I recently won this little gem on ebay. Its the first photographic proof I’ve seen that the U.S. routes shields shared the same posts as the state route shields before 1934. This photo had to have been taken at some point between 1926 and 1934 on the highway between La Crosse and St. Paul.
Tag: Constitutional Route 3
Old Bridge in Reads Landing
“Highway Explorer” comes through again….this time with pics of an old iron bridge in Reads Landing in Wabasha County. This bridge is at the west end of 202nd Street, just north of modern U.S. 61. It is now used as a private entrance.
Although it was once part of the Wabasha Military Road, this bridge was never used by U.S. 61. The old military road passed through Reads Landing on its way to Camp Lacupolis, where it ascended out of the river valley and then followed modern County Roads 10 and 4 towards Lake City. The road was eventually moved to a new alignment that bypassed Reads Landing entirely.
The current alignment of U.S. 61 along the lake wasn’t constructed until 1930.
Old Bridges in the Cannon River Valley
Kim Mensinger has sent in some nice photos of a couple of  the historic bridges on the Cannon Bottom Road, just west of Red Wing, which was bypassed in 1931 (it was once part of U.S. 61 and Constitutional Route 3). These bridges are scheduled to be demolished in the next few years. For more info on this historic highway, see the article here (from my U.S. 61 project, pops in a new window/tab).
