HOME AND FARM MAGAZINE SECTION
Automobiles and Good Roads
A Department Designed to Help Farmers With Progressive Road Ideas.
State Takes Over
Yakima Fair
am mi ' tm tit" in" n u '"" 11
A Typical Bad Road and
A3 SOILS differ for agricultural pur
poses, so they differ for roads,
says the roads expert of the De
partment of Agriculture. Clay or soils
of fine texture usually make poor roads,
especially if they contain much vege
table matter. The coarser soils, how
ever, which contain some sand or gravel,
will often make very satisfactory roads
for liglit traffic, provided they are kept
in proper repair.
If the road is composed of fine clay
or soil, it will sometimes pay to re
surface it with top soil from an ad
jacent field which has sand or gravel
mixed with it. This method, called the
top-Boil method, is now in successful
use in Virginia, North Carolina and
Georgia, and probably other states.
The earth road can best be crowned
and ditched with a road machine, and
not with picks and shovels, scoops and
plows. One road machine, with a suit
able power and operator, will do the
work of many men with picks and
shovels, and do it better.
Don't Put off Working.
The road machine should be used
when the soil is damp, so as to make
the soil bake when it dries out. If it
is worked dry, it takes more power to
draw the machine, and, besides, dry
earth and dust retain moisture and
quickly rut after rains. The use of
clods, sods, weeds or vegetable matter
in building earth roads should be avoid
ed because they also retain moisture.
It is a great mistake to put the
working of the earth off until August
or September. The surface is then
baked dry and hard. It is not only dif
ficult to work, but is unsatisfactory
work when done. Earth which is loose
and dry will remain dusty as long as
the dry weather lasts and then turn to
mud as soon as the rains begin. By
using the road machine in the spring
of the year while the soil is soft and
damp, the surface is more easily shaped
and soon packs down into a dry, hard
crust, which is less liable to become
dusty in summer or muddy In winter.
Storm water should be disposed of
quickly before it has time to penetrate
deeply into the surface. This can be
done by giving the road crown or
slope from the center to the sides. For
an earth road which is 24 feet wide
the center should be not less than six
inches nor more than 12 inches higher
than the outer edges of the shoulders.
A narrow road which is too high in the
middle will become rutted almost as
quickly as one which is too flat for the
reason that on the narrow road all the
traffic is forced to use only a narrow
strip.
Don't Loosen or Flow.
Shoulders are often formed on both
sides of the road which prevent storm
water from flowing into side ditches,
One Tnat Happily Is Steadily Growing
retaining it in the ruts and softening
the roadway. These ruts and shoulders
can be entirely eliminated with the road
machine or split-log drag.
Ordinarily, the only ditches needed
are those made with the road machine,
which are wide and shallow. Deep,
narrow ditches wash rapidly, especially
on steep slopes, which is another good
reason for decreasing the steepness of
the grades. It is difficult to maintain
an earth road, or any kind of road for
that matter, on a steep grade.
The width of the earth road will de
pend on the traffic. As a rule, 25 or
30 feet from ditch to ditch is sufficient,
if the road is properly crowned. A road
that is narrower than 25 feet is diffi
cult to maintain for the above stated
reason that on narrow roads the teams
are more apt to track than on a wider
road, causing it to rut if subjected to
heavy hauling.
The road should not be loosened, dug,
or plowed up any more than is absolute
ly necessary. The road should be gradu
ally raised, not lowered; hardened, not
softened.
Prevent Washing Out
On flat lands, where water moves
slowly, grading material should be
taken from the lower ditch and culverts
supplied where waterways occur. A
shallow ditch on the upper side makes
it possible to give culverts a good fall.
Two or more small pipes, instead of one
large one of equal capacity, may be
used for culverts, especailly if the large
pipe necessitates much grading or rais
ing of the roadway. At least six inches
should be left between each pipe and
earth should be tamped around them
thoroughly so as to prevent a wasohut.
To prevent washing on steep roads,
the water should be carried under the
surface at frequent intervals from the
upper to the lower side, and from the
lower side away from the road. Five
12-inch pipes in a mile of roadway is
about as cheap and far better than one
24-inch pipe. The water must be dis
posed of before it gains force or head
way, or has time to damage the road.
The maximum velocity lor a 24-inch
vitrified tile flowing full without head
on a grade of 2 inches per hundred feet
is 13.6 feet per second, or about 2
miles per hour. When the grade is in
creased to 36 inches in 100 feet, the
velocity becomes 20 feet per second, or
about 13 miles per hour. The discharge
for the 24-inch pipe in the first instance
will be 5,086 gallons per minute and for
the steeper grade 28,260 gallons per
minute, it will therefore be seen that
a 24-inch pipe laid on a grade of 86
inches to the 100 feet will.have over
five times the capacity of the same
size pipe laid on a grade of 1 inch to
the 100 feet.
