Baxter Springs news. [volume] (Baxter Springs, Kan.) 1882-1919, 1904-05-19
THURSDAY, MAY 10.
PROGRESS OF THE GOOD ROADS
MOVEMENT.

1
building of roads appears to be
making great Roadway. This 10
proven by the number and enthus-
iasm of it's supporters, and even
more strikingly by the consterna-
of those who are openly or secretly
opposed to the scheme. When the
agricultural bill came up in the ma.
tional House of Representatives re-
Gently remarks were dropped by a
Der of SPEAKERS which ipdicat-
ed that letters. petitions and rrso-
lutions demanding the passage of
the BrOwnlow road bill are coming
from all eections. The same thing
happened again when the bill came
up in the Senate. Senator Bailey of
Texas, who is opposed to national
aid, said it was easy tn see what is
coming, and addressed this signiti-
cant remark: II will live, If 1 live as
long as my father has done, to see
a federal officer probably supervis-
ing all the county roads 10 this
country"
While none of the so.called good
roads bills have come up for action
in either end of the capitol, the
friends of the road office in the De.
partment of Agriculture have scor-
ed an important victory in secur-
ing in the Senate an increase of
$4,000 in the appropriations for
road Investigations and expert:
ments, including the building of
object.lesson roads.
This il national aid on small
scale. But il is of great importance
from an educational point of view.
Heretofore this object-lesson work
has been conducted in the follow
ing manner: An application is sent
in by some experiment station or
agricultural college, or by road
officials or public spirited citizens
of some progressive community
asking the government to CO oper-
ate in the building of a short stretch
of road. The government usually
furnishes nothing more than an en-
gineer or an expert to make plans
and supervise the work. Road max.
ing machinery is usually furnished
free of charge by the manufactur-
ers for the sake of the advertise.
ment IL gives them. The railroads
also take hand and transport the
machinery free. The institution or
community making the application
has to foot the bills for labor and
materials.
Among the benefits flowing from
such work are: 1, that 1t gives an
excellent opportunity to investigate
and test the various local materials;
2. that il gives the people of that To-
cality lesson in the methods of
road building and the use of road
materials and machinery; and 8,
that the building of short piece of
good road usually leads to the
building of large mileage of i'm
proved road in the vicinity. To have
Uncle Sam come into community
and help build good road, be it
ever 90 short, seems to arouse great
popular interest and stimulate To-
cal effort. 1t lie claimed by those
who know most about the results
of the work already done that in no
other direction does the govern
ment accomplish so much with so
little outlay.
But the opponents of national aid
are afraid that object lesson roads
are only a stepping stone to nation
al aid of vastly greater dimensions,
aud in this they are probably right.
However that may be, II appears
certain that object lesson road
building will be carried on next
year to a larger extent than ever be-
fore. Many applications are now on