Showing. But first, joining us is michael owens. The author of after ike on the trail of the centuryold journey that changed america. Hugh did it change america . Along the route, thousands came out to cheer the convoy on, to look at the vehicles, talk to the men who remember in the convoy and it spurred a lot of interest in travel by motorized vehicles. Were going to watch the film. Did it get a lot of attention in the press . It did. They happened a major sendoff at the white house. President wilson was in europe but secretary of war newton baker waved them off. There were speeches, the press was all there and there was quite a scene at the white house. Theres a district through maryland through frederic, maryland, where they spent the first night. Walk us through the genesis of this idea and why 80 vehicles as part of this convoy . You have to look at it in the context of the time. World war i had just concluded a few months earlier and the American Military leadership realized that in future warfare motorized vehicles would play a very important role. They had a number of different motorized vehicles but they wanted to know how would they perform under different circumstances. If it was necessary to move troops from one post to another, would they be able to do it, how long would it take . So they were interested in the conditions of the vehicles and which ones performed and which didnt. Early in also interested in the condition of the roads. Until you got to california there were no paved roads at the time so they wanted to know how long it would take and how difficult. A young Lieutenant Colonel who would go on to serve as president of the United States. Dwight david eisenhower. What was his role in this . Its an interesting story because at the present time he was very disappointed that he didnt get to europe during world war i. Most of his west point teammates did. He was contemplating resigning from the military and he heard about this trip at the last minute. He had to go to the campsite where they spent the first night but it really kept him in the military and of course that changed his life and changed the history of the u. S. So lets watch this film the u. S. Army motor convoy and who had the idea of filming this . The u. S. Military wanted to film it because first of all they wanted to be able to show people back in washington, the military leadership, heres the condition of the roads, heres the condition of the vehicles and which vehicles performed well or not and they wanted to record it for history but because they realized that this would be an historic trip so they wanted to have a record of it for everyone who would be interested. As we watch this film, when did you first hear about it . I read a Magazine Article in an American History magazine about 20 years ago about this trim and it piqued my interest and ive been fascinated about it ever since but it wasnt until i retired from my first career that i was actually able to take the time to follow in the footsteps of the trip. What are we looking at right now . This is the Zero Milestone marker. Its right across from the white house. The cameraman is standing with his face immediately to the white house. Newton baker there in the light suit. He was the secretary of war at the time. President wilson was in europe so newton baker waved them off and he dedicated the Zero Milestone marker and its still there today. And you can see the backdrop of the washington monument. Now were at, sit camp megs . Meegs. It doesnt exist today but all the vehicles had assembled there and drove to there from the white house and took off. Its important to understand how premitive the roads and bridges were. There were confinement a number of covered bridges at the beginning of the trip in the east and nose were fairly precipitous. Of course, these bridges were built for horse and buggy, not for 10ton mac trucks. Some of them had to be restructured. And modified. The engineers there, they had to look off the top of the bridge so the trucks could come through. So the engineers were really busy at each of those bridges. Did they have drivers licenses . Not everybody, interestingly enough, had a drivers licenses. They drafted from the Service People who said that they could drive. Eisenhower later wrote some of the men were more familiar with horse and buggy than they were with motorized vehicle. They learned at as they went along and became better. Talking about primitive these were very primitive trucks but howd they train on them . They happened very limited training. Remember, were right after world war i so theyd not been able to train very much in preparation for this terrorism. They did do some preparation at camp meegs where the trip started but not Long Distances. Kind of a big deal in ohio and elsewhere . It was a big deal all across the country. People lined the roads all across the country and cheered them on. It was a frontpage headline in virtually every newspaper of the day and people really found in a source of National Pride and in the aftermath of the war sort of like a vickery lap. You can see someone waving. The roads go from concrete and asphalt to dirt roads, as we see in franklin grove, illinois. Yes, once they got toy, illinois, just west of chicago, the asphalt ended and they were on dirt roads then all the way to San Francisco or to nid california and you could see a problem there was the dust, which was really troublesome but when it rained they had mud. What is this here . This is one truck that overturned. Remember, they were built