Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-01-26

The automobile has become the life
giving blood of our social and economic
existence, according to G. w. Churchill,
general Buick sales manager. If 1t
were possible today to shut off the cir
culation of the millions of cars that
flow over our arterial highway system
we would soon relapse into the COM
parative inconsistencies Of the gay
ninetieS"
Few people realize today the inf1u-
ence the automobile is exerting in re-
shaping mans relationship to his fell
low man." he said. I'VE do not stop to
think of it as the medium almost en-
tirely responsible for speeding up the
tempo of our industrial and social life;
of the part it is playing in making the
United States the industrial hub OF the
universe.
But if the automobile vert suddenly
to be taken out of our scheme of things
the resulting stagnation would soon
change the picture of national progress
to a cartoon of a sleepy Uncle Sam. In
comparatively few years ou- great high
way systems would disintegrate and our
road maps would show again the
struggling, dusty country roads.
Cities Would Shrink.
"The general store at the crossroads
ming to escape temporarily from the
isolation of an automobile-less rural ex-
iStence. would become reality again.
Sectional differences would be born
anew and community feeling intensified
to a degree that is impossible to realize
in this day of neighborlineSS between
cities and towns.
And as for the cities, they would
necessarily diminish In area. Most
suburbanites would find 1t imperative to
move back into town, and the compare
tive few who determined to keep their
families in the sunshine and flowers Of
the outlying sections would be COM
PEELED to move within a reasonable
walking distance of the local way sta
tons. The shrinkage in realty values
would approach the total cost Of the
World War.
"The efforts Of our sociologists would
be swept away, for the resulting con-
gestion that would ensue in the big
cities would bring back again the tene-
ments and slums that formed the black
est blot on American life in the nine
ties In fact, it is difficult to picture
all the reactions that would follow the
loss Of the automobile. The delivery
of milk and other foodstuffs to city
families would be only one Of q hum
bred serious problems that would be-
set us.
Span Of Life Increases.
1.-The big insurance companies that
are so vitality concerned with the ma
tional health figures of the country
have stated repeatedly in the last few
years that we are becoming a healthier
Nation, that the span Of life in America
has been on the increase for the past
20 years. 1t Is significant that the de-
crease in mortality figures runs parallel
with increasing automotive production
figures.
LET us look back for a moment and
we can readily see the major position
transportation has always occupied in
our life and progress. Before cur rail-
roads were built, the United States was
fundamentally an agricultural country;
the South was q land OF plantations,
the North country Of small, intensely
cultivated farms. Each family was
almost entirely dependent on its own
efforts for nearly all the necessities Of
life; every fireside had its spinning
wheel and bread was the product OF the
family oven. We were q Nation OF
farmers and shop keepers.
Then came the railroad linking city
after city into chain that carried the
surplus products of one town to an
other. The South began sending its
cotton to New England for manufacture
instead of shipping it to the distant
shores Of Old England Mill after mill
was built in the North to handle this
product of the South. The railroad had
brought about the beginning of our
economic independence and 1t grew
with unprecedented rapidity.
Machine shops sprang up all over
the East to supply the mills and rail-
roads; coal was discovered and the
mines were opened up to supply the
mills and machine shops. Year after
year and mile after mile the steel rails
stretched east and west and north and
south carrying development and pros
perity over the ties.
And so we rode into the beginning
OF the present century-an increasingly
prosperous Nation, but a Nation made
up of sections. Sectional industries,
sectional customs and habits and view
| points, and through all sections a divid-
| ing line between the country and the
city, which is best remembered by the
expressions 'rube' and city slicker.'
1T was at this point that the auto
mobile was injected into our American