After the first contract for building the Interstate was awarded in 1957, a section near Gretna was the first section to be completed that year. The first long segment to be opened was a section between Dodge Street in Omaha and the West Lincoln interchange in Lincoln in 1961. During a "Golden Link" ceremony, the last section of I-80 in Nebraska was completed when a brass connector was inserted in the roadway near Sidney on April 1, 1974. This was designed to emulate the golden spike ceremonially used to complete the Trancontinental Railroad in 1869.