Most prized part of your "Roadgeek" collection

[ssummers72]

I know that all of us have some form of collection of maps, photographs or highway documents, What is your most prized and/or favorite item(s).

My favorite part of my collection is a 1935 Official Highway map showing a bunch of proposed state highways that never cam to be.

My most prized are the files from the FHWA(BPR) and AASHTO(AASHO) documenting 99% of all Interstate Highway changes since 1957.

What are your most prized parts of your collections.

Take Care,

Stephen

[Truvelo]

My most precious collection is the hundreds of maps I've drawn of modified interchanges. I dread to think of the number of hours I've spent in MS Paint. Of all the maps I've drawn my favorite is shown below. Because of the time I've put into them I've saved the full size originals of each so I can always edit them in the future.

I don't have many paper maps that I value. One is a photocopy of a 1960's plan for a city center ring road showing interchanges that were never built. I also have some 19th century 25" to the mile maps of the local area with my house being in the middle of a field

[bugo]

This:


I am also proud of my 1949 Rand McNally atlas and a couple of Arkansas maps from the 1930s.

[Ian]

My most favorite map is a 2001 Maine map that still shows I-495 as an interstate and ME 217 still alive. As for my favorite sign, it would be this NY 9N sign since 9N goes right by my aunt's lake house...

[Brandon]

A 1933 Texaco map of Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio.

[xonhulu]

I have a number of old official Oregon Highway Maps, dating back to 1915.

If you can't tell from my avatar, my favorite highway is US 30; consequently, these photos of US 30 signed with each of its remaining 3-digit routes are among my very favorite road pix:

[akotchi]

My yellow Yield and Stop signs.

[agentsteel53]

[KillerTux]

These..

It was just plain luck to find any of those. Jake helped me out with one 

[agentsteel53]

any idea what year that large 40 is?  My guess is '52-53 or so but I don't have much way of substantiating that.  They switched from cutouts of a similar layout to that design, and had both wood and steel variants, and then apparently they went to the white squares for a while.

[corco]

Mine is more intangible, but it's the fact that I've driven every mile of state highway in Washington (and I'll be done with Wyoming here in a couple months, too! Washington will be more special, though because it was the first state I did (the systems are both about 7500 miles in length- if I somehow did Texas (a possibility for state #3, that would be more exciting than Washington))), so I guess the thousands upon thousands of photos of Washington road signs would be my favorite part

[agentsteel53]

I've driven every mile of state highway in Washington

any cutouts left?

[corco]

any cutouts left?

Not that I was able to find- the occasional 57 spec interstate shield was about the extent of unique old signs

[agentsteel53]

Not that I was able to find- the occasional 57 spec interstate shield was about the extent of unique old signs

those aren't occasional - there's a good number of them if you know where to look, especially on the 90 corridor.  I found three '57 spec 90s in Spokane a couple weeks ago, for example.  82, now that is a tough, tough find.  Jeff Royston and I have scoured that corridor about four times between us and come up with nothing.

there is apparently a 12 shield that is a patch over a 410, which is pretty unusual.  No idea where it is.  Also, the US-99 green sign in Seattle, we all know and love, and an original late 1950s guide sign for US-97 in Ellensburg, that has the US-97 shield a patch over an outline shield.

[corco]

There's also a ton on I-5 as well. One of my bigger regrets with Washington was that I was sort of a junior roadgeek- I was just starting to get a feel for what I was doing, so a lot of my photos are pretty crummy and I wasn't really sure what I was looking for when I started, so it wouldn't surprise  me that I missed a lot of old signs- I was more focused on the scenery and the towns I was passing through. I like to think I've gotten a lot better about noticing oddities with Wyoming- Washington was sort of a "practice" state

[agentsteel53]

there are indeed a lot of 5 as well.  The three-digit routes are a tougher find.  Don't know of any 182.  405 there is the one surviving example that we all know of.  205?  Good luck. 

as for Wyoming ... there's oddities there?  They seem to be really on the ball as far as regular maintenance of signs goes.  They do keep to '57 spec more often than other states, though, which is a good thing - and to '61 spec US shields.  But the yellow-and-brown state route shields are fading fast, and there's only a couple of circle route markers left in Carbon County.  Last I saw, there were two white town boundary signs on side streets to I-80... still there?

