Legends of America: The National Road: First Highway in America

By the early 19th century, the wilderness of the Ohio country had given way to settlement. The road George Washington had cut through the forest many years before, called the Braddock Road, was replaced by the National Road. Cutting approximately 820-mile long path through the states of Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, it was built between 1811 and 1834 and was the first federally funded road in U.S. history.