112