When you’re on the road, you often want to pull off for a cup of coffee or a bite to eat. Once you do, the road starts to beckon again almost immediately.
Leesville, New York, was one of the most western posts on the First Great Western Turnpike, built as a toll road from Albany, the state capital, to the frontier town of Cherry Valley in the late 18th century. Commerce didn’t come cheap – drivers (of a different sort) paid 3 cents per dozen to move their sheep and swine along the road. No tolls were collected from people going to or returning from church or the grist mill, or from those who were on military duty or on journeys within the town where the tollgate was located.
This is as urban as it gets along Route 20 in New York, as it passes through the state capital of Albany. Here it runs along the Empire State Plaza, home to the offices of state legislators and executive branch agencies. More compelling, perhaps, is the egg-shaped structure called, appropriately enough, The Egg, a performing arts center that descends six stories below ground level.
Modern-day Albany is a far cry from its early days. It was first settled as the Dutch trading posts of Fort Nassau (1614) and lays claim to being the longest continually chartered city in the United States (chartered in 1686).