In the early days there was the Pequot Trail, the Nashaway road and the Mohawk trail: paths traced by the passage of Native American tribes of the Northeast on their migration routes. These were faltering and fragmented trails which Mother Nature and the elements could modify at their pleasure. Then came the European settlers, whose arrival ushered in the need to establish reliable, safe communications between the newly founded cities of Boston and New York. In January 1673 the governor of New York, Francis Lovelace, appointed a horseback mail carrier to ride all the way to Boston, braving a perilous, two-week long journey. Thirty years later, the route had already become an established post road. This marked the beginning of the Boston Post Road, America’s first true “Main Street”. The road, barely wide enough to accommodate two passing horses, and its prolongation to Philadelphia and Virginia, soon started to spread the settlers’ malcontent for the English crown, then letters from one conspirator to another; later still, it carried convoys of troops bearing the new stars-and-stripes flag. In short, this road witnessed the birth of an entire nation that was to make mobility one of the cornerstones of its development.
