The King’s Highway That Inspired Petty’s Song
A song about taking a risk with love points to an important road in America’s past
Oh, I await the day
Good fortune comes our way
And we’ll ride down the King’s Highway
Connecting Charleston, SC, to Boston, MA, the King’s Highway traverses more than 1,300 miles. Constructed between 1650 and 1735, it was ordered built by King Charles II, the last English monarch to use the name until recently.
The King’s Highway is the oldest formal road in the US.
The original route has been subsumed by a patchwork of other roads and highways, but sections of it still exist. The King’s Highway Historic District in New Jersey covers US Route 206 and New Jersey Route 27, connecting Lawrenceville with Kingston through Princeton.
Another major section runs through northeast Philadelphia. This became the subject of a documentary in 2016 (trailer below). Development continues to wipe out the historical record of the highway and the American culture that developed along the route.
Petty grasped onto the idea of the King’s Highway as an image of how to take his love far away when the time was right.
The song was released in 1991 on Into the Great Wide Open, an album that spawned two major hits for the band — “Learning to Fly” and “Into the Great Wide Open.” While “King’s Highway” was released as a single, it did not fare as well on the charts.
However, it has an enduring quality, like much of Petty’s work, and continues to get a warm reception whenever we play it.
Join us on the King’s Highway at an upcoming show!
WooHoo!!