Return to story

'It literally put the country on wheels'

December 8, 2004 12:00 am

It wasn’t long before Lee, slide rule in hand, was doing “grunt work” on the state’s Interstate 95 project.

The entire highway would eventually run from South Florida to northern Maine, but each state was responsible for designing and building its own section.

That left about 180 miles through Virginia to guys like Lee.

“This was a massive undertaking,” said Lee, who has spent 48 years working for what is now called the Virginia Department of Transportation. “I got most of my training on that project.”

Prior to the road’s completion, the area was a lot like Mayberry RFD, said Lee, a Fredericksburg native. It was still a small community where most everyone knew everyone else.

But the good old days weren’t all rosy. If you needed something a tad out of the ordinary, rather than a quick trip downtown, it meant an all-day journey to Richmond, Northern Virginia or D.C.

More than likely, that trip would take place along U.S. 1, a dangerous four-lane road stretching the length of the eastern seaboard.

I–95, by comparison, was a four-lane, divided highway. The opening of the road in Fredericksburg on Dec. 18, 1964, was heralded as “a new era of safety and convenience” by the state’s highway commissioner.

Lee said he doesn’t blame I–95 for the explosion of development in this area.

Fredericksburg’s proximity to Washington meant that it would one day become a population center. The arrival of residents, tourists and businesses—many of whom relied on the treacherous U.S. 1—was already underway before I–95 was completed.

“The highway is a reflection of the changing character. I don’t think we grew because of the highway. I think we needed the highway because of the growth,” Lee said.

At the time, many residents saw the interstate’s arrival as a boon for this area, he said.

Suddenly, trips to Northern Virginia and D.C. that had once taken all day were reduced to an hour. Folks could live in Fredericksburg and work in those other places, broadening their job opportunities.

And those who had never had the time or inclination to travel before could now consider it an option.

Web extras • Interactive time line. • Photo slide show • Discuss this series Interstate 95 in the Fredericksburg area opened Dec. 18, 1964. Today begins a three-day series about the highway and the changes it brought to the region. SUNDAY: Those who were there at the beginning recall the building and opening of the interstate and the impact it had on them. MONDAY: The new highway produced new business growth but doomed many stores along the road. Also, find out about life at the exits. TUESDAY: I–95 is now clogged much of the time. Are there solutions to this?

“I know we fuss about 95, but if you think about it, it’s allowed us to have a life we never had before,” Lee said. “This was freedom. This was a big change with people and their driving habits. It literally put the country on wheels.”

A better night’s sleep

Before I–95 opened, the phone at the Thompson house rang throughout the night.

Wheeler T. Thompson was the funeral director for the family-owned Wheeler & Thompson Funeral Home on Princess Anne Street.

When the business shut its doors in the evening, phone calls were routed to Thompson’s Marye Street home.

Sometimes, nursing homes would call to report a death, said Thompson’s son, John.

But most of those late-night calls came from hospital staff, coroners and police officers, reporting deaths of motorists on dangerous U.S. 1, he said.

News reports from the ’40s and ’50s referred to the section of U.S. 1 through Hanover, Caroline and Spotsylvania counties as “a slice of hell” because of the high number of head-on crashes that littered the road.

And the city had its own “dead man’s curve” on Lafayette Boulevard—once part of the original U.S. 1—near the Fredericksburg National Cemetery, he said.

Back in the day “I do remember going on Florida trips with my Mom and Dad [before I–95 was built] and traveling Routes 17, 1 and 301. It is one of the things I miss about traveling now. We used to have to go through every town and city on the way anywhere. It was great to see and be in those places that were names on the maps rather than catch a fleeting view as you speed by at 65 mph nowadays. ... The last thing I recall is that there were a lot of dirt roads and turnarounds left by the [I–95] construction crews. These roads were on the outside of the I–95 fence and were great places to have long conversations with your date.” —Dave DiPardo, King George “Before 95 was there, I was a sailor in Norfolk going up Route 17 to Penn. Got lost in Fredericksburg during a snow storm and discovered Mary Washington College just as classes were dismissed on a Saturday. Thought I had died and gone to heaven. Met my wife on a blind date and never went back to Penn.” — Warren Uecker, Reno, Nev. “I was only about 8 years old, but I vividly remember how excited my dad was. He worked at the brand new Sears store at the Landmark Shopping Center in Alexandria, so what a treat it was for him to have this great big road to ride on. He piled all five of us into the family station wagon to go for a ride. It seemed to stretch forever and few cars in sight! Hah! Not anymore!” —Lynn Embrey, Stafford “I was just a little girl when I–95 was being built, but I have wonderful memories of the construction. My godfather was one of the many men driving dump trucks full of asphalt for the road. Either I was not in school yet or it was summer, but I rode in that truck with him many times where my job was to pull the lever that let the truck bed tip up and dump the asphalt. I think my favorite part of the day was lunch time when he would allow me to eat my favorite treat—a hot dog with mustard. I think the hot dog, chips and a soda cost less than 50 cents!” —Sherry Sprow Chambers, Alexandria “Anyone who has seen the traffic jams on Interstate 95 going south on Fridays and north on Sundays can relate to the way Route 1 looked prior to the interstate being built. I can recall that few of the ‘locals’ would attempt travel on holidays or weekends unless it could be done on the back roads, thus avoiding Route 1. ... Once Interstate 95 opened up, it was eerie to ride on Route 1 and see only a few cars. Everyone that I knew was glad to see the interstate come so that local traffic could move smoother.” —Beverly Beach, Spotsylvania “I am 75 years old now, but when my husband and I were first married in 1950, we lived in Norfolk. My sister and her family lived in Falls Church, so we frequently came to visit them. Of course, the bridge-tunnel from Norfolk to Hampton was not built yet either, so we would take Route 1 all the way, through Suffolk, Richmond, Fredericksburg, etc. The whole way the highway was busy with motels, restaurants and gas stations. I remember one time we were driving late at night and I fell asleep while my husband was driving, and suddenly I awoke and said, ‘Oh what a beautiful statue of Jesus on the cross.’ He said, ‘I didn’t see anything. You must have been dreaming.’ About 20 years later we moved to Stafford and our boys played Little League baseball right near that statue so I was able to prove that it did exist. I still think it’s beautiful.” Carol Whitley, Spotsylvania

