Honolulu star-bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1912-2010, 1917-02-10
MOTOR CAR OUTPUT PASSES MILLION
MARK AND ENTERS ON new PERIOD

Is. 200 were exported, leaving for dis
tribution in this country 1,539,5 sos.
The National. Automobile Chamber OF
Commerce estimates that there are
now not less than 3,500,000 motor
vehicles in the United Stats.
What is the dominant note of the
has entered? In the opinion of the
manufacturers the automobile has
fairly won its way to recognition as
one of the great public utilities, COM
parable with the railroads, the tele-
phone, and the telegraph as a factor
in national development. Each Of these
established new system of communi-
cation; they made the United States
more united. so to say. Each played
its part in knitting the country into
something truly national. The gain
was vast. but in sweeping aside old
WAYS of communication there was one
great loss. The building and extension
of the railroads laid deadening hanu
on the development of highways and
roads. The old traffic that went by
way of the fourhorse freighter over
highway and turnpike from one state
to another was loaded into railroad
freight cars. The freighter with the
stage coach disappeared. Public at
tention was taken from consideration
of highway maintenance or build
ing on large scale Highways, gen.
orally speaking. became merely local.
Auto Brought Roads
To put life into the highways again
required new kind of vehicle, with
a speed far SURPRISING the horse, and
economical of operation This is the
field of the automobile; here is the
great part it is to play in a national
development that in the end will COM
pare favorably with the progress pro-
NOTED by any other of the great pub
lie. utilities. Systems of countrywide
highways are to be built that were
not dreamed of as possible before the
automobile appeared. These highways
are to bear traffic, passenger auto
mobiles and motor trucks, never
imagined in the days of the horse.
The railroad. with. all its capacity
for service. has its limitation 1t is
rigid TRANSFORMATION. bound to steel
tracks. The automobile is. elastic
transportation. free to go wherever
the highways lead. To have home
or farm at any considerable dis.
lance from the railroad or the troll.
ley line was to be out of the world.
These places the automobile is bring.
ing into the world. 1t is reaching out
and knitting into the great active
world. as new part of 1t, isolated
areas. where life was cramped and
dull. and resources undeveloped.
Moves the People
Problems of national importance
that remained unsolYed in spite of all
the railroads. telephones, telegraph,
rural deliveries. and lecture bureaus
in existence. the automobile is to for
ward to solution. One of these. fun
damental to national well-being and
progress, is to stay the movement Of
population from country to, town. to
Keep the farmer on the farm. This
problem first entered the stage of ac-
tive discussion about two decades ago
and the interest It aroused was the
father of the Back to the Land"
movement and the Forward to the
Land movement Farm life was pic
tured in alluring colors by lecturers,
and thousands of city people were in
duced to go forward" to the land;
thence. later. most of them retreated
to the city in thorough sympathy with
farmers who would not stay on the
land. Even with heralded convent.
ences OF the telephone, the rural mail
delivery. and nearby railroad, the
farm was dull place to most people
Just what was the matter no one