Drive Main Street and Historic U.S. Route 40 from Union to Clayton, Ohio, on this 3.9-mile real-time drive through Union, Englewood, and Clayton along two of Montgomery County’s most important historic highways.
U.S. Route 40
U.S. Route 40 – The Historic National Road
Few highways in the United States can match the historical significance of U.S. Route 40. Stretching from the Atlantic Coast in New Jersey to the Wasatch Front of Utah, US-40 follows much of the route of the National Road, America's first federally funded interstate highway. For more than two centuries, it has served as a gateway to the American frontier, a vital commercial artery, and one of the country's most enduring cross-country highways.
The story of U.S. Route 40 begins before the numbered highway system itself. In 1806, President Thomas Jefferson signed legislation authorizing construction of the National Road to connect the young nation's eastern states with the rapidly expanding western frontier. Construction began in Cumberland, Maryland, in 1811 and gradually pushed west through Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. The road opened vast new opportunities for settlement, commerce, and travel, carrying stagecoaches, freight wagons, livestock, mail, and countless pioneers seeking new lives beyond the Appalachian Mountains.
When the U.S. Numbered Highway System was established in 1926, much of the National Road became U.S. Route 40. The new designation preserved the historic corridor while modernizing it for the automobile age. As America's love affair with road travel blossomed, US-40 became a favorite route for family vacations, trucking, military convoys, and cross-country adventures. Small towns flourished along its path, welcoming travelers with diners, gas stations, motels, and roadside attractions that defined the golden age of American highways.
Although Interstate highways have bypassed many portions of U.S. Route 40, the road remains remarkably intact. Travelers can still experience original brick streets, historic stone bridges, century-old courthouses, restored downtown districts, and communities whose identities have been intertwined with the National Road for generations. In many places, Interstate 70 closely parallels US-40, allowing motorists to leave the interstate and experience a slower, more scenic journey through the heart of America's transportation history.
Along its route, US-40 traverses an extraordinary variety of landscapes. It climbs through the Appalachian Mountains of Maryland and Pennsylvania, crosses the rolling farmland of Ohio and Indiana, passes through the prairies of Illinois, spans the Missouri River into Kansas, crosses the Great Plains, and ultimately climbs into the rugged mountains of Colorado before ending in Utah. Few highways showcase such a broad cross-section of the American landscape and the communities that call it home.
For The Open Road Archive, U.S. Route 40 offers far more than simply a means of getting from one place to another. It is a journey through the evolution of American transportation itself. Every drive along US-40 explores a corridor that helped build the nation—connecting cities, supporting commerce, encouraging westward expansion, and preserving countless stories along the way.
This collection features every Archive video filmed along U.S. Route 40, from major cities and suburban corridors to quiet rural stretches and historic downtowns. Whether you're researching a destination, reminiscing about a road trip, or planning your next drive, these videos showcase one of America's most important—and most fascinating—highways, mile by mile.
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