End of US highway 38
View a map showing this route.
Photo credits: me
Additional research: Dan Drackley
| Approx. time period | East terminus | West terminus |
|---|---|---|
| 1926-1931 | Omaha, NE | Greeley, CO |
I found the photo above on the Nebraska Dept. of Roads website. No credit was given, but it was dated 1927, and the caption said the view was to the north on 27th Street in Lincoln NE, approaching the intersection with "O" Street. The east end of US 38 was in Omaha; the 1931 map below shows the spot:
Droz
In case you can't quite make it out: US 30 and US 75 come in together from Council Bluffs (east across the Missouri River). US 75 heads south on 24th Street, but US 30 continues west on Farnam Street. US 38 comes in from the west on Center Street, then turns north on 36th Street, and ends at US 30/Farnam.
The photo below is looking east on Farnam. At the time it ran one-way westbound, but I'm told this segment is back to two-ways now... and at any rate, that's how it was back when US 38 ended here:
me, June 2001
36th goes off to the right; that used to be the east beginning of US 38. The building in the photo below is on the southwest corner of the intersection:
me, June 2001
Today US 30 doesn't go through Omaha. US 6 does, but it's not routed on Farnam. Today Dodge Street is Omaha's east-west "Main Street" all the way through the city (you can see on the map above how US 30 jogged up to Dodge a little further west of 36th). Best I can tell, US 38 followed Center west to 132nd Street, then south to Millard. It probably would've used today's Millard Avenue to get to Q Street, which it then followed west - probably to 204th, and then south to the town of Gretna.
From there, US 38 pretty much followed the same route west as modern US 6: through Lincoln, Hastings, Holdredge, and McCook. Then into Colorado, serving Holyoke and Sterling (which explains the seemingly-misnumbered US 138). From Sterling, US 38 continued along the South Platte River, through Brush and Ft. Morgan. At Wiggins, instead of following the "Denver Cutoff", US 38 traffic was directed to continue alongside the Platte to Greeley, on the road that is now US 34. The US 38 designation ended at its junction with US 85; you can view photos on this page.