for horse and buggies so they were quite narrow and the drivers werent always the most experience. This driver lost control and it landed upside down off the road but they were able to right it and with block and tackle and manpower get it back up on the road. Today when you travel crosscountry there are hotels and restaurants and a lot of gas stations. What did these folks do . They camped out. They had a couple of kitchen wagons so they cooked all of their own meals. Their marching orders were to be selfsuficient. They did have to stop for gasoline but they had two tanker trucks so they were pretty well prepared. In looks like a pretty impressive bridge in iowa. They were concerned that all of those trucks would be too help for the bridge so they sent them across one or two at a time. Your book after ike, explain the genesis of youre your research. , i was interested in this trip. I think its a very important trip in the history of the us, and i was interested in the fact that eisenhower went along on this. He was only 28 years old at the present time and later, i think partly because of the inspiration of this trip was the driving force behind the interstate highway system and i wanted to see the actual route they followed. I was able to follow their exact route. This is just west of lexington, nebraska. These roads, obviously there had been rain so theyre pretty muddy. Yes, and you can see a truck sort of slipping and sliding there. They had one artillery tractor which was able to pull them out in most places but sometimes it was really slow going. On this particular day, according to the log, they traveled 34 miles in 10 hours. And what if the tires broke down, if they were flat . Did they have enough materials to sustain themselves . They had two trucks that carried only spare parts and they stopped at military bases along the way to replenish those parts. They had to make do sometimes. Of the 81 vehicles that started the trip, 71 made it all the way through. Thats a pretty good track record considering the conditions. And all were enlisted in the army at this time . There were. There were some civilians who followed them or went with them for part of the way. Did anyone write a diary about what was happening during this time . Several people kept diaries but the most complete one was kept by a lieutenant, jackson. He was in the east. He lived in pennsylvania, new jersey and hed never been to the west. He kept a detailed diary and thats how i was able to follow the route because he said precisely which towns they stopped in along the way. How far would they travel on any given day and what were their evening evenings like, their routine . It varied depending on the Road Conditions. With Road Conditions like that, as i said, on some days they only went 30 or 40 miles. When they were on concrete they went quite a bit farther but still it was fairly limited because there were breakdowns with vehicles and inexperienced drivers caused some problems. Even on the best days they didnt go much more than 100 miles. You talked about how some thought they were riding horses instead of operating a vehicle. Thats something eisenhower wrote about. He said some of them when the truck stalled hollering giddyup. Giddyup and go and some of the drivers didnt know what a clutch was, which was why their vehicles kept stalling out. Do you know how many vehicles, cars and trucks were in the u. S. Vs. How many horses were operating approximately . At the time of the convoy they were about 400,000 motorized vehicles, including cars and trucks and everything but that quickly surged in the years following so that by just a few years later, in the mid 20s, there were millions of motorized vehicles on the roads. Where would this film have been shown and what would those in theatres have thought as they watched this silent film in 1919 or 1920 . Flood watches there was a lot of american primed. Remember, the world had just come out of the First World War victorious. There was a feeling that the u. S. Was becoming a world power. Only a handful of people had actually driven in their individual automobiles from one coast to the other so this was the first real crosscountry convoy that was officially sanctioned and it was front line front page in news papers across the country. It was estimated that about 3. 5 Million People witnessed the convoy first hand and that was about 3. 5 of the entire population either. This took place from july 7 to september 7, 100 years ago in 1919. But who mapped out the journey . There was a nascent highway known as the lincoln highway, which some civilians, who were enthusiasts or motor trips had mapped out it went from times square in new york all the way to lincoln park in San Francisco and that route was established, but in many places, especially west of chicago, it wasnt just more than just two ruts cross the prairie, as some people called it. It was a difficult route but it was a route that they could follow and they tried to follow that with a few minor detours all the way. You wonder if they were envious the train was working a lot faster than the convoy. The u. P. Had been there for over 50 years. They chose the u. P. Tracks because they wanted a flat surface. Also, of course this would have been the height of the summer no air conditioning, of course. What was the conditions like for them on these trucks . It was hot and sweaty and of course they had to stop and push and exert a lot of effort along the way. So it was difficult and its hard to know what was worse, the heat and the sweat or