Charlevoix county herald., 1913-08-16
Interesting Trip
Automobile Trip Described by
Miss jennie Waterman
Detroit, Eich., Aug. Z, 1911;

| bSuOit, IIiSh., huB. \, 1910
Dear Friend:-
There is always kink in a real
trip to start out on, don't you think?
We wanted good omens though, so we
refused to go back after our lunch
when we discovered it was missing, a
couple miles out of town. We left
Main st. at 6:43 and made Eastport at
500. About twenty miles brought us
to field Of five-inch corn and a CORES
ponding backWardness in other crops
The hypothesis that last years corn
was as poor is all we could find to ac-
count for the straight.tailedness of the
pigs in the next fields.
We found teams working on the
the roads but had no trouble before
reaching Traverse City at 9:55. Here
fataer's cousin, Edwin Waterman,
surveyor of Traverse County, made us
a plat of the roads we were to follow as
far as Manton. Passed through a
storm area just below Buckley.
,Buckwheat fields are numerous and
flourishing from Buckley and east of
Big Rapids.
We made CADILLAC, log miles, at ESQ
and came on to Big Rapids by train
While father and mother spent the
night near Evart at D. A. Bretz' home.
The car made 141 miles Tuesday
Wednesday morning we left Big Rap
ids with entire party and paraphernalia
at 9:35. The things along the road of in
cidental interest were young quail,
real sanger that had shed its rattles.
this being the season for that. Cobble-
stone houses appeared often and we
think they are fine. Certainly they
had some artistic and comfortable
porches. An unusual number of fine
big barns were either just finished or in
process of construction, and we had
several glimpses Of wind-stackers in
action.
At Mt. Pleasant we discovered that
the valve had been broken off, letting
the water out Of the cooler, and used
three pals of water in cooling the
machine down. Through Chippewa
County we saw beautiful level fields.
Really got to miss our native hills be-
fore we struck some slight grades in
Lapeer County today. Farming looked
pretty prosperous through there. The
oat crops were especially fine.
At Shepard they were repairing a
bridge so with fear hidden and smiles
showing we forded a river. II was
really an interesting experience, water
did not come over tool box. Just
about here we passed groups of splen-
did farm buildings.
We saw a storm ahead of us at 4:30
but it was travelling same direction as
we were and we did not overtake any
of it except the puddles. This was
along the thirty miles of absolutely
straight road between st. Louis and
Saginaw which we made in an hour
and a quarter. The farms and build
ings looked poorer from st. Louis on.
We had made 10 miles for the day
when we, stopped for the night at May
vile.
Our third day started out beau tifully.
Everybody smiled, A farmer with a
wagon load OF milk cans assured us
we were good looking but his horse
was afraid of us just the same. Barley
fields were fine through to Brown
City. We found silos quite numerous
and they commonly have an octagonal
roof which | have never seen up north.
We found a rather faded Stroebel
Bros. Hardware sign. 1t did not say
but we figured it out to be 32S miles 80
rods from home. Query, does adver-
tising pay? A large pig was out in the
road as we passed here and when we
footed he Immediately advanced to
meet us and waited until we stopped
the car before deciding in favor of the
clover on the right hand side of the
road.
We found the clay roads of Lapeer
County bad after the storm, whenever
the roads are bad we think we must be
off the route and stop for instructions.
Conferred with knight of the pipe,
said pipe of unestimable strength and
were recommended in all sincerity to
keep right on the telegraph poles and
we couldn't miss it."
In following instructions we rode ov-
er clay bump and broke the rear
right hand spring. This was near Yale
3S miles from Port Huron. Found that
we could not get new spring in Port
Huron so trailed into Detroit shortly
after ZOO p. m. Father has taken the
train to the Overland Car Works in
Toledo and we hope to leave dear old
Michigan by noon tomorrow.