TENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK-PART X (50 



"HOW CAN WE I.MPROVE OUR ROADS?" 



BY T. C. RO.XK. 



(Before Worth County Farmers' Institute.) 



If you expect me to solve this question submitted by your program com- 

 mittee, you will' be sadly disappointed, I can assure you from the start. 



For some fifty years, more or less, this problem has worried the fariners 

 in this western country as much as any other one thing with which they 

 have come in contact, and yet the solution seems to be as far off as ever. 

 The laws have been changed back and forth from time to time in the 

 hope that our country roads might improve, but legislative enactments 

 seem to be unable to effect the desired object; something else is required 

 to build permanent highways. That many improvements have been made 

 all these years our roads* have been worked, especially as to bridges and 

 impassable places, must be cheerfully admitted; but I don"t think to be 

 much in the wrong in stating that yet we have not a road in the whole 

 county where anything like a load can be hauled any distance at all sea- 

 sons of the year. 



During half of the year, and at a time the farmers have the least use 

 of them, being busy in the meadows and fields, our roads as a rule are in 

 fine shape, and if the King drag is diligently used — according to law — 

 after heavy showers, automobiles even can travel with speed and comfort 

 in all directions without getting into trouble. If we could manage it so 

 that all- our hauling could be done between the first of May and the first 

 of October, not much fault could be found with our country roads. But as 

 a matter of fact our heaviest hauling ccmes in the other half of the year, 

 and then we often find the roads impassable by any kind of vehicle. A 

 road that is not passable 365 days in the year is no road at all — only a 

 makeshift. 



But how can we improve our roads and make them passable all the 

 time is the question for us to answer. Having expended labor and money 

 and traveled them for, lo, these many years, in fine weather and foul 

 you will no doubt readily agree w^ith me, that it is a very difficult problem 

 to solve. 



Theoretically it seems very simple. It is thus: If we want good roads 

 we have to build them. But practically it is different. We have been 

 building year after year, and still we have no roads to speak of. We have 

 at last learned one thing — or at least ought to have learned it— that good 

 roads cannot be constructed from any material that may be handiest to 

 get at. Our rich black loam is unsurpassed for raising crops of all kinds, 

 but very deficient for road building. 



In constructing highways — as well as most anything else — three things 

 are necessary: Money, labor and material. I might add a fourth which 

 is equally as necessary — if not more so — and that is brains. I am afraid 



