824 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



There is a good job of grading in Washington township west from E. 

 L. Booth's, to the C. G. W. Railway; and, by the way, Mr. Booth is re- 

 sponsible for some of its goodness. He used the drag last summer. 

 Whenever it is possible to get gravel near by the driveway should be 

 covered with gravel. Some good has been done in this way to roads in 

 Jackson, LaFayette and Washington townships. 



The proper use of the road drag will keep the grade smooth, which 

 will distribute travel over more surface, and thus avoid ruts and holes 

 that hold water and make mud. The drag should be used repeatedly and 

 systematically to produce satisfactory results. 



I do not claim that the drag will do the work of the grader but after 

 you have built a grade and provided drainage, the drag presses and packs 

 the earth into the holes and ruts. After the grader has done a good job 

 the road drag, if used, will preserve the grade. You can not do satisfac- 

 tory work with the road drag on very sandy land, among stumps, or on 

 stony roads. Don't get the idea that the drag is the whole thing. 

 Where water stands along the roadside and in the road bed during four 

 months in the year, the drag will do but little good. There have been 

 seventeen road drags made since last spring for use in the first super- 

 visor district of Bremer county. They cost about $60, and the work done 

 with them, if paid for at $3 a day for man and team would cost about 

 $100. But it did not cost the county over half that amount, because 

 several progressive farmers used the drag to demonstrate its benefits. 

 And these farmers also paid their road tax (some of them without grumb- 

 ling) .' 



There has been no money expended on the roads in the district that 

 has brought more comfort and satisfaction to those who had to use the 

 roads. Fifteen of the seventeen drags did good work. The other two 

 have not j-et made one rod of road better because they have not been 

 used, and these two will never do any good — not even to the extent of 

 a tinkers blank — unless they are used. It is the same with a great many 

 good things. The Golden Rule and the precepts of the Sermon on the 

 Mount are conceded to be very good, but they are entirely useless to any 

 man unless he puts them into practice. 



(Since the paper was read at the Institute a bill has passed the Iowa 

 legislature which provides that trustees shall have the road drag used 

 on highways under the direction of the road superintendent when in 

 their judgment the road would be improved thereby. In choice of per- 

 son to do the work preference shall be given to the occupants of the land 

 abutting. Reasonable compensation shall be allowed for such work, but 

 in no case shall it exceed 50 cents a mile for each time dragged; and 

 there shall be not expended therefore more than $5 per mile for any mile 

 on which said work is done during any one year.) 



I hear complaints against the road law. The trouble is not so much 

 with the law as with the administration of the law. The best road 

 laws known to man will not make good roads unless the requirements 



