Travel by water was eventually supplemented by overland roads as frontier settlers ventured beyond rivers, streams and railroad stations. Expeditions undertaken by the military troops were recorded and formally documented as maps. Many of these US Army-prepared maps were adapted for use by the US Post Office as the earliest Postal Routes.
Commonly used routes for overland travel were initially referred to as "trails" and early on where rarely more than a simple worn grass path. They were adequate for horses, stagecoaches and other animal-drawn wagons. Trails were often referred to as the person or agency that blazed the route or the event that established it.
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Trails were eventually replaced with improved "roads" to accommodate motorized vehicles. Early streets and highways would generally follow established trail routes as they offered shallow elevation changes and easy stream and river crossing locations. But eventually, trail paths were abandoned for better, more efficient routes which could be installed with heavier construction equipment and better materials. Even today, while forgotten by most, some original wheel ruts remain visible on historic trails including the Bismarck to Deadwood stagecoach route.
Trail names will resurface as organizations leverage their historical significance and invoke nostaglia for their own purposes. Today, "Red Trail" is associated with a Mandan School District elementary school, an ethanol production facility in eastern Stark County, commercial promotion of a scenic highway and a street name used in the City of Mandan.
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The map presented above (which can be enlarged by clicking on it) shows a comparison between three of the most traveled east-to-west overland routes in the Mandan-Bismarck area.
Boats were used to shuttle people, vehicles and materials across the Missouri River before the first bridges were installed unless the river was sufficiently frozen to allow travel over the ice. John McGinley from Mandan was among the earliest operators to provide such services. He would row his customers and their belongings across the river in a small skiff in the 1870s and early 1880s. Once the Northern Pacific Railroad "high bridge" was completed in 1882, people would risk a walk across it between trains to cross the river. Most commercial goods and cars were transported via train.
Until September 1922 when the North Dakota Memorial Bridge and US Highway 10 was complete, river ferries operated out of southside locations (west of today's Dakota Zoo in Bismarck and near Mandan's Broken Oar Tavern.) Materials were ferried in 1879 and 1880 to not only build rail track out westward from Mandan, but also to ferry railcars including locomotives needed to service it. The river crossing was also part of the route between the Capitol to Fort Abraham Lincoln road funded by the ND legislature in 1909 and built by inmate labor from the state penitentiary.
But even before the automobile bridge, the demand for crossing the river was intermittent enough that the City of Mandan supplemented the operation with subsidies. The "Marion" ferry was the last; and discontinued operation in 1922.
In 1922 with the addition of the North Dakota Memorial Bridge (later renamed Liberty Memorial Bridge), Bismarck connected the west edge of its Main Street at Washington Street beneath the NP railtracks to Front Street. The eastside approach to the bridge involved a sharp left turn. Bismarck's Main Street would be connected with a straight-on approach in 1960.
Early Recorded Routes
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Fort McKeen / Fort Abraham Lincoln had been established to facilitate the westward expansion of the railroad. Half of Dakota Territory, west of the Missouri River, remained unsettled when the nation's economic collapse in 1872 forced the railroad to pause construction east of the river at Bismarck.
The mission at Ft. Abraham Lincoln pivoted to scouting a location for a new fort in the Black Hills to support operations in the ongoing "Indian War." Their missions involved navigating overland in unmapped territory.
Auto Trails to Highways - The Good Roads Movement
Through the 1920s, local commercial booster groups banded together to persuade government officials to spend money to improve these paths which were frequently scraped ground. These "auto trails" frequently followed established historic trails which had been originally established due to their ease of use (level topography, shallow stream and river crossings, etc.) Examples in North Dakota were Custer's Trail, Old Trails Highway (a designation duplicated by others) or the Bismarck to Deadwood Stagecoach Trail. This patchwork of roads promoted by hundreds of trail associations resulted in overlapping trails and/or sometimes lacking connections to the adjacent roads. But worse, sometimes mapped through towns that paid dues rather than efficiency per a history prepared by the Federal Highway Administration history. Destination signs and road designations were not standardized. Road maps were not widely available.
In 1902, nine clubs met in Chicago IL banded together to coordinate efforts for better roads. The American Automobile Association (AAA) was instrumental in gathering and sharing road data. The AAA formally incorporated as a separate umbrella organization in 1910. The focus shifted to advocate for a nationwide network of improved roads and to assure roadside services were available in increments no farther apart than every 120 miles. Preparation of road maps for the motoring public was also key.
