434 



THE IKRIGATION AGE. 



The New Sante Fe Trail 



History of a Great Enterprise that Follows the Path 

 Trod by Earliest Western Settlers. 



* ' IT is the greatest roadmaking effort in the West today." 

 That was what the leading editorial writer on one 

 of the biggest newspapers in the Middle West said to 

 R. H. Faxon, of Garden City, Kansas, president of the 

 New Santa Fe Trail, now building through Kansas and 

 Colorado. 



Union Depot, Pueblo, Colorado. 



The New Santa Fe Trail hugs the main line of the 

 Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railroad from Newton, 

 Kansas, to Canon City, Colorado, a distance of about 500 

 miles, jusf as the Santa Fe railroad hugs the old Santa 

 Fe trail, after which this splendid new highway was 

 named. It has recently been extended eastward from 

 Newton, Kansas, to Kansas City, and will now cover 700 

 miles. 



Good roads is no new thing in the West, but the New 

 Santa Fe Trail is the highest expression of the desire for 

 a continuous good road that has yet been found in these 

 parts. The Trail is the first definite, large project in road- 

 making in the West. 



The road is actually building, too. Commencing at 

 Hutchinson, Kansas, it threads its way in a less circuitous 

 way than might be expected, up the famous and fertile 

 Arkansas River valley, never very far away from, and 

 generally right along the Santa Fe railroad. There are 

 two lines, one cutting across from Hutchinson to Kinsley, 

 Kansas, and the other following the Santa Fe main line in a 

 northwesterly way, around the great bend of the Arkansas, 

 meeting the other at Kinsley and thence running along 

 with the railroad to the Kansas-Coloredo state line. 



There the state of Colorado picks up the highway 

 and carries it, still up the Arkansas valley, still along the 

 Santa Fe railroad, to Pueblo and Canon City, from where 

 it is planned to take it on to Colorado Springs and Denver. 



The laws of the state of Kansas, because of the con- 

 stitution, do not permit the state to engage in works of 

 internal improvement. Hence it is not the easiest thing in 

 the world to build a great highway like this, which lends 

 still more interest. The work must be clone in three ways: 

 By utilizing the township road levies, which run from $100 

 to $500 per township; by aid from the county commis- 

 sioners, which is generally in the form of bridges, etc., 

 unless there is a county road, in which case the commis- 

 sioners can spend considerable money; and by private 

 subscription. All three methods are being used. In Col- 

 orado, of course, where there is no constitutional inhibi- 

 tion, the state highway commission and the counties can 

 spend large sums of money. 



A Continuous Great Highway. 



The Kansas roads the western Kansas roads are 

 principally common dirt roads, and not hard to build. So 



the township boards will follow the lines laid down by 

 the county engineers, and unite, county to county, end to 

 end, a continuous east-and-west road, thus forming the 

 great highway. If there are jogs in the road; if there are 

 turns for a half mile or so, there is a straightening-out 

 process put into effect, a new road laid out, or something 

 else done to make the road as continuous as possible. 



New bridges and culverts, mainly of concrete, the 

 modern construction, are put in where needed. Roads are 

 graded, using the ordinary scrapers, the big road-graders, 

 cuts and fills made, and the King drag put on the King 

 drag is the standard split-log drag until gradually a 

 "crown" is put on the road and it sheds rather than retains 

 water. Then the road is kept in constant repair. 



At frequent intervals, very sandy patches are encoun- 

 tered. Here a search is made for clay, gypsum, or gumbo, 

 and that is mixed with the sand, filling the voids, and 

 making a "binder." Such roads become firm and smooth 

 as pavements, like rock or macadam, and impervious to 

 water. Much of this sandhills road work has been done in 

 western Kansas, notably at Garden City, the most pro- 

 gressive of the smaller cities along the Trail. Seven miles 

 of almost impenetrable sand was "bound" with a gypsum- 

 clay mixture, and now iorms what State Engineer Gear- 

 hart calls "the best road in the state of Kansas." There 

 are a dozen of these in western Kansas. 



Entering Colorado, crushed rock and tailings are used, 

 making a fine thoroughfare. There are miles and miles of 

 such roads in eastern Colorado. 



The history of the New Santa Fe Trail is interesting. 

 The idea originated in the mind of C. H. Scott, good 

 roads editor of the Hutchinson, Kansas, News. Happen- 

 ing in Garden City, Kansas, one day a year ago, he men- 

 tioned it to R. H. Faxon, editor of The Garden City 

 Evening Telegram, who had promoted the famous Garden 

 City sandhills road the year before. The two put their 

 heads together, and decided on a campaign for the Arkan- 

 sas Valley Speedway, as it was first called. 



The Work of Two Men. 



For more than six months, these two conducted the 

 best campaign of road publicity that the West has seen, 

 gradually enlisting the support of every newspaper from 

 Hutchinson, Kansas, to Pueblo, Colorado. It culminated 

 in a great conference held early in the year at Hutchinson, 

 when more than 300 delegates, including representatives 

 of commercial organizations, farmers' institutes, board of 



An Apple Orchard near Pueblo. 



county commissioners, mayors, motor clubs, newspapers, 

 and public-spirited citizens generally, met in convention 

 and definitely laid the plans for the New Santa Fe Trail, 

 as it was decided to call it. 



The resolutions of that conference form probably 

 what is the best document on good roads extant. Mr. 

 Faxon was president of the conference and Mr. Scott was 

 secretary. The organization was made permanent. With 

 a vice-president in eastern Kansas and one in Colorado, 

 and with an executive and publicity committee, with Faxon 

 (Continued on page 47'5.) 





