Chicago Road

The Chicago Road is the name of a road from running Detroit, Michigan, to Chicago, Illinois. It follows the general route of the old Sauk Trail, an important Native American trail. In 1680, the explorer Robert La Salle was probably the first European to travel along it.

The disasters suffered in the War of 1812 taught the Government that it could not defend the western country without roads over which to move its armies and their supplies. In 1824, the United States Congress appropriated money for the survey of roads of national importance (General Survey Act of 1824), and the U.S. President allocated one third of the entire sum to surveying a military highway connecting Detroit with Fort Dearborn at Chicago. From about 1830 on, an ever-increasing flood of settlers poured into the Old Northwest and thousands of them traveled the new highway leading to Chicago, which has ever since been called the Chicago Road. In 1833, the Detroit Arsenal was constructed near the eastern end of the road and its water connection to the East Coast. By 1835, daily stagecoaches ran between Detroit and Chicago. [Footpathes to Freeway, The Evolution of Michigan Roadmaps, http://maps.lib.msu.edu/miroadmaps/, Kathleen Weessies, Michigan State University Library, May 17, 2007, accessed November 24, 2007]

Construction of the Chicago Road began on the eastern end of the Sauk Trail, and the road did not reach the Michigan-Indiana border until 1835. [Barnett, LeRoy (2004). "A Drive Down Memory Lane: The Named State And Federal Highways Of Michigan", p. 51. Allegan Forest, MI: The Priscilla Press. ISBN 1886167249.]

Its route is approximately represented by the former route of US 112 (now US 12). From Detroit to Ypsilanti, the road is known as Michigan Avenue.

References

* Dictionary of American History by James Truslow Adams, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1940

External links

* [http://maps.lib.msu.edu/miroadmaps/ 1831 map of the Chicago Road]
* [http://www.michmarkers.com/pages/S0162.htm Branch County Michigan Historical Marker for the Chicago Road]
* [http://www.michmarkers.com/pages/S0280.htm Wayne County Michigan Historical Marker for the Chicago Road]
* [http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/natbltn/400-499/nb436.htm The Old Sauk Trail in Illinois]
* [http://www.swmicomm.org/SWMC/US12.htm Michigan's US 12 Heritage Trail]
* [http://www.michigan.gov/hal/0,1607,7-160--147486--,00.html Press Release for Educational DVD on the Chicago Road]
* [http://www.michigan.gov/mdot/0,1607,7-151-9620_11057-92130--,00.html Press Release announcing US 12 designation as Historic Heritage Route]