San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1925-11-15
PROPOSE NEW
HIGHWAYS To
LINK nation
Trans Continental Arteries
To Lead in Country's
Development.
BY ROY c. HAYES
Universsi Service Automobile Editor.)

BY ROY c. HAYES
fUnfverssi Service Automobile Editor.)
DETROIT, Nov. 14.-In heartily
endorsing William Randolph Hearst''
proposal for three great national trans
continental highways. C. Harold Wills,
president Of the Wills-Saint Clair
Company, declares that these road:
would do more to cement the people
of this nation into one great whole
than any other plan that could pos
sibly be undertaken.
Mr.. Wills is one OF the leaders OF
fine car building in the automobile
industry. When be resigned from the
Ford Motor Company several years
ago. where he served as chief engi-
mech, Henry Ford said Of Wills that
be was the most valuable man ever
associated with the Ford organizat ton.
In light of the fact that a great
many Of the leading figures in the au-
tomobile industry today are graduates
Of the Ford organization, this tribute
TO Wills from Ford gives Wills opin-
Ions even added weight.
SUBLIME SERVICE.
II am. most assuredly. in favor of
q ssystem of trans-ccntinental high
days" said Mr.. Wills, land / believe
u is q subject which requires the i'm
mediate consideration and action of
the government.
when Carl Fisher first conceived
the idea Of the Lincoln highway he did
more to make the dream of a united
nation q reality than has been accom-
pifshed By any one man.
The Lincoln highway and its grea.
sister arteries have welded East and
West beyond the possibility of sever
ance, either physically or spiritually !;
and the Dixie highway has done what
force could never do between our peo-
PIE Of the North and our people of the
South.
1t has made them literally and &C.
tually one. The blot Of sectionalism
has been cleaned off the map with
good roads and to attempt putting a
value on this sublime service is IN
thinkable.
A SINGLE COMMUNITY.
4tu Cdluul tSllHldlt Tue eCcEDullc
contribution Of good roads but its So
Geological contribution is even more
unthinkable. Eight years after the
Civil War, horse-drawn America was
undergoing her blacklist economic mo-
ment. Eight years after the World
War. motoring America is well on
her way to prosperity. Eight years
after the Civil War, we had the manic
OF 10: eight years after the World
War, there looms ahead what prom
Uses 20 20 down in history as the
unparalleled prosperity Of 1926.
What makes the difference? It's the
old story of the bundle of sticks. As
long as communities were isolated from
each other. IL was easy for adversely
IN master them. The favorite strategy
of general depression has always been
to attack one community ct a time.
In 1925 this strategy is obsolete.
The whole nation is a single com
munity bound together by the invis-
ible waves Of radio. by the steel bands
of our railroads; wired together by the
copper strands of our telephone and
telegraph systems; and eemented' to-
gcther by millions Of miles Of broad
highway through which the blood OF
the people Is oxysenated constantly.
HELP BUILD CITY.
would there have been a civil war
IL good roads and the automobile had
come 80 years sooner? All you can
find today where the Mason and Dixon
line used to be is automobile tracks.
And all over the South. where once
bristled the batteries of Lee and Sher-
man, you now find free air signs and
filling stations.
"Out West in the quiek-trigger
country, quarrelling sbeepmen and cat
tlemen have made way for peaceful
cosmopolital wanderers from every
where.
"The money which would be in
vested in such cross-country high
ways as are now being contemplated
would yield enormous returns to the
government and 10 the people in every
section of the country transyersed b.
these roads.
Good roads are unuuestionably the
solution Of the corgested conditions
in our cities because they will enable
people 10 live out in the country and.
at the same time. maintain their close
contact with the city.
Nothing in the last quarter II 4
century has added so much wealth TO
TIE American farmer as good roads.
They have put him in instant touch
with his markets and brought him OUT
OF the mud and put him on the con-
crete and literally obliterated the cor
poration line between town and coun-
try.
SPEED UP TRAFFIC.
ssrhese new transcontinental high
WAYS should all be controlled by gov
eminent legislation and there should
be n minimum speed limit on the
straight-aways Il 10 miles an hour.
They should have the right-of-way
over every intersecting road and the
speed limit should be high enough 50
tSnt n cross-country traveller coull
mako time legally. On these roads j;
wonld be an offense 70 drive SLOWLY
In the middle Of the road and instead
Of nrrcsting speeders, laggardS
80 -. s-,r fio owd n,,,e- r,ce,