The Call of the Open Road

For the Tourist who desires the ultimate in vacations, there’s no place like Wisconsin…” [Page One]

This fascinating guidebook was published by the Milwaukee Journal as a service to motorists across Wisconsin. The newspaper dedicated an entire Travel Bureau staff to report on the road quality and automobile tourism opportunities across the state during the first quarter of the 20th century. They first published the Call of the Open Road in 1915 under the leadership of William ‘Brownie’ Rowland, “who drives thirty to forty thousand miles every year over Wisconsin highways to provide accurate, reliable road information for you” [front endpaper].

This is the 1923 edition, comprised of thirty-two folded pages bound within the original embossed boards. Instructions for use and a legend are followed by an index and six individual road maps covering all of Wisconsin and northern Illinois. Each sheet is issued at a scale of 16 miles to one inch and shows road surface composition, free campsites, and various locations of interest. Six pages of highway logs provide distances between major points along the primary routes and are accompanied by lists of resorts, a comprehensive city index, and simple tables of directions. Further maps show the transcontinental automobile routes across the United States, vacation areas around the Fox River and Wisconsin Dells, connections to St. Louis, and a simple outline of Milwaukee County. The final pages highlight the Journal’s ‘For-All-Wisconsin Program’ that advocates for greater protection of natural beauty and encouragement of outdoor recreation.

Milwaukee’s First Brownie–William Wallace Rowland Part 1 of 3