“There were certain areas around the city and the counties where if you could be in an accident, that’s where it would happen,” he said.

His father took the late-night calls in stride, said John Thompson. But the entire family slept better at night when I–95 opened and traffic on U.S. 1 died down.

“When they built the interstate,” he said, “the calls quit coming.”

Highway work like boot camp

Joe Hancharick needed money for college, so in June 1961, he and three buddies drove down from Pennsylvania and joined a road construction crew.

They were a week out of high school when they started laying grade for the drainage pipes that would run under I–95 in Dumfries.

Ten-hour days in the sweltering Virginia heat, plus a half day on Saturday, were the norm.

The boys had endured plenty of summer football camps over the years, but building I–95 was tough on all of them, said Hancharick.

“We weren’t used to this kind of heat down here,” he said. “It seemed like it was 100 degrees every day. It was just grueling.”

At the end of the summer, Hancharick headed off to Clarion State College, where he earned a teaching degree.

Four years later, he got his first look at the completed highway when he drove to Quantico Marine Corps Base for officer candidate school. At first, he said, he didn’t realize this was the road he had worked on.

He and his friends couldn’t really envision the finished product, he said.

“Somebody might’ve said it was an ‘interstate highway,’ but at that time, I don’t think we had any concept of what an interstate highway was,” he said. “It was just a job.”

Hancharick served five years in the Marine Corps, worked briefly in Pennsylvania’s coal mines and spent nearly 30 years teaching earth science to seventh- and eighth-graders before retiring to Fairview Beach in King George six years ago.

Working on I–95, however, remains one of the toughest jobs he’s ever held.

“The experience working on this highway, as far as the physical end of it ... I had football camp, Marine Corps boot camp and I worked for a time in the coal mines, and I always equated my experience here with those,” he said. “It was pick-and-shovel work.”

Highway grows on you

D. Wayne Retter’s family lived in the path of what locals called the “super highway.”

They sold their Cranes Corner home to the state in the early ’60s and bought another home about five miles away, said Retter, who was about 12 or 13 at the time.

Though the construction cut his childhood neighborhood in half, there were benefits, he said.

Large piles of dirt on either side of the road’s pathway made for great bike-riding hills.

And construction workers often left behind empty bottles of pop after taking their lunch breaks. Retter and his friends would collect the containers and recycle them for a penny apiece.

At one point, workers carved a path through the woods for construction vehicles. Local kids used it as a shortcut to their favorite Rappahannock River fishing spot—at least for awhile, Retter said.

He and a buddy were fishing out there one day when workers started blasting their way through some nearby rock.

“We didn’t pay attention to the ‘Fire in the hole’ [shout]. We didn’t know what that meant,” Retter said. “Then, rocks started raining down on us. We got our fishing poles all tangled up around each other. It was pretty scary for awhile there.”

During the highway’s earliest years, when it was still just four lanes wide, Retter said he could see part of his old home’s foundation poking up through the median of I–95.

The rubble disappeared in the ’80s when the road grew to six lanes, he said.

As for the highway’s impact on this community, Retter said he doesn’t spend a lot of time thinking about it.

“It’s just one of those things,” he said. “It just kind of grew on you.”

‘Change for Fredericksburg’

For a teenager named Ralph “Tuffy” Hicks, the arrival of I–95 was a blessing and a curse.

As bulldozers cleared land north and south of State Route 3, Hicks, a Civil War buff, recovered bullets, buttons and belt buckles left behind by Confederate soldiers some 100 years beforehand.

Road crews even dug up cannon balls while cutting through forests and farmland south of the Rappahannock River, Hicks recalled.

But the land would yield treasures for only so long. Soon it would be paved.

“They were building 95, and we were hunting at the same time they were building,” said Hicks, who served 18 years on Fredericskburg City Councilman. “We were working together, trying to move relics before they put the road down.”

Hicks said he and childhood friend Ray Carpenter recognized the impact I–95 would have on their historic community.

“I was very conscious of the area and the historical significance, even at that young age,” he said. “We even made comments to each other, ‘This is the beginning of change for Fredericksburg.’”

Many realized that the road would make it easier and safer for locals to reach other places, like Richmond and Washington, Hicks said.

But few understood how many outsiders would flock to Fredericksburg and how quickly they’d come, he said.

“We knew it would encourage development, but we never dreamed it would be like this in our lifetime, that everything would be covered over, that it would be like the asphalt jungle you have in Northern Virginia,” Hicks said.

“We’re still asking the questions today we were asking five years after it started: Where are all these people coming from?”

To reach EDIE GROSS: 540/374-5428 egross@freelancestar.com