The Last American Highway

Descending 1,885 miles straight down the center of the United States from Westhope, North Dakota, to Brownsville, Texas, is U.S. 83, one of the oldest and longest of the federal highways that hasn't been replaced by an Interstate. Award-winning author Stew Magnuson takes readers on a trip through the Nebraska Sand Hills, the Smoky River Valley in Kansas and the singular Oklahoma Panhandle. Along the route are the stories of the famous, the infamous, and the forgotten. Buffalo Bill Cody hunted these lands, but what about Buffalo Jones, who set out to save the American bison from extinction? This is where the ruthless, but now largely forgotten bank robbers, the Fleagles committed their most heinous crime; where the Grand Duke Alexis of Russia met George Armstrong Custer and Pussy Cat Nell dispatched the corrupt Sheriff "Brushy" Bush with a shotgun blast. What ties together President Eisenhower, the architect Frank Lloyd Wright and author Truman Capote? Highway 83, of course.