Photos That Show How America’s Truckers Kept the Country Moving
Before highways crisscrossed the nation and GPS made getting around as easy as pie, America’s truck drivers were the backbone of the road. Putting in endless miles across long-haul drives, behind every wheel sat someone who labored away to keep towns supplied, factories running, and families fed — often without a bit of recognition.
From coffee breaks at roadside diners to burning the midnight oil, these 17 old photos celebrate the men and women who quite literally kept America moving.
1. ‘Truck Drivers for the Civilian Conservation Corps, Idaho, 1934’
2. Truck Drivers at a Rest Stop Off Interstate 90 in Madison, Wisconsin, Use Pay Phones To Check in With Their Loved Ones, 1983
3. ‘Keeping Them Rolling. Women Truck Drivers, 1942’
4. A Local Delivery Truck Driver Pictured in Montgomery, Alabama, March 1943
5. ‘My Dad Next to His Rig as a Long Haul Trucker, 1970s’
6. Truck Drivers Stop for a Coffee Break at a Diner on US Highway 90 in Pearlington, Mississippi, 1943
7. A Charles E. Hires Root Beer Company Delivery Driver Pictured Next to His Truck, 1950s
8. ‘My Great-Grandpa Casually Posing With His Coca-Cola Delivery Truck, Late 1930s/Early ’40s’
9. A Truck Driver Loads Up a Truck in Minneapolis, Minnesota, September 1939
10. A Man Stands Proudly in Front of His Truck, Massachusetts, 1960
11. Crowds Cheer as the First Legal Beer Truck Leaves the Brewery Following the End of Prohibition, 1933
12. ‘My Great-Grandfather Was a Dairy Delivery Driver From the 1930s Through the 1950s’
13. Night Rider: A Truck Driver en Route to Mobile, Alabama, Drives on US Highway 29, March 1943
14. ‘My Grandfather Posing Next to His Delivery Truck in the 1940s’
15. ‘Truck Drivers at a Coffee Stop on US Highway 90 in Pearlington, Mississippi, March 1943’
16. A Focused Truck Driver Drives Into a Trucking Terminal in Baltimore, Maryland, 1943
17. ‘Two Men Stand Next to a Coca-Cola Delivery Truck, 1910’
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