[KillerTux]

any idea what year that large 40 is?  My guess is '52-53 or so but I don't have much way of substantiating that.  They switched from cutouts of a similar layout to that design, and had both wood and steel variants, and then apparently they went to the white squares for a while.

Almost done my website of MD signs but based on what I read they started the black square US style 1949 and it ended in 1954, then MD moved to white US square with block font. Block font ended in 1962 and neuter shields came in 1966

[agentsteel53]

Almost done my website of MD signs but based on what I read they started the black square US style 1949 and it ended in 1954, then MD moved to white US square with block font. Block font ended in 1962 and neuter shields came in 1966

that is some great info!  It seems like MD would definitely be the first state to introduce black squares.  New Mexico had them by 1952, and most states came along in 1961 when the feds mandated it.

when did they have the intermediate style of white square shield with the double border?  Like the US-40 in the 40/36 pair on the shield gallery?

[ctsignguy]

I have several prizes.....

1954 Rand McNally Atlas of the US in excellent shape, showing the zenith of the US highway system right before the Interstates (It DOES have a small inset for the Alaska Highway, but alas, unnumbered...

1927 and 1928 road maps of Ohio....

and of the signs, these are the the ones i consider the prizes of the collection:

[agentsteel53]

no Ohio US 23?

It DOES have a small inset for the Alaska Highway, but alas, unnumbered...

this is good information.  My 1957 map (the last RMN 56x40" fold-out US map with no interstate shields) has Alaska routes numbered, and Hawaii routes with US and circle shields apparently in the configuration of the military route system of WWII.

[corco]

there are indeed a lot of 5 as well.  The three-digit routes are a tougher find.  Don't know of any 182.  405 there is the one surviving example that we all know of.  205?  Good luck.

as for Wyoming ... there's oddities there?  They seem to be really on the ball as far as regular maintenance of signs goes.  They do keep to '57 spec more often than other states, though, which is a good thing - and to '61 spec US shields.  But the yellow-and-brown state route shields are fading fast, and there's only a couple of circle route markers left in Carbon County.  Last I saw, there were two white town boundary signs on side streets to I-80... still there?

The oddities are few and far between- but occasionally you'll stumble upon something cool- a couple days ago just by happenstance in Cheyenne I came across an immaculate looking yellow and brown on a side street- I didn't have my camera with me so I didn't get a picture. You can find more circle routes if you go way down those county roads- you can find them at strange junctions way off the beaten path- once again no pictures because the only time I've ever been really far back off the highway I wasn't doing anything roadgeek related or carrying a camera.

Up north there's a ton of older looking peeling-legend signs. Then Park County has their own way of signing state highways from county roads that makes things fun-

[KillerTux]

Almost done my website of MD signs but based on what I read they started the black square US style 1949 and it ended in 1954, then MD moved to white US square with block font. Block font ended in 1962 and neuter shields came in 1966

that is some great info!  It seems like MD would definitely be the first state to introduce black squares.  New Mexico had them by 1952, and most states came along in 1961 when the feds mandated it.

when did they have the intermediate style of white square shield with the double border?  Like the US-40 in the 40/36 pair on the shield gallery?

Ended 1958-1960, have to nail down a date because i found a picture at the Maryland archives from when US 301 routed over to the eastern shore with US50 instead of ending in Baltimore and the new shields were single border but in 1958 when it was US50/MD71 it was double border. What is strange is MD loved black background signs and then in 1953-54 moved to white background and black text.

[agentsteel53]

Ended 1958-1960, have to nail down a date because i found a picture at the Maryland archives from when US 301 routed over to the eastern shore with US50 instead of ending in Baltimore and the new shields were single border but in 1958 when it was US50/MD71 it was double border. What is strange is MD loved black background signs and then in 1953-54 moved to white background and black text.

indeed, they kinda went reverse of what a lot of other states did.

can you email me those photos?

[hbelkins]

My dad had an authentic Kentucky US 66 sign.

Yes, you read that correctly.

Years ago, he asked my mom's first cousin, a KYTC employee, to have the district sign shop make him a US 66 sign. They obliged. I have a photo of it somewhere but not sure where the pic is, but I can get one at anytime because the sign is mounted on the outside wall of my dad's garage. I will most likely be moving into his home later in the year so that sign will become mine.

[agentsteel53]

that makes two that are out there!