Road Trip! Photos From US Route 30 in 1948

1 minute read
Route 30 Nebraska, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Route 30 Nebraska, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
By Ben Cosgrove and Liz Ronk

In the summer of 1948, LIFE photographer Allan Grant set out on a trip from Omaha, Neb., toward Salt Lake City, Utah, traveling west through Nebraska and Wyoming along one of the most storied stretches in America: Route 30, part of the early transcontinental Lincoln Highway.

For reasons lost to time, none of Grant’s marvelous photos from that epic post-war road trip were ever published in LIFE. Here, as summer approaches and the urge to hit the highways — and the byways, and the back roads — begins to take hold, LIFE offers a whole series of Grant’s pictures from Nebraska and Wyoming made seven long decades ago, in tribute to the innate human desire to get up and go.

[MORE: “The Road Goes on Forever: Route 66 and the American Dream”]

[MORE: An unbelievably tricked-out ’47 Cadillac]

Route 30 Nebraska, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Route 30 Nebraska, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Route 30, Wyoming, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Route 30, Wyoming, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Motel along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, Nebraska, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, Nebraska, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Family sleeping outside by a billboard alongside Route 30, Wyoming, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Family sleeping outside by a billboard alongside Route 30, Wyoming, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene after driver fell asleep at the wheel on Route 30, Nebraska, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene after driver fell asleep at the wheel on Route 30, Nebraska, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Motel along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Motel along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, Nebraska, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, Nebraska, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Cars pulling out of trailer camp onto Route 30, Nebraska, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Cars pulling out of trailer camp onto Route 30, Nebraska, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
The 1733 Dance Hall -- reportedly 1,733 miles from both Boston and San Francisco -- in Kearney, Neb., 1948.
Not published in LIFE. The 1733 Dance Hall -- reportedly 1,733 miles from both Boston and San Francisco -- in Kearney, Neb., 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Driver filling a water bag at a gas station alongside Route 30, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Driver filling a water bag at a gas station alongside Route 30, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, Nebraska, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, Nebraska, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
A couple and their five-month-old daughter head back home to Cheyenne, Wyo., after a visit to Omaha, Neb., 1948.
Not published in LIFE. A couple and their five-month-old daughter head back home to Cheyenne, Wyo., after a visit to Omaha, Neb., 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Motor lodge along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Motor lodge along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Scene along Route 30, Nebraska, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Scene along Route 30, Nebraska, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Motor lodge along Route 30, USA, 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Motor lodge along Route 30, USA, 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Charles Corwin White, bicycling from Los Angeles to New York and speaking along the way on "Americanism" and citizen participation in a democracy. Here he's photographed west of Rawlins, Wyo., in 1948.
Not published in LIFE. Charles Corwin White, bicycling from Los Angeles to New York and speaking along the way on "Americanism" and the citizenry's participation in a democracy. Here he's photographed west of Rawlins, Wyo., in 1948.Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

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