The Sedalia weekly bazoo. [volume] (Sedalia, Mo.) 187?-1904, 1886-02-02
COUNTRY ROADS.
A Most Important Consideration n Every
Locality.

| Most Important Considsration a kvery
Locality.
Good roads add greatly 10 the wealth
of a country, and every farm having
access to a good road is greatly en-
HANGED in value. Mr.. McAdsm, an
American. after removing TO Scotland,
turned his attention to the condition of
the roads in that country. and has
made himself famous everywhere in
the name macadamized road. Before
his theories were put in practice il Was
the custom to haul stone to the road to
standing up with sledge-hammers, re-
duced the stone into small pieces. but
il was necessarily imperfectly done.
Mr.. McAdam's theory was TO have the
stone broken into fragments as small as
the width of the average-sized tire of a
wheel, so that the stone would pack to-
gether and not be loosened or jostled
out of place by the wheels of a wagon
running over them. To break up the
stone i'm this fine condition the work
was given to old and infirm men, and
to women, who did il with n small
hammer or stone-bfeaker. sitting down
to the work. The stone was then put
on the road. Mr.. McAdam's whole
theory was. that any soil was solid
enough for good road il kept dry.
and all that was necessary was TO put
solid impcrviouS substance over the
graded road that would run the water
of. and make a roof of the road. so to
speak. He claimed that by his method
he could take swampy ground and
make better road than if il was solid
rock He did not believe in throwing
2p the roadway very high. only high
l6u" -~mk9 give 4 gentle slope each side
on, !!duese.sr. This method of max
40 hf hcame upon can be carried out.
P.o, and hat the, known. Most of
iel" alarm. A vene now worked ny
PC .Mqreturned. II, who are under
~ sSopllJi fected or appointed Ia the
AIT the first Place, the saying. work
hethe road" i bad one. for the
is are generally worked TOO much
.ry wear. They are gone over, and
L soil in the .:itchcs at the sides o:
road is thr'. :. a To the center of the
d-bed.. often making the road almost
impaSsable in summer and making
perfect lobloll, Of mud in the winter
season, holding me water or the road
in the places were the tire cuts in till
it becomes worse than - mortar bed.
and sometimes impossible with an
empty wagon. Often the bitches are
made without IN outlet on each side,
and of course they are worse than use
less, making place for hogs TO wallow
and water to stsgnate and breed pes
thence. The bitches should have q
gradual slope from each side to the
center, and the ditch does not need to
BE- very deep-indeed. it could hardly
be called ditci, if properly made.
Made the way they usually are, with
plow, often great gullies are washed
out, damaging the road and the prop
er:y adjoining.
Several years ago the roa'i on which
the writer lives was grayeled well and
q good road was the result, and all
that was needed was to add more
gravel every year to keep the road in
order, but the next Supervisor plowed
out the bitches and took road scrapers
and scraped the loose soil over the
gravel TO the depth of several inches.
The result can be imaeinei-the road
was nearly wholly impossible even for
empty wagons the coming winter,
wagons sinking to the hub in the mud.
The road was then left pretty much
alone for two or three wears, and was
far better after becoming somewhat
packed down that when worked under
such a system.
Last summer the neighbors contribu-
ted and furnished teams and hauled a
kind of shaley graEel fvpm a creek bed.
It packed do and although it was
not put on YER thick We mad splen-
did road all w..ser All that would be
needed now would be to keep on put
ting on gravel. but now we have one Of
the old fOgy NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.
the-times Supervisors again. who has
commenced his grading process. cover
ing up the gravel. The best paved
streets in city made out of granite
would become impossible after u few
years of the same kind of tOmfoOlery.
The moral of this harangue is, when
the road needs working haul on fine.
broken rock or gravel. and when it
needs working again haul on the same,
and you will be public benefsctor
and have the blessings of a community
instead of their curses.
Of course there are in the South
many localities where neither rock nor
gravel could be had, but these are
sandy in most cases and hence do not
particularly need any covering. A lit
tie sensible working will keep most Of
our roads in superior order.-Csnesn-
,sats Farming World.