1923 International Guide to the Jefferson Highway

The following is the opening text as found in the 1923 International Tourist Guide: From Pine to Palm, The Jefferson Highway — North and South published by the Jefferson Highway Association, Touring Information Bureau located in St. Joseph, Missouri.  All illustrations on this page are taken from this booklet or its companion (published at the same time) Free Tourist Camps, Jefferson Highway.

All-the-Year Vacation Route of America
From Pine to Palm

JEFFERSON HIGHWAY (International)

New Orleans to Winnipeg

This Highway was organized in November, 1915, at New Orleans, Louisiana. It was organized for the dual purpose of providing a great north and south highway and to honor the name of Thomas Jefferson for the part he took in the Louisiana Purchase.

The original conception was formed at Des Moines, Iowa, by E. T. Meredith, former [U S] Secretary of Agriculture [and magazine publisher], but for sentimental reasons the organization meeting was called at New Orleans.

The first thought was to have the course of the Jefferson Highway entirely in the Louisiana Purchase, but that was sentiment. When the time came to actually lay the course it was found to have slipped over into Texas and gotten east of the Mississippi River for a space, in Minnesota.

While the claim is not made that the Jefferson Highway is a 365-day road throughout its length, yet at least half of this highway can be traveled under most any weather condition. We are pleased to inform the motoring public, however, that the Jefferson Highway has been incorporated into the state primary system of each of the seven states traversed, and this fact will insure an all-the-year highway just a quickly as these projects are completed.

The way is blazed by over two thousand metal signs and over twenty thousand pole marks and monograms. [The sign/pole mark can be seen in the corners of the two booklet covers found on this page.]

As it winds its way south from Winnipeg the Jefferson traverses the rich area of the great glacial deposits in Manitoba, through Minnesota southward until it comes to the upthrust of the Ozark Mountains, thence its trend is westward around the western spurs of these mountains till it crosses the Red River into Texas at Denison. From there it takes a southeasterly course through Louisiana over the alluvial deposit of the Red and Mississippi rivers.

In its course the Jefferson not only traverses the heart of the richest country on the globe, but also one filled with romance and sentiment.

[Editor's note: The reference about being incorporated into the state primary system of highways refers to the 1922 establishment of numbered state highways in each state. The Jefferson Highway (which many readers may realize by now is the predecessor to Highway 71 in Missouri and Highway 69 in Kansas) was numbered Highway #1  in Missouri and many maps of the early 1920s may carry that number, but after 1926, maps should be using #71. Jefferson Highway and other early highway "trail" name designations such as Ozark Trails, Red Star Route, King of Trails, etc., would be found on maps from 1915-16 to the mid-1920s.  And in case you are wondering, what became U. S. Highway 66 in 1926, can be found on early maps as Highway 14.  The section of the Jefferson Highway in Carthage from 2nd Street and Garrison to Oak Street and through the westside of town on Oak Street and its extensions beyond the city limits, is better known today as Route 66.]

To view the local portion of the Jefferson Highway through Jasper County and surrounding area, click here.

Anyone with Jefferson Highway memorabilia, signs, or artifacts from businesses located along the highway route (no matter what state), is urged to contact the Powers Museum in Carthage, Missouri. The various historical organizations involved in this on-going research project are especially interested in locating photographs of the highway and its businesses and towns.