314 t)!fc;PARTMENTAL RErORTS. 



in uoi'theni Oliio, sample roads are being l)uilt under the direction of 

 J. H. Dodge, of this Office, at Leroy, l>runswick, and Dover, in that 

 State. Tlie work will continue throughout the season, and full details 

 concerning it will be submitted in my next annual report. 



Object-lesson road work is also in progress at Cumberland, Md., 

 where the Allegany County commissioners have appropriated $5,000 

 for the purpose. A three-fourths mile section of the Old National 

 Turnpike lietween Frosfcburg and Cumberland is being resurfaced 

 under the direction of road experts of this Office. In order that the 

 people of Maryland, and especially of Allegany County, may derive 

 the most j)ractical benefit from this work, August 23, 1902, has been 

 set apart as a "good roads day," and all persons interested in road 

 improvement have been invited to visit these roads while in course of 

 construction, and also to participate in a road convention at Cumber- 

 land on that date, which will include a general discussion and exempli- 

 fication of the science of road construction and maintenance. At 

 another point in Maryland, Chestertown, Queen Anne County, some 

 assistance is being extended to the local authorities in the construction 

 of a road out of furnace slag. This slag can be secured in large quan- 

 tities from Sparrows Point and can be transported down the Chesa- 

 peake in barges. Owing to the scarcity of rock and gravel in this part 

 of Marjdand, the experiment at Chestertown is being watched with a 

 great deal of interest, for, if successful, good roads on the Eastern 

 Shore of Mar^dand will no longer be an impossibility. 



As soon as the Maryland work is completed the road experts and 

 some of the machinery operating there will be transferred to Morgan- 

 town, W. Va., where the funds have already been raised and the pre- 

 liminary plans made for the building of about a mile of object-lesson 

 road. At tliis place we are to have the cooperation of the West Vir- 

 ginia Agricultural College and Experiment Station, the State geological 

 survey, the city of Morgantown, and the road officials of Monongalia 

 County, of which Morgantown is the county seat. In view of the fact 

 that very little scientifically constructed road has been built in West 

 Virginia, it is believed that this work will bring about improved 

 methods of road location, construction, and maintenance. 



If our exi^erts complete their work in West Virginia before cold 

 weather they will be sent to Batesville, Ark., for the purpose of direct- 

 ing the construction of a gravel road. 



Other applications for assistance, advice, and cooperation in road 

 conventions and road work will be accepted during the winter and 

 spring as the occasion may demand, and as our force and means will 

 permit, confining our operations as nearly as practicable to the South 

 in the winter and to the North in the summer. 



An application has recentlj^ been received from Hon. Horatio S. 

 Earle. State wsenator of Michigan and chairman of the Michigan high- 

 way commission, for the assistance of this Office in the oi)eration of 

 the Pere Marquette Railway good roads train, which is to tour the 

 State of Michigan building sample roads and holding conventions, but 

 owing to previous engagements, limited force, and lack of funds, we 

 have been unable to comply with this request, even to the extent of 

 furnishing a road engineer, much as we should have liked to do so. 

 However, it was my pleasure to be present and participate in the 

 deliberations of the Michigan Good Roads Exposition at Greenville on 

 July 29, 30, and 31, 1902, where the good roads train started its work 

 of holding conventions and building samples of gravel, stone, and 

 earth roads. 



