The Washburn times. [volume] (Washburn, Wis.) 1896-1976, 1906-07-26
HINT TO THRASHERS
REASONS THAT THEY SHOULD BE
HIGHWAY BUILDERS

None More Eligible to Become Good
Roadmakers, as They Are General
ly HustIers - How Their Traction
Engines Cam Be Used In the Work.
The following paragraphs are from
paper prepared for the southwestern
| Transformers convention by State
Highway Commissioner Horatio S.
Earle of Michigan. Limits of space
| forbid the publication of the entire pa
per- but the suggestion to transformer
to go into the road building business is
an interesting proposition, says the
Good Roads Magazine.
Why good roads are wanted and
why they are needed by the owners of
| farms, of factories, of mines and by
producers of any other material re-
| curing transportation can be given in
one word-elimination.
| The reason thrashing machines are
| employed to separate the grain from
the straw is for the purpose of elimi-
nation-that is, it is cheaper to thrash
this way than by the use of the fail or
beast stamping process, and so a por-
ton of the cost of thrashing is done
away with and the money remains in
| the hands of the grain producer.
| There is no sentimental reason for
wishing to cut out portion of the cost
of thrashing or of transportation. 1t is
simply righteousness, a very COM
mendabIe quality in a man if only
coupled in right proportions with the
| Golden Rule doctrine.
If it costs So to draw one ton to
market over a bad road and only So to
draw two tons over that same road
when the road has been made good,
then the good road is the machine with
which to do the thrashing-that is,
with which to eliminate a portion of
| the cost of transportation, provided it
doesn't cost more for the machine and
| it's repairs than is saved by it's use.
Every bad road is toll road. AL
though you may not be compelled to
drive under a shed and hand to an old
cripple your cash before going through
the gate, yet the toll is collected just
the same by Cripple Mud or Cripple
| Sand, who are found along the way.
They collect the difference between
the cost of transportation over a bad
road and over a good one, and this diff
ference is never less than one-half the
cost of hauling over bad road So
| farmer who hauls his produce to mar
ket over bad road if it cost him 500
year to haul has paid $50 of this
amount as toll to Cripples Mud and
Sand
No one is more eligible to become a
good roadmaker than the thrasherman.
In the first place he is generally hus-
| tier. He has to be in order to be sue
cessful in his business, for thrashing
doesn't last the year round and he has
to be up and doing while it does last.
| If anybody obeys the old maxim,
Make hay while the sun Shines it is
the thrasherman. Next he has a trac-
ton engine, whose power can be used
to pull the pillow or grader, to haul the
stone and gravel and to crush the stone
and roll the road. He has the time, too,
in spring and early summer as we'll as
in the fall to attend to this work.
| Every dog has his day." and the
good. roads day is here. The thrasher-
man who gets sample permanent
road to build and does it we'll with the
advice and help of a technical practi-
cal road builder will not only learn
how to make good roads, but will Gre
ate a sentiment for them which will
furnish him employment just as long
as he continues to do we'll what he I'M
dertakes. He can work out the statute
labor for the taxpayer by hauling
gravel with his traction engine and as
soon as the taxpayer sees how much
more good the gravel does than the
worn out earth that he has been scrap
ing out of the bitches year after year
and piling up in the center of the road
he will not fail to get "Mr Thrasher-
man Good Roadmaker'' to do his road
work for him every season.