PETROLEUM. 59 



The automobile, of course, first by its novelty and later by its wide 

 appeal, has been the prime mover in the automotive development. It 

 would appear to be unnecessary to particularize as to the social value 

 of the automobile, as this matter is common experience. It may be 

 said, however, that apart from its purely luxury use, with which we 

 are not here concerned, the automobile has served to enlarge the pos- 

 sibilities of modern life, not merely by contributing pleasure, but in 

 improving opportunities for physical and mental recreation, social 

 contact, and business activity, with no small contribution toward 

 facilitating the livableness of the modem city. The automobile has 

 gone far on the road toward solving the problem of personal trans- 

 portation.^ 



An important outgrowth of the automobile development has been 

 the motor truck, now used in great numbers for city and suburban 

 delivery service, and coming into prominence in the more populous 

 country districts as an efficient agent for short-haul freight. The 

 importance of this matter is suggested by the fact that the motor 

 truck in 1917 hauled over 60 ton-miles of freight for each person in 

 the United States.^ The possibilities of the motor truck are still 

 largely unrealized; its continued extension may be expected to re- 

 place largely the short spur line of the railroad; and in connection 

 with the growth of a network of good roads, a country-wide auto- 

 truck utilization will furnish an efficient feeder system to the trunk 

 transportation channels of the country. In respect to the prompt 

 delivery of farm produce, whether to railways or directly to towns, 

 the motor truck has an exceptionally useful opportunity.' The 

 whole problem of food supply, indeed, is closely bound up with the 

 matter of adequate facilities of transportation* and appropriate use 

 of mechanical power, for both of which petroleum products have a 

 tremendous field of unrealized usefulness. 



The tractor for farm use is a still more recent development than 

 the motor truck and the growth in its utilization during the past 

 few years, especially in the Middle West, has been great. Coming 

 into play at a time when the national food problem has taken on a 



> It is scarcely necessary to point out that the automobile supplements, but does not 

 replace, the standardized service rendered by the steam passenger train and the electric 

 urban and interurban lines. 



* This was only a small fraction of the freight hauled by the railroads of the country, 

 whose record in 1915 was 2,768 ton-miles per capita, yet the proportion Is Important 

 and growing. 



' The horse and mule for small-unit haulage are destined to pass in large measure ; 

 they represent an engine consuming high-priced fuel useful otherwise as food, running 

 24 hours a day whether used or not, and low geared with a capacity of only 3 to 4 

 miles an hour at best. 



* The problem of good roads has never received adequate attention in the United 

 States. A striking example of the intricate interrelationships of Industrial problems 

 is afforded by the fact that good roads in part rely upon the use of road oil, which is 

 made both from petroleum and from coal tar, being thus dependent upon the adequacy 

 of the petroleum-product3 industry and the coal-products industry. 



