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"One important project was the 1900 to 1910 macadamizing of part of the Old Chicago Road, Northwest Indiana's major auto route between Gary and Michigan City before the Dunes Highway. In a 1954 Chesterton Tribune article, C.W. Nelson noted that a 12-foot (3.7 m)-wide macadam section of the Old Chicago Road was laid after the turn of the century from his Baillytown family farm north of the present US 12 and west of the current Bethlehem Steel entrance gate to earlier sections of pavement at SR 49. Macadam was the best road surface available for most of the 19th century. However, automobile tires created grooves in macadam roads, which yielded in the 1920s to asphalt and concrete surfacing."[1][2] As more cars hit the road the Chicago Motor Club, founded in 1906, began marking what it considered the best route between Detroit and Chicago. Club members designated what locals referred to as the Old Chicago Road Seven-A-Route to assist drivers without detailed road maps. They placed signs at intersections to help motorists negotiate Seven-A-Route's many right angle turns. For example, from Oak Hill Road travelers on the Chicago Road proceeded east as far as "the high bridge" on the present Old SR 49, then north to the present US 20, then east to the Carver School Road, then north for a mile, then east to Michigan City. The circuitous road punctuated by numerous grade crossings made driving slow and treacherous. These conditions kindled desires for a more efficient thoroughfare which eventually led to the construction of The Dunes Highway.[3] Works Projects Administration writers attributed the genesis of the "Dunes Highway" to 1919 government surveys for an improved road along the lakeshore following the old Detroit State Road route.[4] But Gary Post-Tribune columnist Tom Cannon credited Henry M. Miles, Michigan City engineer, with the idea for a national highway along the South Shore interurban line between Gary and Michigan City. Miles' 1918 speech to the Michigan City Chamber of Commerce, "Trunk Line Highways," appealed to the business community's concerns for more efficient transportation and commerce. Soon Gary Commercial Club members caught Dunes Highway fever. A.H. Hess, chairman of the Commercial Club Good Roads committee, organized the Dunes Highway Association to lobby state highway commission officials for the new road. Representatives from the West Michigan Pike Association and Illinois' Sheridan Drive Association attended the initial January 20, 1919, meeting of the Dunes Highway Association. They saw the Dunes Highway bridging Lake Michigan's western and eastern shores to the straits of Mackinac. Gathering momentum, the Dunes Highway Association launched an intensive public relations campaign assisted by Cannon's Gary Post-Tribune articles.[5]

Dunes Highway Association engineers envisioned the Dunes Highway a "state of the art"40-foot (12 m)-wide concrete highway with a 100-foot (30 m) right-of-way. Therefore, the new road would have closely adhered to proper road design and construction specifications suggested by leading highway engineers for an Ideal Section of the transcontinental Lincoln Highway. Engineers conceived this transportation innovation after the 1916 passage of the Federal-Aid Road Act. In 1922, the 1⅓-mile Ideal Section was built in Lake County beginning at Dyer on the Illinois-Indiana border. This section of pavement was designed to carry automobiles traveling 35 miles (56 km) an hour and motor trucks 10 miles (16 km) an hour on average. The State Highway Commission did not accede to the Dunes Highway Association's wishes for a model road like the Ideal Section. In August 1919, Commission director H.L. Wright tentatively designated the Dunes Highway as State Road 43, to be 20 feet (6.1 m) wide.[6][7]Narrower than anticipated, the new concrete highway was still superior to most Indiana roads, which in the mid-1920s were gravel or dirt with paved sections only between the larger towns.[8][9]

Dunes Highway construction began in 1922 under the guidance of Gary contractor Ingwald Moe and construction engineer Ezra Sensibar. Both public and private funding defrayed the approximately $1 million construction cost of the Dunes Highway. The new road qualified under the 1921 Federal Highway Act for matching government funds. This legislation replaced the original Federal-Aid Road Act of 1916 to more stringently restrict the distribution of highway funds. The law required that states earmark for federal funding less than 7 percent of the state's entire highway mileage. Indiana's total road mileage in 1921 was 73,131 miles (117,693 km). Consequently, only5,000 miles (8,000 km) of state roads could receive federal funding. The Hoosier State Automobile Association also claimed responsibility for financing the Dunes Highway, soliciting businesses along the road to support construction. The Michigan City News-Dispatch reported that the local business community paid an $11 membership fee to defray Dunes Highway construction expenses. Realizing the benefits of a road linking regional industries, the Consumers' Company, a sand mining enterprise, and Inland Steel Company donated rights-of-way through their property.[10]

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  1. ^ *Nelson, C.W. (February 1957). "On the Old Chicago Road". Duneland Historical Society Newsletter: 1–7.
    • Fischer, Suzanne Hayes (1994). Facilities For Motorists, 1900–1940, Historic Context & Property Type Analysis (Masters essay). Indianapolis: Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis. p. 12.
    • Jakle, John A. (1985). The Tourist, Travel in Twentieth-Century North America. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press. pp. 130–132.
    • Sanford, Dena; Williams, Brenda (1996). Historic Properties Summary, Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. Omaha: National Park Service. p. 3.
  2. ^ Staff (August 2005). Development of US 12/US 20: 'The Dunes Highway'. National Park Service.
  3. ^ *The Gary Post-Tribune. November 16, 1923. {{cite news}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
    • Rose, Albert C. (1953). Historic American Highways: Significant Incidents in the Development of Highway Transportation in Colonial America and the United States During More Than Four Centuries. Washington: American Association of State Highway Officials. p. 88.
    • Fischer, Suzanne Hayes (1994). Facilities for Motorists, 1900–1940, Historic Context Study & Property Type Analysis (Masters essay). Indianapolis: Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis. p. 12.
  4. ^ U.S., Federal Writers Project. The Calumet Region Historical Guide. East Chicago, 1939.
  5. ^ The Gary Post-Tribune, November 16, 1923
  6. ^ Indiana Transportation Map (Map). Indiana State Highway Commission. September 30, 1918. {{cite map}}: Unknown parameter |accseedate= ignored (help)
  7. ^ Indiana Transportation Map (Map). Indiana State Highway Commission. September 30, 1919. {{cite map}}: Unknown parameter |accseedate= ignored (help)
  8. ^ The Gary Post-Tribune, November 16, 1923; Rose, 88; Fischer, 12.
  9. ^ Development of U.S. 12 -`The Dunes Highway'; National Park Service; August 2005
  10. ^ Gary Post-Tribune, November 16, 1923; The News-Dispatch, September 12, 1996.
  11. ^ Rose, Albert C. Historic American Highways: Significant Incidents in the Development of Highway Transportation in Colonial America and the United States During More Than Four Centuries. Washington: American Association of State Highway Officials, 1953.
  12. ^ Indiana. Executive Department, Division of Accounting and Statistics. Yearbook of the State of Indiana. Fort Wayne: State Of Indiana, 1917-40.
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