Oklahoma’s Northwest Passage, OK-3 and US-412, 75 miles east of Guymon, September 6, 2011
Oklahoma highway 3 is the longest state highway in Oklahoma and the third longest state highway in the United States. The 341 mile section between Its beginning at the Colorado border in the far northwest area of the panhandle and its junction with OK-74 in Oklahoma City is called “Governor George Nigh’s Northwest Passage.” Most of the section travels through the panhandle of Oklahoma.
In the early 1980s, Governor George Nigh was able to obtain $97.1 million to upgrade the highway between Oklahoma City and Colorado, despite opponents labeling the project “the highway to nowhere.” House Concurrent Resolution 1067 labeled the highway as “Governor George Nigh’s Northwest Passage.” ODOT officially so named the highway on 2 February 1981.
The Oklahoma Panhandle (formerly called No Man’s Land, the Public Land Strip, the Neutral Strip, or Cimarron Territory) is the extreme northwestern region of the U.S. state of Oklahoma, consisting of Cimarron County, Texas County and Beaver County, from west to east.
When Texas sought to enter the Union in 1845 as a slave state, federal law in the United States, based on the Missouri Compromise, prohibited slavery north of 36°30′ parallel north. Under the Compromise of 1850, Texas surrendered its lands north of 36°30′ latitude. The 170-mile strip of land, a “neutral strip”, was left with no state or territorial ownership from 1850 until 1890. It was officially called the “Public Land Strip” and was commonly referred to as “No Man’s Land.”
The Compromise of 1850 also established the eastern boundary of New Mexico Territory at the 103rd meridian, thus setting the western boundary of the strip. The Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 set the southern border of Kansas Territory as the 37th parallel. This became the northern boundary of “No Man’s Land.”
The passage of the Organic Act in 1890 assigned Public Land Strip to the new Oklahoma Territory.
Wikipedia (accessed July 16, 2022)
