 Lincoln Heritage Trail | |
|---|---|
| Major junctions | |
| North end | Lincoln Trail Homestead State Memorial |
| Location | |
| Country | United States |
| States | Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky |
| Highway system | |
The Lincoln Heritage Trail is a designation for a series of highways in the U.S. states of Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky that links communities with pre-presidential period historical ties to U.S. president Abraham Lincoln.
Fifty years after Lincoln's death (1915), the Illinois General Assembly authorized the Illinois State Historical Library to mark the exact route traveled by Lincoln from Kentucky through Indiana to Illinois. Almost another 50 years passed before the 1,000-mile (1,600 km) trail was opened in 1963. Author Andrew Ferguson cites Robert Newman, Illinois' director of tourism in the 1960s, as saying "the whole thing was cooked up by the marketing guys at the American Petroleum Institute. ... They wanted to get people traveling. Get 'em into their cars, get 'em buying gasoline." [1] The Trail originally had 3,000 markers showing Lincoln's route to Illinois.
As of today, much of the trail is in disrepair and signs are missing or nearly obscured. Yet, some still exist. One sign still stands on US 68 in Perryville, Kentucky. It can be seen when approaching Perryville on US 68 traveling west, as it is at the intersection of US 68, US 150, and KY 52. Another Lincoln Heritage Trail sign is located on US 60 in Frankfort, and can be seen when traveling east just past the interchange with US 421 and KY 676. Another sign is on US 60 Alt. near the Grinstead Drive/I-64 interchange in Louisville. These signs are well over 20 years old. They have not been replaced as Kentucky has moved from the old painted signs to Type III reflective signs. Some counties along the trail have made efforts to restore signs and markers, but overall, the trail is somewhat difficult to follow under modern conditions.
In Illinois, the trail includes IL 155, [2] part of IL 1, IL 33, and IL 97 (New Salem area) and IL 125 (Old Beardstown Post Road).
The Great River Road is a collection of state and local roads that follow the course of the Mississippi River through ten states of the United States. They are Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi and Louisiana. It formerly extended north into Canada, serving the provinces of Ontario and Manitoba. The road is designated as both a National Scenic Byway and an All-American Road in several states along the route.
Interstate 64 (I-64) is an east–west Interstate Highway in the Eastern United States. Its western terminus is at I-70, U.S. Route 40 (US 40), and US 61 in Wentzville, Missouri. Its eastern terminus is at the Bowers Hill Interchange with I-264 and I-664 at Bower's Hill in Chesapeake, Virginia. I-64 connects Greater St. Louis, the Louisville metropolitan area, the Lexington–Fayette metropolitan area, the Charleston metropolitan area, the Greater Richmond Region, and Hampton Roads.
Interstate 65 (I-65) is a major north–south interstate highway in the central United States. As with most primary interstates ending in 5, it is a major crosscountry, north–south route, connecting between the Great Lakes and the Gulf of Mexico. Its southern terminus is located at an interchange with I-10 in Mobile, Alabama, and its northern terminus is at an interchange with US 12 (US 12) and US 20 in Gary, Indiana, just southeast of Chicago. I-65 connects several major metropolitan areas in the Midwest and Southern US. It connects the four largest cities in Alabama: Mobile, Montgomery, Birmingham, and Huntsville. It also serves as one of the main north–south routes through Nashville, Tennessee; Louisville, Kentucky; and Indianapolis, Indiana, each a major metropolitan area in its respective state.
U.S. Route 60 is a major east–west United States highway, traveling 2,655 miles (4,273 km) from southwestern Arizona to the Atlantic Ocean coast in Virginia. The highway's eastern terminus is in Virginia Beach, Virginia, where it is known as General Booth Boulevard, just south of the city's Oceanfront resort district at the intersection of Rudee Point Road and Harbor Point. Its original western terminus was in Springfield, Missouri; it was then extended to Los Angeles, California, but in 1964, it was truncated to end southwest of Brenda, Arizona, at an interchange with Interstate 10 (I-10) after the US 60 highway designation was removed from California. I-10 replaced US 60 from Beaumont, California, to Arizona, and California State Route 60 (SR 60) replaced US 60 from Los Angeles to Beaumont.
U.S. Route 41, also U.S. Highway 41 (US 41), is a major north–south United States Numbered Highway that runs from Miami, Florida, to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Until 1949, the part in southern Florida, from Naples to Miami, was US 94. The highway's southern terminus is in the Brickell neighborhood of Downtown Miami at an intersection with Brickell Avenue (US 1), and its northern terminus is east of Copper Harbor, Michigan, at a modest cul-de-sac near Fort Wilkins Historic State Park at the tip of the Keweenaw Peninsula. US 41 is closely paralleled by Interstate 75 (I-75) from Naples, Florida, all the way through Georgia to Chattanooga, Tennessee.
