Iowa Highway Ends (etc.)

May 15, 2011: A Lincoln Highway marker is on Lincolnway in Jefferson’s business district, between IA 4 and the courthouse. Visible in the background is the Mahanay Memorial Carillon Tower.

Greene County plays a very important role in Lincoln Highway history, both past and present. The county was the first to pave its entire Lincoln Highway route, in 1919. In the 1990s, the route was carefully marked and multiple sites were put on the National Register of Historic Places. Today, much of E53 is scored near the outer edges of the concrete, marking the original width before the road was reconstructed in the 1990s.

December 14, 2002

The “billboard” shown above is on E41 on the west side of Boone, but it’s not on the original Lincoln Highway. The very first iteration headed southwest out of town on Ringgold Street and then crossed the Des Moines River between the current Old Highway 30 bridge and four-lane 30, using a smidge of new 30’s westbound lanes and 222nd Drive before returning to E41. The thru route today, which seems so obvious now, didn’t happen until later, with the current Des Moines River crossing built in 1928. A new bridge replaced that one in 2000.

The Lincoln also used 7th Street between Marion and Story streets in Boone, passing by the high school.

UPDATE: The billboard is no longer there.

July 7, 2004

The Reed-Niland corner in Colo is an example of a Lincoln Highway landmark that has been given new life in the 21st Century. The cafe and small motel had been closed for years, but both have been restored. The cafe has exhibits and pictures of the Lincoln Highway inside.

The not-quite-an-interchange grade separation of the Lincoln Highway and US 65 dates back to the late 1930s. According to a marker at the motel, Reed resisted the condemnation of his businesses between the Lincoln and what had been a curve for US 65 turning west to Ames when the Highway Commission planned a full cloverleaf.

State Center has four different historic routings of the Lincoln Highway, and that’s not counting present-day US 30 to the south or the 1912 Transcontinental path. The town recently put out a pamphlet to explain the different markings.

The photo above is from 2001, showing the railroad overpass on 9th Avenue on the west side of town. That was part of the third-generation route; note the L on the right side. The routing right before that crossed the railroad downtown, using Main Street and 3rd Street before that to go northwest. This section with the overpass remained a part of US 30 until the 1960s.

The original original didn’t go through State Center at all but stayed to the north, along 230th Street to Lamoille. Although the Transcontinental used present-day E41, the north route was chosen first and then moved south later. Today, the north route is marked as a loop, shown below at the east end near Lamoille in 2011. This photo also illustrates how the “Loop” sign is not much different from the regular and be hard to grasp on the road.

Happy LH centennial! Today is also the 150th anniversary of the beginning of the Battle of Gettysburg.

November 27, 2002: Morning shadows on the Tama bridge.

November 27, 2002

July 23, 2008: RAGBRAI riders pedal through Montour on the Lincoln Highway.

June 24, 2011: The most recent change to the Lincoln Highway happened with the opening of the Tama bypass. About a mile-long segment where 30 and the Lincoln remained together on the east side of Tama, from by the bridge past the King Tower Cafe, was removed when the four-lane opened.