• i ) VYVITT Published Weekly by The Rural Publishing Co., 
Ml. i.AAUll. :;:)3 w. 30th St.. New York. Trice One Dollar a Year. 
NEW YORK, APRIL 26, 1910. 
Entered as Second-Class Matter, .Tune 26, 1S79. at the Post -yv i-oi 
Office at New York, N. Y„ under the Act of March 3. 1879. i ’ 0, 
The Dirt Road to the Hill Farm 
It Is Leading to Ruin 
P RESENT CONDITIONS.—We people up-State 
in New York are watching the efforts of the 
Governor to put Commissioner Duffy on the retired 
list with considerable indifference. The quite gen¬ 
eral opinion among the folks on the dirt roads is 
that matters can be no worse, although I believe 
that the State road dwellers are fairly well satisfied 
with the present administration. Rut the hill roads 
are a fright. A rainy Summer, followed by an open 
Winter, lack of labor and in some cases downright 
inefficiency have reduced our dirt roads to anarchy, 
and the joke of it is there is no redress. You pay 
your taxes and get nothing and no chance to hit 
the dirt road was the main argument against trans¬ 
ferring the schools to the same people. The rural 
folks reasoned that once the school money and con¬ 
trol was run from the county seat and Albany, we 
would have the same problems we have with the 
roads, and to ask them to haul little ones long dis¬ 
tances twice each day over the abominable mud 
roads of this past Winter is not a joke. It came 
near being a tragedy. Yet that is just what we were 
up against, and is still the bee that buzzes in the 
highly intelligent intellects of our educational ex¬ 
perts at the Capitol. 
WORSE AND WORSE.—Personally, I have trav¬ 
eled on foot over thousands of miles of New York 
State roads in the last 15 years, and I verily believe 
the dirt roads are getting gradually worse. Now let 
fit to travel on foot. Now these same experts tell 
us that the best water-bound macadam will not 
stand the traffic on the State highways, yet on the 
valley roads, when it is so they can get ‘through, 
there is a.stream of autos, trucks, etc., and the only 
material used for surfacing is this stuff from the 
ditch. 
POOR DRAINAGE.—Of course such things as 
drainage, mud holes and the culverts get little at¬ 
tention. Where there is an extra soft place they 
hump her a little higher, with the result that the 
ditch is below grade, and the drainage water seeps 
under the road or remains to dry up. Mud holes 
even on the valley roads are left year after year for 
the unfortunate traveler to drive around, while after 
each rain traffic takes to the sides unless the abutting 
A Flock of Pennsylvania Sheep Busy in a Good Pasture. Fig. 190 
back, of course the hill dwellers go to the polls 
and hand the town superintendent his resignation 
every two .rears, and consign the remainder of the 
road officials to a place where they don’t drive 
“Lizzies”, or need highways, then go home and 
growl for another term. Still, these are the 
same people who are back of the Dairymen’s League, 
and who put the township school law to sleep. If 
they ever wake up, what they handed the school 
ring will look like a prayer meeting by the side of 
of what is due the Highway Department. 
EDUCATION AND ROADS.—And the reason is 
easy. Not over one-half the rural people send chil¬ 
dren to school, and the others are not very much 
interested in what does not concern them. With the 
exception of a few chronic kickers farmers pay their 
taxes cheerfully, especially those for educational 
purposes. If the highway tax was separate it might 
be one levy *vhere there were objections. The objec¬ 
tion to the township law was taking the control of 
the welfare and education of their children from 
the ones concerned. In fact, this administration of 
us examine methods without rancor, and only with 
the idea of improvement. Conditions are the same 
everywhere, and the system is about the same also 
wherever dirt roads are used. Of course the man 
on our fine State roads has no patience with a hill 
man’s grief, and few of our rural people have time 
for anything except to jeer mildly until the next 
time Henry comes home from a spin on the asphalt 
and tries five or 10 miles of hill road, where the 
only hope is two ruts full of slush and it's raining 
a deluge. Then all hands from the boy who drives 
to the occupants-of the rear seat do bless the man 
who tries to build roads. 
A VICIOUS SYSTEM.—When the snow leaves and 
the sink holes get firm our road experts get out the 
machines, and when it comes to moving dirt the 
new road’grader is a whale. Hitched to the biggest 
engine or tractor in the county, they storm up and 
down our quiet countryside, and all the silt. mud. 
trash and debris that has collected in the ditches 
during the past year is humped up in the middle of 
the road. anT? for the next month or so it is not 
owner festoons the banks with old rails and sticks 
of timber. 
THE NEGLECTED HILLS.—Now the hill roads 
are a different proposition. There is of course no 
silt in the ditches. Indeed, after two or three years’ 
neglect there is likely to be little but stones any¬ 
where. yet these roads have mostly gravel and clay 
sides that make very fair surfacing for the limited 
traffic over the hills, and if properly provided with 
breaks there is no difficulty in maintaining a passable 
road over the steep grades anywhere. Rut when they 
get to the hill roads the money is pretty well gone, 
and it is getting late, so orders are “Give her one 
turn, hoys, and let her go.’’ and the man who drives 
the big tractor kicks even on that, while the result¬ 
ing sods are left to nature and the limited travel to 
make a road the best they may. 
THE OFFICIAL ATTITUDE.—Now this is no 
exaggeration, and is put as politely as possible. 
There is no use blaming it on the town superin¬ 
tendent. He is invariably a tine man and a good 
citizen, and endowed with the patience of Job. or 