U.S. Route 68 is a United States highway that runs for 560 miles (900 km) from northwest Ohio to Western Kentucky. The highway's western terminus is at US 62 in Reidland, Kentucky. Its present eastern terminus is at Interstate 75 in Findlay, Ohio, though the route once extended as far north as Toledo. US 68 intersects with US 62 three times during its route.
U.S. Route 119 (US 119) is a spur of US 19. It is a north–south route that was an original United States highway of 1926. It is Corridor G of the Appalachian Development Highway System (ADHS) east of US 23 and KY 80 in Kentucky to Interstate 64 at Charleston, West Virginia.
U.S. Route 136 is an east-west U.S. highway that is a spur route of U.S. Route 36. It runs from Edison, Nebraska, at U.S. Route 6 and U.S. Route 34 to the Interstate 74/Interstate 465 interchange in Speedway, Indiana. This is a distance of 804 miles (1,294 km). Due to the removal of almost every numbered route in Indianapolis, US 136 never meets its parent, US 36; however, it does come within two miles of it at its interchange with I-465/I-74 at its eastern terminus.
U.S. Route 150 is a 571-mile (919 km) long northwest–southeast United States highway, signed as east–west. It runs from U.S. Route 6 outside of Moline, Illinois, to U.S. Route 25 in Mount Vernon, Kentucky.
Interstate 265 (I-265) is a 41.71-mile (67.13 km) Interstate Highway partially encircling the Louisville metropolitan area. Starting from I-65 in the southern part of Louisville, it runs through Jefferson County, Kentucky, crosses the Ohio River on the Lewis and Clark Bridge into Indiana, meets I-65 for a second time, and then proceeds westbound to terminate at the I-64 interchange.
Illinois Route 1 (IL 1) is a state highway in the U.S. state of Illinois. Running parallel to the Indiana border, the highway starts at the free ferry crossing to Kentucky at Cave-in-Rock on the Ohio River and runs north to the south side of Chicago as Halsted Street at an intersection with Interstate 57. This is a distance of 325.59 miles (523.99 km).
Kentucky Route 80 (KY 80) is a 483.55-mile-long (778.20 km) state highway in the southern part of the U.S. state of Kentucky. The route originates on the state's western border at Columbus in Hickman County and stretches across the southern portion of the state, terminating southeast of Elkhorn City on the Virginia state line. It is the longest Kentucky State Highway, though the official distance as listed in route logs is much less due to multiple concurrencies with U.S. Route 68 (US 68) and US 23.
The William H. Natcher Green River Parkway was the designation for a 72.3-mile (116.4 km) freeway that ran from Bowling Green to Owensboro in the US commonwealth of Kentucky. The Natcher Parkway was one of nine highways that were a part of Kentucky's parkway system. The portion north of Interstate 65 (I-65) was signed as I-165, and the portion south of I-65 as Kentucky Route 9007 on March 6, 2019.
State Road 62 (SR 62) in the U.S. state of Indiana is an east–west route that travels 204 miles (328 km) from the Illinois state line in the southwest corner of Indiana to the Louisville, Kentucky area, then northeast toward the Cincinnati, Ohio area.
U.S. Route 31E (US 31E) is the eastern parallel route for U.S. Highway 31 from Nashville, Tennessee, to Louisville, Kentucky.
U.S. Route 31W is the westernmost of two parallel routes for U.S. Route 31 from Nashville, Tennessee to Louisville, Kentucky.
Illinois Route 121 (IL 121) is a 109.48-mile-long (176.19 km) major state highway in the central part of the U.S. state of Illinois. Although it travels from northwest to southeast, it is marked as a north–south highway. It travels from IL 130 in Greenup to Interstate 55 (I-55) in Lincoln at the interchange of I-55 and IL 10.
Interstate 55 (I-55) is a major north–south Interstate Highway in the US state of Illinois that connects St. Louis, Missouri, to the Chicago metropolitan area. It enters the state from Missouri near East St. Louis, Illinois, and runs to U.S. Route 41 near Downtown Chicago, where the highway ends, a distance of 294.38 miles (473.76 km). The road also runs through the Illinois cities of Springfield, Bloomington, and Joliet. The section in Cook County is officially named the Stevenson Expressway for the governor, and in DuPage County it's officially named the Joliet Freeway or the Will Rogers Freeway for the humorist. The section from the south suburbs to the area near Pontiac is officially named the Barack Obama Presidential Expressway after the president, who launched his political career from Illinois.
Interstate 65 (I-65) is part of the Interstate Highway System that runs 887.30 miles (1,427.97 km) north–south from Mobile, Alabama, to Gary, Indiana. The highway crosses Kentucky from south to north, from the Tennessee state line near Franklin to the Indiana state line in Louisville. I-65 passes through three of Kentucky's ten largest cities—Bowling Green, Elizabethtown, and Louisville—and serves Mammoth Cave National Park and Fort Knox. Kentucky was the first state to complete its portion of I-65, with the final section, located near Franklin, opening in 1970.
Veterans Outer Loop is a major bypass route in Glasgow, Kentucky. It is maintained by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC).
