re: #489 HappyWarrior

The modern road system is one of Ike’s best legacies. IT was done for military reasons (in the event of a Soviet invasion) but it was a great thing for our country as the railroad beacme less a factor in American life.

Ike had personal experience of the issue; in 1919, the young Major Eisenhower was part of a big Army convoy which set out with an assortment of motor vehicles to go from one end of the country to the other by road (Washington to San Francisco, I believe). I think it took them something like 60 days at an average speed of 8 mph, or something like that: and outside of cities and towns, the roads were, at best, dirt, or more usually (especially in the West), just ruts in the prairie.