the dust as you can see, that was swirling. With the dust they decided to space out the convoy so there was a Long Distance between vehicles. What are we looking at here . This is wyoming and gives you a condition of some of the bridges out west. As i said earlier, these bridges were built for horse and buggy. So a lot of them had to be reinforced or rebuilt and the engineers, to their credit, did a great job. If any of the bridges were damaged they rebuilt them. Michael owen, do you know who made these trucks . Packard made a lot of them. Ford made some of them and garford was a big manufacturer of vehicles them. Some are no longer in business. Did these men, and they are all men at the present time, have a sense of what this mission was all about, what they were trying to accomplish . Well, they did. Some of the diaries that ive read suggest that it was only at the end when they got to california that they realized what theyd actually done and say saw the headlines, thought gosh, this is really something. I write in my book that i wondered if years later some of the men looked back and said that was the greatest experience of my life. Because were celebrating the first t pniversary of armstrong on e moon and i wonder if it was the equivalent of that . It was. The moonwalk of 1919 or early 20th century. Explain how it all came about, as we look at these films and see just how antiquated it was 100 years ago but it didnt start with eisenhower. No, others had ideas for an interstate highway system. F. D. R. Promoted one and he had fairly specific ideas on what it should look like. There should be a transcontinental road but not until eisenhower was it passed. The interstate high waive bill of 1956. The bill passed in 1956 and construction started pretty soon after that. And as i look at these tires, they really look so thin. Im wondering how they were able to sustain the weight of the vehicle, the truck and also the journey from washington to San Francisco. A man by the name of frank seaberling, who was the c. E. O. Of goodyear, rode a fairly significant part of in along with the convoy and later he wrote about the need for better tires so i think better tires came out, as a consequence, out of this trip just as so many other things did. Now were heading further west past the rockies in utah and as this film depicts, they are going very slowly. They are. Ive been on that road and theres a precipitous vertical dropoff on the left side and even though theres a small guard rail, a truck that size would easily brake through the guardrail. The road is only one lane and they had to stretch out a little bit because of the dust but fortunately they got through and that and over the paz. This is close to a high pass going over the sierras and down into california. I think the top of it was about 6 7600 feet. They were able to get across with no other mishaps. Were there any other vehicles at the time . The police and Highway Patrol did not allow other vehicles on that highway while they were on that pass. What are they doing here . This is in utah, the road was very bad there. Theyre actually cutting sage brush to put underneath the vehicles to get some traction for them. Because they were in this deep sand. They had difficulty getting through the sand. In fact, they said some of the vehicles were so heavy, they sunk down two feet into the sand. So they were putting down sage brush to get some traction. A journey that lasted a couple of months. You mentioned earlier they were selfsustaining but howd they wash their clothes, make sure they had enough to eat, what if they had medical issues . They had a couple of parallel cars with medical supplies and really remarkably, there were very few serious injuries. A few people dropped out but no really lifethreatening injury along the way. In terms of keeping clean, i think they stayed pretty dusty, especially west of chicago. When they got to San Francisco, there was a big washdown. Now were even further west, almost in San Francisco but this is a pretty baron part of utah. This is why they had to be selfsumbt. Of course they had a couple of kitchen wagons and you can see one on the left. Theyre preparing a meal there. Pretty primitive way to cook but thats how they did it and of course, cooking for 81 men on a contraption like that wasnt easy. And they had to be hungry. They did. They has a lot of complaints about the food in the beginning in part because the person who was doing the cooking was also a supply officer. And in omaha they got a fulltime crook cook and the food improved quite a bit. Howd they determine who was going to be the twin . They asked for volunteers and then they found people who said they were familiar with vehicles. As it turned out, some of the drivers had a very limited experience with driving. We are so connected today with cell phone technology. How did the leaders of this communicate . Person who kept the dialies, jackson, once they would set camp for the night. He would write a telegram reporting. So he was the one responsible for staying in touch and its nose submissions that make up a key part of his daily log. In terms of the timeline, did they have a certain schedule that they were determined to meet . Did they want to be in San Francisco by Early September . They had an openended commitment. They wanted to get there as quickly as possible. Part of the goal, objective of the trip was to see how difficult it would be since nobody had tried Something Like this before and the military wanted to see how quickly could we get troops trained