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Highway 61 in Minnesota

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View of Highway 61 from John A. Latsch State Park

View of Highway 61 from John A. Latsch State Park. Photograph by Wikimedia Commons user McGhiever, October 3, 2012. CC BY-SA 3.0

For more than a century, the routes now known as US Highway 61 and Minnesota State Highway 61 have captured the imagination of Minnesotans looking for views of rushing rivers and cascading waterfalls. Although the road has been renamed, reconfigured, and interrupted multiple times, it continues to serve as a vital transportation channel along the state’s eastern corridor.

At the end of World War I, a wave of economic developments changed the way Americans traveled. Improvements in automobile engineering and efficiencies in manufacturing made cars increasingly affordable for the country’s growing middle class. While the number of automobiles registered in Minnesota increased from 45,000 in 1913 to 324,166 in 1920, the state’s early roads were not built for automotive traffic. Most roads were little more than narrow, dusty lanes from the horse-and-wagon era, punctuated with deep ruts and inconsistent signage. Nationally, a populist Good Roads Movement called for collaboration among local communities, individual states, and the federal government to build a blended federal highway system.

In Minnesota, that collaboration began in 1920. Voters approved an amendment to the state constitution, authorizing construction of a statewide network of hard-surfaced trunk highways. The amendment, developed by Minnesota Highway Commissioner Charles Babcock, identified seventy trunk routes crossing the state. The route that Babcock considered most important—Trunk Highway 1—was designed as a border-to-border roadway from the Iowa state line near Albert Lea to the Twin Cities and Duluth, then passing along the North Shore of Lake Superior to the Pigeon River crossing to Canada. Much of this route eventually became Highway 61.

Work on Minnesota 1 began in 1921 with surveyors mapping the new road over footpaths and trails first traveled by Native Americans—particularly Ojibwe and other Anishinaabe people. Some sections were built over military roads laid out in the mid-1850s. Others were built adjacent to rail lines from the late 1800s. The road was constructed a section at a time, and a formal opening was celebrated on August 27, 1921.

While Minnesota was making progress on its trunk highways, officials unveiled a national plan that included a mid-continental route to be named US Highway 61. The new route started in New Orleans and loosely followed the Mississippi River through Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. It then entered Minnesota from La Crosse, Wisconsin, and continued parallel to the Mississippi River on Minnesota Highway 3, rather than Minnesota 1, as far as St. Paul. US 61 joined Minnesota 1 at St. Paul before continuing to Duluth and the North Shore.

Signposts were labeled US 61 and Trunk Highway 3 in the southeastern part of the state and US 61 and Trunk Highway 1 from St. Paul northward. In May 1934, however, the state trunk routes were fully absorbed into the US highway system, and the entire route from New Orleans to the Canadian border became US 61.

During the Great Depression, the Civilian Conservation Corps completed projects along US 61, including a scenic overlook at the Cascade River and a refectory at Gooseberry Falls State Park. After a pause during World War II, President Dwight D. Eisenhower supported a comprehensive interstate highway plan. A network of divided, four-lane expressways was designed to skirt the country’s downtowns and congested neighborhoods. Three of the new interstate highways were proposed to run through Minnesota: I-90, I-94, and I-35.

The new interstate expressways were not intended to replace US or state (trunk) highways; planners expected drivers to use the existing state roads for shorter distances, and to rely on the new interstate highways for long-distance trips at high speeds. US 61, then, retained its route through the lower half of the state as far as Wyoming, Minnesota, where it merged with I-35. The two highways ran concurrently from Wyoming to the Canadian border until about 1990 when the US Highway designation for all of US 61 north of Wyoming was withdrawn. The US 61 route along the North Shore was turned over to the state, and MnDOT renamed the North Shore section Minnesota Highway 61.

Both roads—Minnesota 61 along the North Shore and US 61 in southeastern Minnesota—have inspired artists and writers. Bob Dylan recorded the album Highway 61 Revisited; Cathy Wurzer wrote Tales of the Road: Highway 61; actress Jessica Lange published Highway 61: Photographs, and Moose Lake’s Blacklock family produced multiple photography books related to the road’s path along Lake Superior.

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“Good Roads Amendment Is Decisively Carried.” Duluth Herald, November 6, 1920.

“Good Roads Will Open Door of Opportunity to State.” Minneapolis Sunday Tribune, October 31, 1920.

Harlow, Tim. “Minnesota Trunk or State Highway, What’s the Difference?” Minneapolis Star Tribune, March 8, 2020.

Jensen, Bob. “Highway 61.” City of Maplewood.
https://www.maplewoodmn.gov/1663/Highway-61

Lange, Jessica. Highway 61. Brooklyn, NY: powerHouse Books, 2019.

