Lancaster Turnpike Road Company was chartered April 9, 1792, as a
part of the general plan of the Society for the Improvement of
Roads and Inland Navigation already described. This road,
sixty-two miles in length, was built of stone at a cost of
$465,000 and was completed in two years. Never before had such a
sum been invested in internal improvement in the United States.
The rapidity with which the undertaking was carried through and
the profits which accrued from the investment were alike
astonishing. The subscription books were opened at eleven o'clock
one morning and by midnight 2226 shares had been subscribed, each
purchaser paying down thirty dollars. At the same time Elkanah
Watson was despondently scanning the subscription books of his
Mohawk River enterprise at Albany where "no mortal" had risked
more than two shares.

The success of the Lancaster Turnpike was not achieved without a
protest against the monopoly which the new venture created. It is
true that in all the colonies the exercise of the right of
eminent domain had been conceded in a veiled way to officials to
whose care the laying out of roads had been delegated. As early
as 1639 the General Court of Massachusetts had ordered each town
to choose men who, cooperating with men from the adjoining town,
should "lay out highways where they may be most convenient,
notwithstanding any man's property, or any corne ground, so as it
occasion not the pulling down of any man's house, or laying open
any garden or orchard." But the open and extended exercise of
these rights led to vigorous opposition in the case of this
Pennsylvania road. A public meeting was held at the Prince of
Wales Tavern in Philadelphia in 1793 to protest in round terms
against the monopolistic character of the Lancaster Turnpike.