and trucks out to the west coast if we ever needed to get them there. Have any of these trucks been preserved . These particular trucks, i dont believe so once they got to San Francisco they were cleaned up and refurbished and sent off to Different Military bases all over the western part of the u. S. So they were separated then. But they had to deal with every time of terrain and weather condition. Heat, rain, probably no snow at the time of the year but a lot of potential storms. Yes, and the elwell jackson was complaining about the dust. But the alternative to dust was heavily rain in which they would have sunk down into the mud. The dust was preferable to the rain and mud. What surprised you the most in researching this journey . I think the fact that so few people knew about this trip. It seems to me it was such an important part of American History and laid the foundation for motorized travel in the u. S. But very few people knew about it. I stopped in libraries in every town along the way and looked up in the log of newspapers of the newspaper that was published the day after the convoy had been there. It was always front page material in each of those numerous along the way but people nowadays rarely know about this trip. Did they have somebody ahead to give them reports . Thats an important point. There were two men on Harley Davidson motor cycles so they went ahead of the convoy all the way. First of all, they would mark if there was a fork in the road and if they saw difficulties, they would look at how to deal with it and come back and consult with the convoy so those two men on harleydavidsons really played a key role. How fast or slow were they going right here . They averaged in the west about 6 Miles Per Hour so it was Police Department slow. And do you know who shot this film . They had publicity people with them, they want to have a good record of the film. If youre going out east and youre headed up lake top, oh its a spectacular sight. Yes here you can see lake tahoe in the background. Its such a bright blue, that was kind of a milestone for the man because they knew they were right at the border with california, here and nevada really close to california and soon there would be paved roads. In a sense they almost reached the finish line . You mentioned earlier the role in california, so how far is this from south San Francisco . Right here they got on paved roads and, lets see, looks like its not yet paved but very soon ill be on paved road. This is in eastern california, very small town even nowadays, i saw they had a sign welcome and now leaving right next one another. So you see the flag of the people as they arrived. Heres a paved road again so they would be paved right away. Will you talk about then Lieutenant Colonel eisenhower, was he one of the leaders . No he was, not he was one of the officers, there is only about 30 or so officers but the leader, Commanding Officer was colonel Charles Charles mick floor, he retired after this final mission in the military. It looked like a parade of sorts. They knew they were coming, in the governor of california actually met them at the nevada state line and welcome them and prepared this at major towns, so they had a big welcoming parade in sacramento and even larger one in San Francisco. So now we are midway between the capital of sacramento and about an hour and a half today from San Francisco. Of course they had to take a fairy, no bridges then, so they had to take two ferries to get from oakland to San Francisco. But you see the power lines there so they are back in civilization. You can only speculate but what do you think they were thinking . I think they were thinking its almost over, weve done the worst part and now they are in oakland and they really knew that the end was in sight and they are really quite excited about getting there. And here they are add the ports in oakland and getting ready to get all the trucks onto varies across the bay there. Again by now they have 75 vehicles, big news and there is plenty of people who turned out. This is the bridge that you are talking about a moment ago . These are ferries, these are the areas that i was talking about, they want across from oakland to the waterfront in San Francisco. Did somebody make this journey in advance of the convoy to get a sense of how they would wrap up the route . And different individual had driven coast to coast previously and their own private automobile so they had some experience from them and incidentally one of the most fascinating individuals to drive across country was the etiquette guru emily but she drove with her santa crosscountry. What are we looking at now . This is the closing ceremony, there are greeted by military personnel, thats the mayor there in the top hat, and you have the mayor coming up around there and driving to lincoln park where they drop the vehicles. You can see them going to lincoln park and the water going off into what is the Golden Gate Bridge now. Your overall assessment of this film and its impact on history . I think the trip first of all was what had the greatest impact on history because so many people saw this and this was the dawn of the automobile age and it really led people to think automobiles are really the way of the future, so i think that really had a major impact. I think the film is interesting as a historic artifact and just to remind us how far we have come and really only a century because it was a century ago, this of course had a major impact on eisenhower and he said himself that trip really led him to