LINCOLN HIGHWAY NEWS IS A BLOG BY BRIAN BUTKO
Make sure you keep following Denny Gibson’s blog after the first day he hits the Lincoln Highway (his Day 9). Click HERE to continue with Day 10. Highlights include encountering snow at Donner Summit (note the LH “Subway” beneath the railroad overpass just left of center) and an adventurous ride along the sometimes perilous Kings Canyon Road (on a tour led by Nevada LHA director Jim Bonar).
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An AP story this morning reports that snow has forced the closure of I-80 between Sacramento and Reno, Nevada, where it is parallel to (and often intertwined with) the Lincoln Highway in eastern California. Eastbound I-80 was closed at Colfax (50 miles NE of Sacramento) and westbound traffic was being held at the Nevada state line. Meanwhile, floods, mudslides, and winds are battering southern California.
For a calmer take on winter weather, Paul Gilger, Chair of the Lincoln Highway Association National Mapping Committee, sent along these images from brothers Greg and Grant Gassman, members of the California chapter of the LHA. A few weeks ago, they took these photos of the original 1913 alignment through Kingvale up near Donner Pass. The first one is looking east on the 1913 alignment just before it rejoins the 1926 alignment on Donner Pass Road (which does get plowed):
The second photo is just taken a little to the west of the first photo. It’s also looking east on the 1913 alignment:
“You ever wake up sometimes maybe around 3 o’clock in the morning, you look up at the ceiling, the blackness – you feel that terrible urge to see it all, to get on the road. To smell the pine trees, watch all the rivers, see all the skies, climb all the hills….”
Jean Shepherd was a humorist known to millions through books, radio, and live shows, but is best known to modern audiences for co-writing and narrating (as grown-up Ralphie) the 1983 film A Christmas Story. He also had a very popular TV show: Jean Shepherd’s America, produced by WGBH (PBS) Boston, aired 13 shows in 1971 and 13 in 1985. (They’re available on DVD, or learn more here.) This clip, from the last show of the 1971 season, is the final segment and end credits. Jean and his crew are snowbound in Wyoming at Holding’s Little America motel and truck stop, along the Lincoln Highway and I-80. During the 4-minute video, he talks, in his measured prose, about life on the road, and the American urge to keep moving.
With more snow falling today, few cars are crossing the Allegheny Mountains near me in Western Pennsylvania
Here’s a view from University of Michigan showing the snowy Lincoln Highway west of Stoystown in 1924.
Many towns along the Lincoln Highway woke up to severe weather today, including snow and wind in the East and Midwest.
The image above shows cars struggling to climb snowy Donner Summit about 1930. This was of course where the Donner party of emigrants got caught in the early snows of early November 1846. An excellent recounting of their story that puts the reader there is The Donner Party Chronicles: A Day-by-Day Account of a Doomed Wagon Train, 1846-47 by Frank Mullen Jr. The well-researched book makes it simple and intriguing to follow their journey through the use of maps, diary excerpts, images of artifacts, modern photography, and archaeological debates.
While it will only be the 20s the next few days where I am in PA, it’s will reach the 50s in Truckee, the area where many from the Donner party camped to wait out the winter. You can check my web site’s LH Weather page to see conditions at a dozen locales from coast to coast.
Click the map above for a full-size view of the Lincoln Highway.
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Another fun book! The Ship Hotel: A Grand View along the Lincoln Highway recalls the greatest roadside attraction along the coast-to-coast road.
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