01/06/2026
It's fun to see our wonderful community mentioned and celebrated!
MONTOUR, IA - Tama County
CROSSROADS - HISTORY AND TRANSPORTATION with HENRY OSTERMANN
Henry Ostermann was one of the most important figures in the early history of the Lincoln Highway and a key advocate for transcontinental automobile travel. Long before a marked coast-to-coast road existed, Ostermann was driving across the United States by motor car. In 1908 and again in 1912, he made transcontinental journeys at a time when such trips were rare, difficult, and could take sixty to ninety days. He understood better than most the challenges motorists faced and believed strongly that good roads were essential to the nation’s future.
In 1914, the Lincoln Highway Association hired Ostermann as its first Field Secretary. He became a tireless promoter and cheerleader for the Lincoln Highway, spending years on the road persuading reluctant Iowans—and others across the route—that automobiles were not a novelty but the future of travel. He visited every city and county consul, often twice a year, logging more than 15,000 miles and over 500 official visits. By 1919, he had driven the New York-to-San Francisco route twenty times, doing as much as anyone to turn the Lincoln Highway from an idea into a functioning national road.
During World War I, Ostermann’s road knowledge took on added importance. While still serving as Field Secretary, he piloted military convoys along the East Coast. In 1919, he conceived and guided the Army’s transcontinental motor transport convoy—about seventy trucks and two hundred men—over the Lincoln Highway to demonstrate the feasibility of moving troops, supplies, and equipment by motor vehicle across the country. The convoy helped shape future thinking about highways and national defense.
Ostermann’s life ended suddenly and tragically. On what would have been his twenty-first trip across the country—his honeymoon—he was rushing to an early morning meeting in Marshalltown when his car overturned on a curve east of Montour, killing him instantly. He is buried in his hometown, but Montour memorializes him with a plaque in its cemetery, marking the place where one of the Lincoln Highway’s greatest champions lost his life along the road he helped build.