Larsen, Arthur J. “The Development of the Minnesota Road System.” PhD thesis, University of Minnesota, 1966. Available at the Minnesota Historical Society library as HE356.M6 L28.

Long, Barbara Beving. “Bridge No. 3585, Gooseberry Falls State Park: Spanning Gooseberry River at Trunk Highway 61.” Historic American Engineering Record, Rocky Mountain Regional Office, National Park Service, Denver, Colorado, March 1996. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/master/pnp/habshaer/mn/mn0500/mn0547/data/mn0547data.pdf

Minnesota Department of Transportation. “A Brief History of MnDOT.”
https://www.dot.state.mn.us/information/history.html

Office of the Revisor of Statutes: 2022 Minnesota Statutes: 161.114, “Constitutional Trunk Highways.”
https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/cite/161.114

“Road Dedication a Grand Success.” Ely Miner, July 17, 1925.
https://www.mnhs.org/newspapers/lccn/sn90059182/1925-07-17/ed-1/seq-1

Schwartz, George M. A Guidebook to Minnesota Trunk Highway No. 1. Minnesota Geological Survey, Bulletin no. 20. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota, 1925.

“Superior National Forest to be included in the Development Program of MRSH.” Ely Miner, August 22, 1924.

Weingroff, Richard F. “From Names to Numbers: The Origins of the U.S. Numbered Highway System.” American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) Quarterly (Spring 1997).
https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/infrastructure/numbers.cfm

Wurzer, Cathy. Tales of the Road: Highway 61. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2008.

Related Images

View of Highway 61 from John A. Latsch State Park
View of Highway 61 from John A. Latsch State Park
Pigeon River at the US–Canadian border
Pigeon River at the US–Canadian border
Silver Creek Cliff
Silver Creek Cliff
Lake Superior International Highway illustration
Lake Superior International Highway illustration
Color image of The New Highway #61, c.1939. Watercolor on paper by Clement Haupers.
Color image of The New Highway #61, c.1939. Watercolor on paper by Clement Haupers.
Pigeon River border crossing
Pigeon River border crossing
Tunnel section of Highway 61
Tunnel section of Highway 61
Highway 61 exit
Highway 61 exit
Mississippi River Bridge at La Crosse
Mississippi River Bridge at La Crosse
US Highway 61 sign
US Highway 61 sign
Produce vendor on Highway 61
Produce vendor on Highway 61
Motel on Highway 61
Motel on Highway 61

Turning Point

President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956, calling for a network of high-speed, limited-access expressways crossing the country. In Minnesota, Interstate-35 eventually replaces US Highway 61 as the primary route from the Twin Cities to Duluth and the North Shore.

Chronology

1919

Highway Commissioner Charles Babcock proposes a network of seventy numbered highways throughout Minnesota.

1920

Nearly three-fourths of Minnesota voters support an amendment to the state constitution authorizing Babcock’s plan.

1925

The Trunk Highway 1 Bridge over Gooseberry Falls is completed over the summer, opening up the North Shore to motor vehicle tourism.

1926

The American Association of State Highway Officials authorizes a nation-wide, interstate system of roads. Minnesota Highways 1 and 3 are combined and share the new US Highway 61 route running from La Crosse, Wisconsin, to the Canadian border.

1934

Minnesota Highway 1 road signs are removed on May 4, and the road becomes US Highway 61 for its entire route. “Trunk Highway 1” signs are re-used for a new route, running from Illgen City, Minnesota, through Ely to the North Dakota state line at Oslo.

1939

US Highway 61 is considered complete from south to north when the last asphalt section is laid to the Pigeon River.

1956

President Dwight D. Eisenhower proposes a national interstate highway plan, authorizing construction in Minnesota of Interstate 35. The new interstate will replace US 61 as the fastest and most popular route between the Twin Cities and the North Shore.

1962

Interstate-35 construction begins.

1977

I-35 is completed, connecting Laredo, Texas, to Duluth, Minnesota.

1990

US Highway 61 is decommissioned north of Wyoming, Minnesota. On the North Shore, US 61 is turned over to the Minnesota Department of Transportation and is renamed Minnesota 61.

1991–1994

A 1,344-foot tunnel is constructed on Minnesota 61 through Silver Creek Cliff on the North Shore, eliminating a dangerous blind spot at the edge of the cliff.

2000

Minnesota Highway 61 between Two Harbors and Grand Portage is named an All-American Road and designated as North Shore Scenic Drive.

2002

Highway 61’s All-American Road designation is extended to include twenty-seven miles between Duluth and Two Harbors.

2021

The Minnesota Great River Road, which includes US Highway 61 through southeastern Minnesota, is designated as an All-American Road.