Pacific Highway Milepost 303 - Central Point, OR - U.S. Route 99 - The Pacific Highway on Waymarking.com

For the past year or so, I've been researching the history of Oregon's Pacific Highway. The Pacific Highway existed from 1913-1926. It was known at the time as Pacific Highway No. 1 and is displayed on old road maps as ‘1’. When completed in 1923 as a paved road, it was longest continuous stretch of paved road in the world at the time and the first paved highway west of the Mississippi. Its northernmost point was the Canadian border at the Peace Arch Provincial Park and encompassed three states: Washington, Oregon and California, ending at the Mexico border in Tijuana.

In 1924, the State Highway Department placed numbered concrete mileposts starting at the Columbia River border between Washington and Oregon and heading south on the right-hand side of the road and numbered accordingly (1, 2, 3, 4 etc.). The last milepost was placed in the Siskiyou Mountains at the California border. The concrete milepost I recovered would be 303 miles from Portland/Columbia River when the Pacific Highway was fully paved, border to border and two years before the Pacific Highway was renamed to US99.

I have even created a blog website with an article devoted to the Pacific Highway and the mileposts that still exist in Oregon. In southern Oregon, I've been able to locate four mileposts that have survived and have created a custom Google map outlining where these surviving mileposts are located as well as guessing where ones I haven't recovered would be located. Thus far, with my custom Google map, I have placed a waymark point almost every mile from Hugo, OR to Central Point, OR. A green waypoint references a ‘found’ milepost. A red waypoint references an either ‘destroyed’ or ‘not found’ milepost. Of course, many mileposts have obviously been destroyed because of road widening over the years, particularly near and in city areas. A few may have been stolen by treasure hunters. And still more mileposts have probably been destroyed by landowners, road crews and even Mother Nature herself. I suspect there are a few hidden in shrubbery and other foliage (particularly BlackBerry plants) and perhaps a few lying in a ditch and/or buried.

This concrete milepost is the first I have waymarked and when I get more time later this year, I'll locate the other surviving mileposts and waymark them as well. It's really exciting to be able to discover a piece of history that has survived for over 90 years!

State: Oregon Nearest City: Central Point Type: Marker or Milestone, historic in nature

Visit Instructions:
Please give a brief description of your visit. Maybe why you were there, what you found interesting, or something along those lines. Photos are also encouraged. Although the only requirement to log a visit to a waymark in this category is to physically visit the location, the photos and extra information you can provide about the area is very helpful.

Recent Visits/Logs:

There are no logs for this waymark yet.