Most of the early automobiles in the U.S. could have used an “off-road” feature. Aside from the rail routes, the country had just local “market” roads, largely unpaved. But the era of the car was dawning, and entrepreneur Carl G. Fisher, who owned several car-related businesses, went on a promotional spree for the construction of an east-west highway connecting the coasts. Fisher and his fellow automobile industry entrepreneurs (sans Henry Ford, a vociferous objector), formed the Lincoln Highway association to finance the construction of their road.

On this day, October 31, in 1913, the Lincoln Highway was dedicated. San Francisco residents cheered the arrival of the first official convoy of cars to traverse the highway end to end, and hundreds of local celebrations in towns along the road also took place.

The Lincoln Highway stretched through 13 states and 3,400 miles between Times Square in New York City to Lincoln Park in San Francisco. The first convoy reportedly inspired Dwight Eisenhower, who became president 39 years later, to create a whole network of highways, and the idea for “great transcontinental highways” was echoed in an opening ceremony in Iowa. State Engineer Thomas H. MacDonald said the Lincoln Highway was just the beginning: “That such a radial system of roads should be built is of very much more importance than that one great continuous road across the state shall be built.”