Overview of the National Road Museum

The National Road Museum is our primary museum.  This is where most of our volunteers give their time, and where a significant portion of our “behind the scenes” work takes place.

We are located along the Historic National Road, about 2/5 the distance between Baltimore and the place where the road leaves our state (just west of Grantsville, MD.)  Although we aren’t exactly halfway along the byway, we make a great central point for guests traveling from the cities to learn about the National Road.

So what is the National Road and why is there a museum about it?

We will go into more detail on the road in later lessons, but here is a summary!

The Historic National Road was the first major roadway built by the Federal government.  Although the portion of the road we are on is not part of that federally funded section, that federal road was ‘tacked on’ to our pre-existing road starting in Cumberland.

Our exhibits, listed below, give a broad overview of the Road’s history, and its impacts on both our nation and local area.

• Overview of the Road
• Early Roads and Indigenous American origins
• Theater – Currently showing National Road music video and drone footage of the road today.
• Evolution of Road Vehicles from horse drawn wagons to bikes to autos.
• Road impacts on commerce
• Engineering and Construction Methods
• America’s first Macadam
• Good Roads for Civil War Armies
• Exhibit Case – Currently housing items related to exhibits
• Lodging, including a replica Green Book for visitors to examine.
• Landmarks along the Road, including a complete and authentic National Road milemarker
• Experiences along the Road – Stagecoaches and Dangers
• Eisenhower Interstate Highways
• Photo-Op spot with Sidling Hill
• Original painting: The National Road by Tony Mendez
• Photo: Backyards of Boonsboro along the Road.

Here are some highlights of the road’s history:

More detail on this history is included in History lessons, so feel free to just skim this list for now.

• During its heyday, the National Road (also called the National Pike) was the most reliable route over the Appalachian Mountains to reach “the west” which incuded everything from Ohio and beyond.
• It is sometimes called “The Road That Built The Nation” because it allowed the country to grow west and gave access to resources that helped the young nation grow and survive.  It is also called the “Main Street of America” because of all of the towns which grew up along its length, a nickname shared with Route 66.
• Conestoga wagons were often seen on the road.  Settlers taking their families west used them for the long journey, but they also were commonly used as cargo transports, sort of like tractor & trailers today.  Stagecoaches were also seen frequently, working like long distance buses to carry passengers and only stopping to change horses every 12 miles.
• A route from Baltimore to Cumberland already existed in the 1700s as a series of privately maintained toll roads.  Some of the roadway had started as Native American trails widened for fur traders and then later in the 1750s by George Washington when he was with the British Army working under General Edward Braddock.
• In 1806, with the advice of a Swiss-born Secretary of the Treasury named Albert Gallatin, Congress and President Thomas Jefferson approved federal funding to continue this route from Cumberland to the Ohio River.  This was named the Cumberland Road or the National Pike.  The name was later applied to the entire roadway including the preexisting road.
• The private toll road between Boonsboro and Hagerstown was improved in 1823 with a new road building technique invented by John Loudon McAdam of Scotland, creating a surface known as macadam.  It was the first time macadam road was used in North America, and within a few years it became the standard practice for many roads including other parts of the National Road.
• Congress continued funding construction westward as new states were added to the country, eventually ending the project in Vandalia, Illinois in 1837.  (A state road continued from there to the Mississippi River at St. Louis)
• During the 1830s, deciding that it was unconstitutional for the Federal Government to fund road maintenance, ownership and all financial responsibility of the federally built road was turned over to the states it passed through.
• Inns and taverns opened all along the road, making lodging available every few miles.
• Between the 1840s and 1880s, railroads began to reach the same destinations in the west that the Road served, and toll revenue began to decrease.  Private toll road companies began to run out of money and go bankrupt.
• During the Civil War, both armies made use of the Road in our area: in addition to troop and supplies movements, it played a minor role in the Battle of South Mountain, wounded from the Battle of Antietam a few days later were transported on the Road to various makeshift hospitals, and after the battle of Gettysburg, confederate General J.E.B. Stewart held off Union attempts to stop the retreating confederate army along the road both in Boonsboro and in Funkstown.
• The Road fell into disrepair in the late 1800s, sometimes locals and farmers tried to maintain it themselves to keep it usable.  The decrease in travelers due to railroads and other roadways impacted town economies.
• During the period of decline, farmers and bicyclists (many of whom were women) across the country led a movement to convince the government that the nation needed better road surfaces, aptly named the “Good Roads Movement.”
• In 1906, President Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Aid Roads Act which put federal funding into road repairs and road building for the first time in nearly 80 years.  Within a decade, nearly every major road had been improved with new pavement of some kind.
• Major roads were given names and logos, providing organized east-west and north-south routes.  The National Road was incorporated into a Baltimore – Los Angeles road called the National Old Trails Road.  The western 1/4 of this road later became part of Route 66.
• In 1927, roads were given numbers instead of names, and the National Road was attached to a different series of roads west of St. Louis to create US Route 40 to San Francisco.
• Road trips became popular, and motels, restaurants, and service centers opened along the roads to support this.
• In the 1930s and 1940s, a bypass was built between Frederick and Hagerstown that allowed for faster, safer travel.
• In the 1960s, a new interstate was being constructed which began as a bypass of Rt. 40, and was renamed Interstate 70 during construction.
• Around the same time, the 40 Alternate Bypass and the original Rt 40 had their signs swapped, making the road through Boonsboro Alternate 40.  Between Ellicott City and Frederick, the official Rt. 40 name was given to Interstate 70 as a dual-number road, while the original road became Maryland State Route 144.
• In 1976, the National Road was designated a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark by the Army Corps of Engineers
• Finally, the Historic National Road was designated a Maryland Scenic Byway in 1996, and an All-American Road National Scenic Byway in 2002
• The National Road Heritage Foundation was formed in 2005, and opened the National Road Museum in 2024 after over 15 years of fundraising, planning and design.