The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-09-21
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THREE GREAT tNFbUENCES.
 Aside from the ordinary railroads, which are generally working their way into every portion of the coun- try. there are three strong influences at work which will effect a great change in the relationship of city and country within another generation. These are the electrical trolley roads, the telephones and the free delivery system.
 Tehre are many portions of the country where the old style railroads cannot be profitably built and opera ted. at least for the present. The ex- pense is too great for the present de- mand. and the traffic and other busi- ness would not be sufficient to make them a paying investment. These ob- jections do not apply to what are now generally referred to as trolley lines. for they can be constructed and oper- ated so much cheaper than the rail- roads that they are becoming a com mon feature of towns and cities and their suburbs, but that is not all. for they are growing in length and im- portanee and reaching from city to city over many miles of country here tofore deprived of rapid communica- tions.
 These roads are of immense advan- tage to our rural populations. Even if they only extend a few miles in every direction from the city, or de- scribe belts around through the neigh boring country. intersecting the direct lines, they afford quick, cheap and fre- quent oportunity for the people to visit each other, or to go to town at almost any hour of. the day and return at pleasure. These roads will prove of immense value to the coun- try people. and we are practically at the beginning of their usefulness and convenience. Each line that is put in operation proves the desirability of others, and they will spread till there will be few towns without their net work of trolley-roads.
 The spread of the telephone is an- other modern convenience which is just beginning to make itself useful outside the cities. Though they have been familiar objects for a number of years their application has practical ly been confined to the towns and cities. Now these lines are not only following the railroads and trolley roads all over the country but are reaching out and following the dirt roads. and in many cases they are cutting the woods and fields in the most direct route from one settlement to another. They are enabling the rural inhabitants to talk to each other and to the towns people without leav- ing their homes-a convenience which can only be fully appreciated after a trial.
 And as a sort of complement to the telephone the modern system of rural free delivery comes to add an- other great convenience for the dwell CTS in the country. It brings their letters and their papers and their mag azines to their doors, and removes one of the greatest obstacles to general information that has ever existed. This delivery system is in the nature
 
 try people will not take a paper or magazine regularly because they can not get them except by occasional visits to the postoffice, which visit may be weekly sor only monthly. For this reason they are not as well in- formed on general subjects as they should be. A great many never see a newspaper at home. and in conse- quence they know very little of what is going on in the world outside their limited area of acquaintanceship. Of the great outside world they are almost totally uninformed.
 The free delivery system will change all this. When the farmers and other dwellers in the country find that they can have reading matter left at their doors every day they will become newspaper readers. Then they will keep themselves posted in politics and in governmental and na- tional affairs. They will know what is going on in foreign countries as well as at home, and as a natural con sequence of increased and extended
  information they will be prepared to wield a much greater influence in their local and State government than they now do. It will be an influence which not only belongs to them but which it Is their duty to exercise. Because of their lack of general information the intelligent farmers have held back and allowed the other classes of our citizenship to lead and control in po- litical and civil affairs to an extent that has not been fair or just. Let the farmers generally take advantage of the opportunities now open to them and take their rightful places in the work of shaping the destinies Of the State and the country.
 The trolley road, the telephone and the free delivery system will john the schools in the great work of educating and uplifting all the people.
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 SPEAKING RIGHT OUT.
 Massachusetts Is likely tn ziya Tn.