Great American Journeys — National Geographic Society, First Edition (1989)

A first-edition 1989 National Geographic exploration of American travel, history, and landscape, following historic routes by the same basic forms of transportation that originally shaped them: on foot and horseback, by boat, by train, and by automobile.

Rather than functioning as a conventional travel guide, Great American Journeys sends four writers across the country to retrace routes deeply embedded in American history. Cynthia Russ Ramsay follows the Wilderness Road through the Appalachian highlands and the route of the Pony Express across the West. Jennifer C. Urquhart explores American waterways, traveling the Mississippi by steamboat, West Virginia's Kanawha River by flatboat, and Lake Huron by sail.

Tom Melham examines the American railroad experience aboard a steam locomotive through Colorado's Animas River canyon and Amtrak's Empire Builder between Chicago and Seattle. Thomas O'Neill takes to the road, following portions of the historic National Road and stagecoach routes through the American Southwest.

Published near the end of the 20th century, the book is now an interesting piece of cultural and transportation history in its own right. Its writers encountered historic routes not as preserved abstractions but as living landscapes still connected to communities, railroads, waterways, highways, and traditions of travel. The photographs consequently document both the country's geography and the late-1980s America encountered along the way.

The book is extensively illustrated in the characteristic National Geographic style, combining large-format color photography, maps, historical background, and firsthand reporting. It provides a visual record of the ways geography, transportation technology, and human movement helped shape the United States.

Contributing Writers: Cynthia Russ Ramsay, Jennifer C. Urquhart, Tom Melham, Thomas O'Neill
Publisher: National Geographic Society, Washington, D.C.
Year: 1989
Edition: First Edition
Pages: 199
Format: Hardcover with original illustrated dust jacket
ISBN-10: 0-87044-669-X
ISBN-13: 978-0-87044-669-6

Condition: Vintage hardcover with original illustrated dust jacket.