be interested in an interstate highway system. So it had major impacts in that way. You wrote a summary report november 5th 1919, so let me just share with you part of what he wrote. Quote extend interests fire trucks through the middle western part of the United States are impractical until roads are improved, and then only light truck should be used on a long hauls, it is believe that the Motor Transportation corps should pay more attention to disciplinary drills for officers and men, and that all should be intelligent, snappy soldiers before giving them the responsibility of operating trucks. So two different points there. Right, first of all i think eisenhower like all the other people in the convoy saw how bad the roads were and they were shocked about how bad the roads were, they realize the army and military are interested in finding out can remove trucks and equipment and men across the country and quickly, they saw no we cant its gonna be quite an effort. So they improved roads in the west not only for the military but for more and more civilians getting automobiles. The second one eisenhower wrote about the lack of discipline early on, especially in the first few weeks of the convoy, as i said earlier a lot of men who are not used to driving vehicles and more used to horse and buggy and they werent really able to follow orders very well. He also faulted some of the officers who didnt really get the discipline that they should have had. This is 1919 and the iterstate highway system iteostate highway system nearly four decades later, why did it take so long . There was interest but i think the Great Depression came along and there was no money for that and world war ii came along and there were other priorities but fdr at this day, we need to have this crosscountry highway system and then after the war truman was interested and in fact under truman there were some roads built but it wasnt until eisenhower came along that a fool interstate highway act was passed that allocated the money necessary to start build a nationwide system. And are you about to make the journey again, for those who want to recreate the route, how can they do that . Well they can read my book first of all, the lincoln Highway Association has a couple thousand active members, they have annual conferences and they are very, they have been very busy promoting the lincoln highway, keeping the knowledge of the lincoln highway active, so i would say go to the lincoln Highway Associations website, look at what they have for information there, you can get a detailed map and in each of the states along the way the tourist bureaus have information on the lincoln highway as well. The roads are certainly better today but for those who make the route would they see similar topography that these people saw . Yeah absolutely, they would see more farms and small towns coming up and more buildings along the way but the topography is certainly the same. Of course nowadays you have the interstate but if you want to do it fast you can get right out there in just a few days over the interstate but i founded a lot more fun and a lot more interesting to go on the small roads because they still go right through, right down main street through all the small towns like the convoy. Did two more, things first of all we saw some of the major communities, the reaction among the townspeople was . Wet very enthusiastic, they of course had the to advance man on the motorcycle saying the convoy will be here and three hours and they knew it was coming and they got event notice from people on harleydavidsons, so they had a little parade as the convoy pass through so that was an important factor. And finally you touched on this on a number of occasions but the importance of this convoy, this trip, was what . Several, things first of all it show that a trip like this could be done but it was challenging and if the military wanted to get military vehicles across the country quickly they needed to improve the roads, also there are a number of civilians interested in better roads, several of them started the good roads movement, some of those people from the good roads movement drove along with a convoy for portions and they use this as their way to recruit more people for the good roads movement but also the press and different state governments to allocate more money for highways and improve highways along the way. So it was a concerted effort by military and civilians to really improve the highways in the west. So are you retired from the service . Yes, it was a great adventure, it was a lot of, fun i meant a lot of people along the way and he u j gratifying for me to be able to tell the story because as i said so many people have not heard of this. The book is titled after ike, on the trio that changed, america thank you very much for joining us on c span American History tv. Thank, you my pleasure. United states truth cooperating they have done a difficult task of keeping, order avoiding any incident that might aggravate the situation, Brigadier General commanding general berlin command, he has a watchful eye on the operation, was berlins mayor, aware of the intense feelings of his people tens of mass ruling. The mayor urges restraint, expresses confidence and support for free berlin by the United States in the western allies. And the next few days american soldiers were on the border area, yards away from the shooting ball, its a time for patients, but u. S. Troops are ordered to resist any encroachment on the freedom was berlin or entering into east berlin