Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1944-08-03
LOOKING
AMAD
sy GEORGE S. BENSON
, PrssiaestsHaralxgHo college
N SeArrE 04rkaASas
Freight

Years DelOTe L ever paw Oh 0N-,
pictures of Oriental places and
people interested me. Distinctly l
remember one decorative drawing
of a Chinese boy. He wore wooden
shoes and bread-tray hat. His
queue seemed to wave sportily be-
hind him as he walked with wood
en- yoke on his shoulders. The pole
helped him carry two buckets that
hung by cords, one from each end.
Later I saw such men in real life,
many of them. l was old enough
then to wonder what was in the
buckets and why people had to lug
them. The first such common car
rier" l patronized had kerosene in
his buckets, five gallons at each end
of the yoke. His daily job was to
walk ten miles and carry ten gal
Ions, for which labor the local oil
dealer paid him ten cents day.
A Sharp Contrast
Oil consumers paid one cent gal
lon for ten miles of overland trans
portation, which is exhorbitant. The
dealer had to content himself with
a speed of one mile per hour in
transit, which is ridiculous. The
poor Coolie worked ten hours a day
for a penny an hour, So month.
which is preposterous. Such was the
Orient when / was there and il
hadn't changed much in thousand
years.
In America, where there are rail
roads, and the economy of volume
applies in transportation as well as
in other things, one cent pays fol
moving a gallon of kerosene over.
land 100 miles, not ten. Speeds ir
transit are rarely below 200 miles
a day. Trainmen who do the work
get $175 a month, not So. The diff
ference is that railroad investment
exceeds $4,000 per employee.
EverybOdy's Asset
Total railway investment in the
United States exceeds 26.5 billion
dollars. In a recent address ir
Florida, Thurman w. Arnold of the
U. S. Court of Appeals charged the
railroads with trying to throttle
competition to make their invest
ments safe. I do not know the
specific accusation, but l know two
things: ID Real competition cam
be throttled and (O investment:
ought to be protected.
Whose investment is it? Millions
of people. Railroads don't belong
to the officers of the company. They
don't belong to their mere million Of
stock and bond holders. There are
dozens of millions of people who
own insurance policies and have
bank accounts who are the real in.
vestors in railroads. A government
with the interest of its citizens in
mind would help to protect their
investments; their accumulated la
Dor.
Railways Are American
Railroads, more than any one
thing, made America what it is to-
day. They are partially responsible
for the differences between the
United States and China. America
is superior because it's interior is de
veloped. Railroads penetrated the
wilderness and brought its wealth
to market. Then venturesome pic
neers hurried inland from botE
shores to seek personal gain anc
the interior was developed quickly
by economic law.
Railroads like other industries are
sending young men to war. Rail
roads have their manpower short
age and it's acute. But with fewer
cars and fewer locomotives thar
they had in World War l, railroad:
are doing above 500 more actual
work than they did under Fedora
bunglement. Our only route to still
higher American efficiency after the
war is through protecting and en-
couraging liberal investments o.
private capital in the tools Of pro.
duction.
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