THE DIXIE HIGHWAY (Old Brick Road) – This portion of the 5,706-mile-long highway which stretched as far north as Ontario, Canada and as far south as Florida City, Florida is made up of bricks from two major companies; Southern Brick in Tennessee and Graves Brick in Alabama.
HIGHWAYS – The Dixie Highway and U.S. 1
Early county developer Isaac I. Moody, Jr., was elected President of the Board of County Commissioners for St Johns County in 1912. Newspaper accounts show that in Apr 1913 he was in St Augustine with his wife to hear a speech by William Jennings Bryan. They then left for Washington, DC where they attended the Good Roads Convention.
In Apr 1914, Isaac was pleased to announce that St Johns County voters had approved a $650,000 Bond Issue for a new highway to be made of vitrified brick. Soon thereafter work in present-day Flagler County started from the Bunnell State Bank and preceded in two directions, one crew working east to Ocean City and one crew working north towards Espanola. The highway was to become a part of the Dixie Highway, a small network of interconnected paved roads, rather than a single highway that connected the Midwest with the southern United States. It was overseen by the Dixie Highway Association and funded by a group of individuals, businesses, local, and state governments. The federal government played little role, but from the early 1920s on it provided increasing funding, until 1927 when the Dixie Highway Association was disbanded and the highway was taken over as part of the United States highway system with some portions becoming state roads. The Dixie Highway came south from St Augustine, through Hastings, through Espanola and then on to Bunnell. From Bunnell, it went east to Ocean City and then south along the present John Anderson Highway to Volusia CO. Later an extension was added which whet from Bunnell to Korona and then SE to connect with the present John Anderson Highway.
The Dixie Highway, which we now call the old brick road, ceased to be a major roadway, when the New Dixie Highway, named by the State as State Road 4 (now U.S. 1), was opened on 01 Dec 1927 offering a direct route south from St. Augustine to Bunnell, to Korona and on south to Ormond.
