HIGHWAYS: The Concrete Canal

Governor Thomas E. Dewey last week formally opened the first section of what will be the longest, best-planned and most remarkable toll road in America, the New York Thruway. At a banquet in Rochester, Dewey pressed a button that opened turnpike exchanges on the 115-mile stretch from West Henrietta, near Rochester, to Lowell, near Utica. For New York, the Thruway may be the most important achievement of its kind since De Witt Clinton in 1825 opened the Erie Canal and gave the state the jump on its neighbors. The aorta of commerce, the canal made the state great. In...

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