Monday, February 9, 2009

Arkansas highway DA NR-1?

The following excerpt is a portion of the 1963 revision of the AHTD Ouachita County map.
















The area to the south and east was once part of the Shumaker Naval Ammunition Depot. Note the oddly lettered highway running east from US 79. The highway in question is part of today's AR 205. I'm guessing "NR" stood for "Naval Reserve" or something similar. But what did "DA" stand for? How was this highway signed, if at all? And was there a DA NR-2? What's the story behind this oddity?

Special thanks to Geostor for the historic map images.

5 comments:

  1. Going from states I have more familiarity with, I would have to say it wasn't signed in the field, but just an internal designation necessary to catalogue it for state funding. Probably the number 205 (or any predecessor) came about when they desired to sign it and realized DA-NR wouldn't do the trick.

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  2. Old post, I know, but DA-NR relates to a federal funding category from c. WWII. I've figured out DA refers to "Defense Accses", and I think the NR refers to roads to naval facilities (although I haven't been able to figure out the corresponding WR).

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  3. Follow-up to a comment on a dead blog: The NR or WR refers to the Secretary that authorized the project as being necessary to the war effort; the Secretary of the Navy or the Secretary of War.

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  4. Thanks for the info. By the way, the blog isn't dead, it's just hibernating.

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  5. It's mentioned in the 1953-69 minute orders several times when talking about current 274 west from US 167. Search http://www.arkansashighways.com/minute_orders/Mo53-69.pdf for DANR. The 1959-1967 Ouachita map shows that this one also became 274, but in typical Arkansas style was reassigned as another section of 205 (original 205 went south from 8 to Tri County Lake).

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