Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1899-09-02
EVENT OF NEXT WEEK,
Good Roads Convention and Har-
vest Home Festival in
Rock Island.
FOUR COUNTIES TO JOIN HANDS.

a Day of Education and Pleasure, the
Building Demonstration to be Follow ed
bya Meeting to Organize and q Prone
made In the Evening, with Abundant En-
tertaInment for An-PrIce Paid for Roads
Incidental to the good roads con-
yention. at which will be taught n
practical lesson in scientific road
building, there will be an event.
which has been styled n harvest home
festival, that will contribute much to
the enjoyment of this important occa-
sion, when the people. particularly
the farmers. of the four counties of
Rock Island. Mercer. Henry and
White-ide will come together for one
solid days education aud pleasure.
At night the business section of the
city will be brilliantly illuminated.
and all the stores decorated with the
products of the farm, while in Spen-
Ger and Market squares bands will be
10 o'clock. 1t will certainly be gala
affair. All this happens in Rock ISL
and Sept. 9-and don't forget the
date, and further, make it point to
be on hand, for if you don't, you'll
miss a good thing.
The old saying that what the
eye never sees the heart never
grieves'' is well illustrated in the
stolid Indifference with which Ameri-
cans pay tribute to the tyranny of
mud roads, and when the people of
this country are once brought to Il
full realization of the price they are
paying for this medieval folly there
will be the greatest economic revolu-
tion ever witnessed, even in this pro-
fessedly progressive republic.
Mud Embargo a Hidden Tax.
No tax is popular with the tax
payers unless it can masquerade as
an evasion of taxation, and this is
precisely what the mud road tax has
always done. 1t is paid in the form
of expense for additional horses.
wagons, harness, feed, stable room,
repairs, labor and a hundred other
things, the necessity for which would
be greatly reduced or entirely re-
moved by the construction of good
roads.
And the good roads would not in
volve one-fourth the cost that is en-
tailed by the lack of them, to say
nothing of the comforts and conven-
fences made possible through easy
communication. We Americans NAV
imagine that our feet are dangling
over the dashboard of the car of pro-
gress, but in the matter of highways
we are not even in the procession.
Europe In Advance OF Us.
1t is CALLING to be compelled to ad-
NIT that the land whereon roosts the
glorious bird of freedom can learn
anything from the effete monarchies
of Europe, but it is said that ''open
confession is good for the SOUL" and
a little research will show that. in
one respect, at least, some parts of
Europe are as far ahead of us as we
are of the Patagonians. 1t is sad
commentary on our boosted progress
siveness and business sagacity that it
costs US three times as much to haul
one ton of our crops one mile as it
costs the European farmer to perform
the same work; but it is true, and
therein lies the burden of the mud
road tax, which calls itself economy
1t is understood the street railway
company will be induced to cooperate
in keeping Second avenue from Fiji
teenth to Twentieth streets free from
traffic next Saturday night during the
promenade of the harvest home festi-