The Butler weekly times., 1910-04-21
Importance of Good Dirt Roads.
Isasc Notes 10 The Farmer 4 stOckman.

Isaac Notes 10 the Farmer Stockman
A recent railway journey of over
500 miles through one of the richest
farming sections in the central west
held several surprises for me, one of
which was the poor dirt roads in COM
munities rich and thickly settled
enough 10 have far better highways.
Near the big cities the rock roads
were, Of course, excellent, but in all
other sections, where the land was
Just as rich, they were common dirt
roads, and nine-tenths of them in
wretched condition after a month of
deep snow, at that time almost melt
ed.
Ii costs so much to build rock roads
that many rich and thickly-settled
farming communities do not want to
60 to the expense of making them,
but the surprising feature isl that
many such communities are well able
10 keep the dirt roads in excellent
condition eleven months in the year,
and yet they do not. Farmers seem
TO have an idea that since they are
not able TO make rock roads il is not
worth while to expend much energy
upon improving the dirt roads, yet a
good dirt road is almost as service
able eleven months in the year as a
rock road, the principal difference
being that more repair work is neces-
Sary to keep up the dirt road. In
fact, despite the importance of rock
roads and turnpikes in old, thickly-
settled communities, and near large
cities, good dirt roads, well cared for,
are better for most farming commu-
mites in the west than rock roads,
because so much cheaper. And even
if they were not would still have to
make out with them, for fifty years
from now we of the west will still
have to depend, largely, upon our
dirt roads. They can be built up
gradually, as time permits, by all
hands working together, with no great
outlay of labor and money at the be-
ginning, the effort being more to
make good roads of them eventually
than to make them first-class at the
outset, at large expense, as in the
case Of rock roads.
On this trip Of which speak, nine
tenths of the roads crossing the rail-
road track did not appear to have re-
ceived any attention whatever during
the winter. None of them showed
any indications of having been drag
ged or rolled, and no effort appeared
to have been directed, by the people
living upon them, to giving them an
oval surface, and very, very few of
them were ditched at the sides. Yet
the country was thickly settled, the
land rich, the farms showed indica-
tons of having yielded fine crops last
summer, the houses were fine, the
yards full of shrubbery and ever
greens, and, in fact, everything ex-
cept the roads showed thrift, prosper
ity and up-to-date conditions.
Quite a number of these roads were
at the bottom of deep cuts where they
crossed the railroad track, with the
roadbed the lowest part of the cut.
No effort had been made to ditch
alongside the roads to run the water
off during rains, or to drain them af-
ter the rains had ceased and had
lilCltCu. lCt lllCiC Cllllu oIOuiu
know that road must not be made
along the lowest part of deep cut.
An hours work by two sturdy farm
hands, with shovelS or short spades,
would have made any one of these
roads 500 per cent better. When a
road is properly ditched, whether at
the bottom Of "a cut or on level ground,
it becomes fit for use ten times quick
er, after rains, than if not ditched.
saw other roads crossing narrow,
marshy strips of land on the level
ground, through the mud, when two
dozen or so wagon loads of gravelly,
rocky sand thrown along the road,
making a bed eight or ten inches
high, would have given it a hard sur
face over which wagons could have
passed in the worst weather. Men
who live near city where they have
good rock roads cannot help being
amazed at the woeful lack of attention
given to dirt roads in wealthy COM
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