End of historic US highway 104

View a map showing this route.
1934-1971
Picture
Summa
US 104 never connected with its implied parent route (US 4), but it shared the same approximate latitude, and I do not consider its number to be a major violation of route numbering guidelines...
...but the thing I do find remarkable is that New York even requested a US route designation for this corridor.  From the earliest discussions about the US route system, New York was a vocal proponent of having only major inter-state routes included.  So to then turn around and have an intra-state route added to the system seems like it was very much out of character.  Anyway, the east end of US 104 was at its junction with US 11 in Maple View:
Picture
c. 1943, USGS
This sign was for travelers eastbound on NY 104, at the junction where historic US 104 ended.  When US 104 was decommissioned, it became NY 104, and today that designation continues about ten miles further east than US 104 did:
Picture
Kerr
This shot was looking the opposite direction; straight ahead was the historic east beginning of US 104:
Picture
Kerr, May 2002
US 104 lasted for less than 40 years; AASHO approved its decommissioning in 1971.  Here is that agenda item from the actual meeting minutes:
Based on that, both of US 104's endpoints may have been moved during its final years: apparently the designation was extended to jct. I-81 near Maple View, and it was truncated to jct. I-190 in Niagara Falls (although I have not seen a map illustrating either of those changes).  For maps, photos, and info relevant to US 104's historic west terminus, please see the Niagara Falls page.
Research and/or photo credits: Doug Kerr; Dale Sanderson; Michael Summa
Page originally created 2000;
last updated Feb. 11, 2020.