The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1902-09-12

superintendent of rural free deliver,
before the good roads convention hell
in ST. Paul:
"As a postoffice official I am i'm
pressed with the absolute necessit,
for the building and maintenance Of
good roads throughout rural com
munities. If our great and expanding
postal service is to be brought to thai
degree of perfection which progress
sive and enlightened public has 9
right to expect, and which all of the
people now demand, we must make
improvements. am therefore willing
aud ready to do anything in my power
to further the cause in which this
: convention is engaged.
y Good roads This is by no means
8 new question. The Orientals built
good roads before the dawn of western
civilization. The ancient Greeks, es-
peclally the Athhenians and Spartans,
knew what it was to travel over good
mountain roads. Later on the Ro-
mans showed full appreciation of
the great commercial and military
advantages Rome would gain by the
construction and maintenance of good
roads, for ne read in history that they
built substantial stone roads, all of
which led to the Eternal City.
The Apian Way. built more than
200 years before Christ, is a lasting
evidence of their thrift and ingenuity,
and today among the objects of inter-
est pointed out to tourists in France
and England are the old roads built
by Julius Caesar almost 1000 years
ago.
The roads constructed by Napoleon
are monuments Of his sagscity and of
the system of internal improvements
which he established. OF these, the
road from Basic to Hamburg will per-
petaate his memory for all time to
come. The system of road building
inaRgurated by this great genius forms
the foundation of the excellent system
in vogue in France today.
Coming closer to home, we find
that this all-important question agi-
tsted the public mind early in the his
tory of our own country. The power
OF the federal government to CON-
struct or aid in constructing roads, or,
In fact, any other works of internal
formed one of the most |
steadily and earnestly controverted
topics connected with the legislation
OF the country. Its existence was
affirmed, and it's exercise unanimously
demanded by the representatives of
the spreading west, aided by many
liberal and far-seeing representatives
Of other sections of the Union. It was
opposed with equal ardor by nearly an
equal number throughout the whole
struggle. The friends of internal i'm
proVements won in the end, and as a
result of The victory the great national
pike, better known as the Cumberland
'oad, was built, and for a number of
Years maintained by appropriations
rom the national treasury.
For this great achievement the
s9ople are indebted to the perseyer-
nee, indomitable energy and force of
hat great and good American, henry
Jay, whose voice never failed him in
ne advocacy of anything he believed
o be in the interest of the people.
The United States postofice de-
'srtment during the early DAYS of our :
evinced special interest
n the building and maintenance of :
atlonal pixies, especially those leading
ut into the then remote sections. ,
assing from town to town and state ;
state. On these the department had !
o depend, that it might properly
erform the great national duty i'm
'osed upon it, the distribution of in ,
diligence, civil, commercial, literary !
nd social 1t is not surprising, then. 1
md that the postmaster general of
hat day advocated the use of surnlus 6
ostal funds in the building of roads i
nd bridges. But the necessity of these
ational pixies, as means of mail 8
transportation, disappeared with the :
dvent of the steam railroad. a
Railroad superseded pixies and c
ormed the great arteries for the postal |
ervice. Il was then that the federal q
overnment relinquished the Cumber-
and road. which has ever since been
after fashion by the n
everal states it traverses. While its Y
se as a great highway or thorough n
are to the west has been long since n
iscontinued, it remains great bless r
ng to the localities through which v
: passes Every farmer whose land Il
es on or in the immediate vicinity of g
le Cumberland road has cause to r
less the memory of the grand Ameri- r
an statesman to whom have just re- v
erred. q
"The interest the postal service .
olds today in the good roads move
tent has greatly changed since the n
avs the western mail was carried o
yer the Cumberland road In those G
avs the department was satisfied to 81
Kpedite the transportation of mail g
'om city to city and state to state, p
aving the people to get their mail il
ON the centers of distribution along n
ia line of the national pike as best Il
ley could. Il
"The newer, and | might add the y
oo,ar ;Dforosf tbo denart.nanf noun ~