Introduction

The decades following World War II marked a watershed for trucking in North America, as massive federal investment and wartime logistics experience converged to transform the industry into a backbone of commerce. The 1956 Federal-Aid Highway Act unleashed the construction of the Interstate System, slashing coast-to-coast transit times and enabling long-haul operations on an unprecedented scale (National Archives). As railroads retrenched, trucking companies seized new market share, shipping everything from raw materials to finished goods faster and more flexibly than ever before. So moving on to key design innovations that have helped made trucking easier and more efficient.