The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-03-29
DUSTY ROADS
 AND DISEASE
DISEASE MEANS DEATH FAULTY
 HIGHWAYS HAVE NO PLACE
Caiffernia's Oiled Roads . Boon to
 Fruit Growers But It Required Fali In Grange Prices to BrteE
 Thens fnfo voxue.

II Fruit Growers But It Required .
 Fall in 0ran&e Prices to Brt1s
 Them inte sesue.
 Washington. March ss---tspecial.l-- I'T have noticed that wherever see
 bad roads, invariably ace neglected unkemrt. unwashed children. l
 travel along a good road, see child
 ren well cared for do not say that one thing directly follows the other, Ebut they andosbtedly go together. A
 community that is negligent of It's roads will be negligent of It's children, l and community that is negligent of I it's children will not produce good citi- | zens nor above all things will # have
 Ia high standard of public health
 That seemingly iong-diatance ob . servation on cause and effect was re- gently voiced by pr. Allerton s. Cush- Public Roads of the United States De- | partment of Agriculture. at meeting
 of the American Public Health Asso- ciafson.
 Dr. cashman was asked yesterday to | justify the statement. 1t is. think, | justified by day spent in an automo- bile in any country section said ne land. insisting as I do on the condi- | ton. T think it has a bearing on the ! question SO frequently asked by un- Ehinking Americans: What possible
 relation can there be between the pub lic road and public health?'
 | If the medical men of the world know what they are talking about the relation Is intimate. Dirt and dust mean disease. Cleanliness and sant- tary surroandings work for better .f ffn mundane things is evident, # one Will use even a Speroentage of the powers of deduction which Conan Doyle gave to Sherlock Holmes. Science. holds in her archives a delightful little story which well illustrates my purpose. It is related that at one time the flavor of the. famous Staffordshire cheese had H departed and splendid industry was endangered Sir John Lubbock. the great naturalist. made prolonged in- .vesti@atfon and finally reported to the farmers that in his Judgment the best festorative measure possible would De to import a great number of cats aud set them free in Staffordshire.
 Naturally the unbelieving scoffsd ct the proposed ant.dots for they deemed the suggestion ridiculous, They asked q reason for so extraordinary a pre- scription. s. q The peculiar flavor of the stafford shire cheese comes from hybrid clo- yer which. formerly grew here tn great abundAnce,' said Lubbock. The bunn- blebee ts the one means of eross-fert- ,iltz.ng that clover The Asld mice have increased very rapidly in num- bers of late. and they are destroying the nketa of the bumbIebees. If you can destroy the mice, the beAs can work on that clover and .Staffordshire cheese will soon hA as good as ever. Get cats therefora.,
 Il don't Youeh for the story" con- tinued Dr CuahInan 'but I endorse it for It's power of illustrating the deli cate equilibrium which, under our complex civilization, exists between the public health and public stflities.
 Nobody will deny that the 000
 miles of public roads of Anaeriea con- stieute the national dust factory and furnish fully ninety per cent of the dust we inhale. The delicate breath ins apparatus of the human body was never meant to .harbor such substances as every passing breeze biowH from. of people dying from disease carried by dust is Aisper than is generally believed. EWhen the public win conceds that ta bG fact the Director of Public toads and the Stata and county road builders and 9vsrss s-a wtll be gls en q sreater degree of popular support than they now recst "a Teil the erein- arv citizen. or the busy farmer that the bad, dust-heav roads are not merely dfsagreeable but dangerous to health as well, he smiles sarcastically and shifts the conversation.
 The American becomes d skeptic when you confront him with. a prop osition which. to him. iR akin to the eats of Stafeordshire' If he doesn't understand what vou are talking derstand 1t yourself. He finds dusty roads a menace only when ft Is brought home 10 him that they cost him money. That was demonstrated to the orange growers of Californfa a few years ago when dust covered fruit no longer commanded so high a price as when free from dust. The result was an aroused interest in road inr- provement and in dust suppression. Ap- peals on the score of cleanliness and
 good health never stirred the Cali fornians. but slump in the price of oranges brought about wonderfuI era of activity The outcome was gratify- ing and California soon had dustleSs oiled roads. In that state the oils pos sess a higher asphaltuF1 base than the oils of any other section of the world, anu when IHeS are SPESAQ Ou. tue Eut4tts the volatile portion of the oil eVapor- ates and the asphaltum rematns aS a
 binder. ~F
 @Ths almost ifnmsdlate success of this plan attracted the attention of highway engineers throughout the world. In France and some ox our Eastern States 1t was st once assumed that oiIing was the best road treat
 ment and That the longed-for solntion of hA 5pss aiiSnnce protlefp had heon found. a
 This has not been praved td Do the case because in many localities the only oil available posaesses d pAtfoleuHa rather than an asphaltum base. It has
 been found that when the volatile DOT. ton evaDorates the oil left behind he comes greasy and similar in consistcu- cy to vaseline. Such quality Of oil does
 not adhere and bind the road but it is picked up and scattered By passing trafic. and the man who gets a 'reas
 onable quantity of it on his clothes ba- comes firm enemy to road oiling.
 If then. as doctors say. dust means dirt: dirt means disease and disease means death. dusty roads have no place in our national economics."
 When a fair percentage of the thinking r.@.: and women of the eoup- try grasp these truths thus interest ingly voiced by pr. Cughman, a de- termined effort will be made to secure clean and dustless roads.