From Battlefields to Peacocks
Originally the Dixie Highway was marked by a "DH" emblem painted on telegraph
and telephone poles. By the mid-1920s, the federal government implemented anumeric
sign system. The program ignored the named road system and northwest Georgia's Battlefield
Route became U.S. Route 41, as did muchof the Dixie Highway in Georgia and Florida.
Communities offered tourists free services at first, including tourist tent camps
and roadside parks with picnic tables.
With road improvements, travel increased. Entrepreneurs seized the opportunity.
Tourist courts, cabins, inns and motels with adjacent restaurants, diners, hot dog
stands, filling stations, and roadside markets sprang up.
During the upcoming vacation season, this route would see more than 800 tourist automobiles a day! Constructed between 1915 and 1927, the Dixie Highway was part of the new road system built in response to the growing number of motorists during the early decades of the twentieth century.
The highway extended from Ontario, Canada south 5,706 miles to Miami, Florida. The Dixie Highway Association was the driving force behind the development of the Dixie Highway. Highway associations, like the Dixie Highway Assoc., and the well-known Lincoln Highway Assoc., which connected San Francisco to New York, were formed by motor enthusiasts and/or entrepreneurs to launch the construction of roads that would connect cities to each other. The idea for the Dixie Highway came from Carl Graham Fisher , a native Indianan, entrepreneur, and land speculator.
back to topInvolved in the early stages of the Lincoln Highway , Fisher was experienced in promoting roads. By 1914, he and Michigan businessman W.S. Gilbreath had gained enough support for this north-south highway that they brought the idea to the American Road Congress annual meeting in Atlanta.
For a More Extensive Historical Review, Check out: The Historic Context of the Dixie Highway By Pam S. Ecker