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The Road to Rainier Scenic Byway has grown from a Native American forest trail, hundreds of years old, to a modern forest highway carrying 1.5 million travelers a year. In 1833, a European tourist first reached a glacier, and soon others followed, seeking the wonders of Mount Rainier. In 1903, the railroad reached Eatonville; and national park visitors, who started as a few thousand, became tens of thousands. With a market for timber, hundreds rushed to claim the lands. Forestry and tourism both thrived off the rich natural resources, and as the region developed, purely commercial ventures were supplemented with educational outreach. Charles L. Pack Experimental Forest, established in 1926, conducts scientific research into forest management and sustainability. Historical interpretation has become a function of the Mount Rainier Scenic Railroad and Logging Museum. The Road to Rainier Scenic Byway continues to serve all as it heads to scenic Mount Rainier.

For a century, the route of Highway 99 has been the main transportation corridor in western Washington. Forest and farm products, fish, and families have all been a part of the flow of business and recreational travel between the Canadian border at Blaine and the Columbia River at Vancouver. What is now Highway 99 originated as a loose network of muddy roads connecting early settlements. With the dawn of the automobile age and construction of good roads, travel for business and pleasure began to shift away from ships and railroads to trucks and family cars. Roadside services developed within and between towns to cater to the new type of travelers--as many as 1,300 "gas, food, and lodging" businesses lined Highway 99, ranging from primitive auto camps to luxury hotels and from simple burger stands to roadside eateries shaped like giant tepees and igloos.

The Sunset Highway works its way east to west across the 300-mile-wide expanse of Washington State from the Spokane River to its ending at Seattle on Puget Sound. Later known as Highway 10, the route traverses a landscape of big cities, small towns, and wide-open spaces; rolling hills and rugged mountains; fertile fields of grain, apple orchards, and ranches; roaring streams, deep rivers, and rock-walled coulees--now dry, but once a mighty watercourse. The Sunset Highway arose from a collection of existing wagon roads, becoming the main cross-state thoroughfare with highway improvements. As traffic increased, roadside businesses sprang up to accommodate motorists. In towns, bright neon lights attracted both locals and passers-through, while tourist courts, restaurants, burger stands, and service stations lined the highway approaches.