Continuing with my “exactly five years ago” series—by this point we had made it to mid-Illinois and one of our carefully planned stops.
In the quiet village of Franklin Grove, about five miles southwest of Ashton, we stopped for a little over an hour in the early afternoon at the national headquarters of the relatively new but very active Lincoln Highway Association. Ivelis and I walked in and quietly signed the guest book. Already inside was another couple traveling the Lincoln Highway in what they told us was a far more leisurely fashion (measured in many months versus a few weeks) than ours. They were driving in an impressively well preserved and maintained (and evidently quite functional) 1980s Volkswagen Vanagon Westfalia—I neglected to get the precise year.
An amiable woman named Lynn Asp (in general, folks were wonderfully gracious to us during this entire trip) spoke to us at length about the Association and their various upcoming events. It was only well after departing Franklin Grove that we realized that there is a picture of Lynn in one of the many Lincoln Highway-related books that we were carrying with us in Lauren’s rear compartment—we definitely should have gotten her to sign it!
Lincoln Highway 101, Second Edition
The relatively newly reconstituted Lincoln Highway Association’s online presence includes much useful information, context, and advice, but the absolute star of their site is a fantastic, stunningly detailed, and extreme accurate Google Maps overlay of all the Lincoln Highway routes.
