In 1986, Life magazine named U.S. Highway 50, as it crosses Central Nevada, the loneliest road in America. A photo of a straight stretch of empty highway fixed it in the national imagination as a symbol of the state's vast emptiness.
To mark the anniversary of the Life photo, I drove the length of U.S. 50 in Nevada with a reporter to examine issues important in the rural communities along the highway, meet its people and explore loneliness in the hyper-connected age.
