The Country Dweller and the Automobile 
By Howard Victor Bowen 
Photographs by Jessie Tarbox Beals T. C. Turner, and others 
sq\|L THOUGH the automobile cannot be said 
to have created the interest in country living 
that has returned to take such a hold upon 
us, it has assisted to a marked degree with 
the development of this phase of our do- 
mestic progress. Fifteen years ago the 
countryside was being deserted, everyone who could, moving 
to the city; then came the reaction, and everywhere people 
began turning back to the restful environment of a prox- 
imity to the open country, with its green fields and blue 
skies. The automobile, with its facility for covering great 
distances in a remarkably short space of time, came to our 
generation at just the proper moment to become a potent 
factor in country living. It helped greatly to open up vast 
stretches of beautiful land not yet traversed by railroad or 
trolley, thus tempting the city dweller from the nervous 
strain of fretful town life. The automobile has made it 
practical for the city dweller to become a country dweller 
without the disadvantage of distance interfering with reach- 
ing his business, for even though he may choose to live fifty 
miles from the city, the man with a place in the country can 
motor into town far more comfortably than he could take 
a three-mile ride in a street car; neither would he be de- 
pendent upon the arbitrary hours of a railway timetable. 
The automobile is of particular value as an accessory to 
any country home. In the matter of driving horses, the 
up-keep of a stable, even one of moderate size, is a costly 
item compared with the expense of maintaining several well 
selected gasoline or electric vehicles for home use. How- 
ever, the selection of the motor car must be made carefully, 
with direct reference to the requirements of the use to which 
it will be put, inasmuch as some families would need motor 
cars for purposes that other families would not find in the 
program of their daily life. For instance, a family which 
entertains but little would hardly select the same sort of car 
that might be chosen by one which did; and, as a further 
illustration, a country physician, who wishes to cover the 
ground quickly and must be his own chauffeur, has no use 
for a sixty horse-power touring car, whereas a man planning 
transcontinental endurance runs could not use a two-pas- 
The automobile places the country dweller who lives in some secluded part of the countryside in immediate touch with his neighbor, and it is one 
of the principal factors in making aceess to modern country living both convenient and comfortable, as well as furnishing truly healthful recreation 