Anton L. Westgard
Anton L. Westgard, "The Great Pathfinder", was a Norwegian immigrant with a thirst for adventure. Previous to 1913, Westgard crossed the continent three times in 147 days in a stock automobile while collecting data for a series of maps published by the AAA.
His 1911 cross-country field survey via automobile led to the first transcontinental route from New York City to California along the Hudson River and the shores of the Great Lakes; then onto Omaha, Denver, Salt Lake City and Sacramento. This coast-to-coast route would come to be known as the "Lincoln Highway."
In 1913, Westgard took a position with the National Highways Association. As vice-president of the NHA, he left New York City on a 17,000 mile trip to compile first-hand data by which the association hoped to use the data to convince the federal government to build roads. This trip included scoping out the best route for what would later become the National Parks Highway or what locally North Dakota designated with its system of colors "Red Trail."
While the AAA did identify multiple cross-county auto-trails, the early nation-wide efforts to construct improved roads focused on providing a trancontinental overland route to California destinations to support the Panama-American Exposition in San Francisco in 1915 and the Panama-California Exposition in San Diego through 1917. To this point, left large portions of rural sections of the country were under served.
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Competition Causes Confusion - Frontier Trail Names Use
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The National Park Highway Association, was formed in 1913 worked to construct a improved road across the northern US to connect to Yellowstone National Park. Like most of the trail associations, a chapter was formed in each state to spearhead efforts in their area of influence.
Stephen Mather, the first director of the National Park Service, had a vision for a circular series of roads between 13 National Parks in the western United States to meet the growning demand for access by the public. The National Park-to-Park Highway Assocation was formed in 1915 to coordinate efforts to create National Park Circuit Highway, added in part for Anton L Westgard.
Roads Denoted by Colors
Prior to 1913, roads were maintained by city and county road supervisors. When the ND State Highway Commission and associated State Highway Department was created, colors were used as the first highway designators to identify roads, most hardly more than a two-track trails at the time. And sometimes not even that well established. Planning on a state-wide and eventually national basis began. The first state highway map preparaton was also authorized.
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"Red" Trail was the first designation for a trans-state route. It originally ran along the west side of the Red River through Fargo, up north to Grand Forks with the intent to cross the state through Minot and Williston which would avoid the need for a bridge to cross the Missouri River.
Eventually, when the "Red Trail" was later changed to a more southerly route through Jamestown, Mandan-Bismarck and Dickinson, the north-south segment to Grand Forks had already established itself sufficiently to retain the Red Trail designation.
Roads Denoted by Numbers
By 1917, the Highway Department began using numbers rather than colors. Now the east-west route from Fargo to Mandan and west to Dickinson, Medora and Beach being designated State Route 3.
The Missouri River crossing remained dependant on river ferrys. Bismarck's east access point on the east bank remained off Front Street down to the point west of today's Dakota Zoo. The west ferry landing had been moved Motsiff, south of Mandan (near today's Sitting Bull Bridge / Dogtown) when the first bridge was installed across the Heart River on State Route 6 south to Fort Lincoln.
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"Old Highway 10"
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In 1921, the State Highway Department introduced embedded meaning to its highway designations, with even numbers for east - west routes and odd numbers for north - south routes. State Route 3 became ND Highway 6. When national highway standards were established for routes, design and construction, designation and signage and the selection of "national" highways, Highway 6 became part of the most northern coast-to-coast US highway i.e., US Highway 10.
With the completion of the Interstate Highway System, the federal government eliminated funding for highways that duplicated travel routes. In 1986, the US Highway Administration removed the designation (and financial support) of US-10 in North Dakota for points west of an intersection in West Fargo. In Morton County, Main Street west out of town from the intersection at 6th Avenue NW is also known as "Old Highway 10" but officially designated as County Road 139.
From that same intersection, "Red Trail" turned north to follow 6th Avenue NW out of town, overlapping the Mandan street named "Old Red Trail" starting at the intersection immediately north of the I-94 interchange. Once out of the city limits, it becomes County Road 139A.
County roads CR 139 and CR 139A join near New Salem and countinue west with the CR 139 designation to the county line. Stark County refers to "Old Highway 10" as CR 10.
The MHSoc's museum and office is located at 3827 30th Avenue NW; Mandan, ND 58554 Contact us at info@mandanhistory.org