Flat Culverts Fill Up.
Under the same conditions the maxi-
Lena Common
mum velocity for a 12-inch tile on a
grade of 1 inch per 100 feet equals it
feet per second or about ) miles per
hour, and for the same tile on a grade
of 36 inches to the 100 feet the velocity
would be 7J feet per second or about
5 1-6 miles per hour. The discharge for
the 12-inch tile in the first instance
would be 442 gallons per minute, and
for the steeper grade 2,650 gallons per
minute or about fixe times as much.
By increasing the fall, we increase
the capacity of the pipe, decrease the
size of the pipe necessary, and there
fore decrease the cost of the culverts.
Furthermore, culverts laid flat will soon
fill up, but if given a good fall they
will keep themselves clear.
If much fall is obtained in aculvert
pipe, the spillway should De pavea.
Earth should be tamped under and
around the pipe in layers, and should
be of sufficient depth to prevent the
pipe from being broken by traffic; but
under no circumstances should a ridge
over the culvert be allowed, for it not
If much fall is obtained in a culvert
but is a menace to traffic.
Repair Only When Needed.
An attempt to drain mud holes with
culvert pipe will fail in most cases.
The water should be drained off by
means of open ditches; the soft mud
thrown out and replaced with just
enough good, firm earth to make it level
(after consolidation) with the surround
ing surface. If mud holes in earth
roads are filled with brush or atone,
it will usually result in two mud holes,
one at each end.
Repairs to roads should be made
when needed, and not once a year after
crops are "laid by." One day's labor,
judiciously distributed throughout the
year, will accomplish more and better
work in the maintenance of an earth
road than the same amount of labor
exponded in six days, especially if the
six days are in August, September or
October, when the ground is hard and
dry.
Because of its simplicity, its effi
ciency and cheapness, the split-log drag
or some- similar device is destined to
come into more and more general use,
With the drag properly built and its
use well understood, the maintenance of
earth and gravel roads becomes a simple
and inexpensive matter. Care should be
taken to make the log so light that one
man can lift it with ease, as a light
drag can be drawn by two medium
sized horses and responds more readily
to various methods of hitching ud
shifting positions of the operator tkan
a heavier one.
Forest fires in the United States
have caused an average annual loss
of 70 human lives and the destruction
of 125,000,000 worth of timber.
THE FIBST oelinite piana iw m
Washington State Fair next fall
. .. .. 1 M IV-
were made at a conference of Governor
Lister with members of the state ad
visory board, the advisory committee oi
North Yakima men ana ir. u. .
Graves, acting commissioner or agricul
ture. Following a resolution unanimously
passed Governor Lister offered the posi.
tion of state fair secretary to J. H.
Shannon, of North Yakima.
Special days are to be arranged, the
premium list is to be pruned of exeess
items, including third prizes, but the
premiums in agriculture, horticulture
and stock departments will not be re
duced. Governor Lister stated to the
meeting that the department of agricul
ture would assume all responsibility for
the fair, which will cost about 130,000.
8 PRESIDENT WILSON ON
GOOD BO ADS.
I
$ "I tell you very frankly that
my interest in good roads is not
merely an Interest in the pleas-
ure of riding in automobiles; it
S is not merely an interest in the
$ very much more important mat-
$ ter of affording the farmers of
this country and the residents in v
villages the means of ready se-
S cess to such neighboring mar-
3 kets as they need for economic
benefit, but it is also the inter-
$ est in weaving as complicated
$ and elaborate a net of neighbor-
t hood and state and national
opinions together as it is possl- V
ble to weave.
"I believe that the develop-
$ ment of great systems of roads
is, psychologically speaking as
t well as physically speaking, a
$ task of statesmanship. I believe
8 that it is the proper study of the
$ statesman to bind communities
together and open their inter-
$ course so that it will flow with
$ absolute freedo mand facility.
"I eannot rationally increase
the prosperity of this eountry
without increasing the roao v
facilities of the eountry."
NONE LEAVENS
BETTER
And Thus Produces Lighter
Cakes and Biscuits Than
Crescent
Baking
Powder
Its Purity Is Guaranteed and
so Is the Moderate Price.
25 Cents
ASK YOUR GROCER
CRESCENT MFG. CO., Seattle, Wash.
Nickel Plate
Have the trimmings on your suto nickel
plated. Alio all other Vlnda o( flnlahei on
anf metal. Write tit prlcei. Mall orders
promptly filled.
OBEOON PLATING WOBXS
16th and Alder Street, Portland, Oregon.
The stomach of a horse will' not
contain more than three or four gal
lons of food at one time.