People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 March 1894 — Gravel Road-Ditch. [ARTICLE]

Gravel Road-Ditch.

Editor Pilot;—-“Another Reader” spelled my name right four times in your paper last week, in what he calls a “Solid Gravel Road Discussion.” This reading and writing sprite, who is ashamed of the name his mother gave him, can make figures which, I was taught won’t lie, to lie so big that I have been surprised that any of my friends should believe their maker. For short I will call him “John.” I own 160 acres of land and haul manure from town to help me raise crops. I want better r.oads so I can haul it any time of year. A portion of my land would be helped if there was a channel cut straightening and deepening the Iroquois river. I believe better drainage and better roads would both be good for all who are situated as I am. There is George M. Robinson, Frances M. Parker, George W. Burke, William P. Baker, William R. Nowels, Luther Ponsler and other better and smarter men than I, with lands'situated much as mine is. that are not actively working for either the gravel road or drainage. I have tried to study out why this “snake in the grass, John” should mention me rather than these other elder settlers and wiser men. 1 read that the funds needed for a public ditch can not be used for any other purpose. The funds needed for a gravel road cannot bo diverted either. Neither project can be made to cost more by reason of the other. It may lie a little harder on us who expect to have to pay for both. 1 suppose this John wants wet lands and wet roads aud by hiding his identity, he also shows that he is a “wet dog.”

The* move for better lauds cannot hurt the move for better roads. The. move for better roads is a wholly independent matter. Cheaper material may reduce the $31,000, estimate of gravel road cost and if it does each of the 726 voters of whom I am one, will share that financial blessing. The soul of this cheap John is so shriveled up. however, that he would reject an ottered blessing if he believed any of his fellow men would be helped by the same providence. A lawyer and doctor arc mentioned with me in John's little sally of fine writing. I find the lawyer’s land over fourteen miles from the “rock” over which John would have you stumble. His land is also six miles from any part of the proposed gravel roads. Even the doctor s land is less favorably situated than mine. In his disordered bump of mathematics this John makes for me a “bonanza,” a regular ophir, out of the gravel road.

What bothers me is, if it is such a big thing for me and all of us stand alike, those not in the swamp receiving a double shower of the golden shower. Why should liQt the whold 726 lay awake of nights and tear their shirts and tumble over each other in getting t > the polls to vote for the same. I look around and tind men who lov e to get and save money, wiser men than I, acting as if v hat a late student in a law office calls a ‘"money making | scheme" was a mere myth. I wish the students in the high school would take the problem John did and see whether John got the right answer in my case. As I understand him if I am assessed to remove the rock, fifty dollars and procure myself also to be assessed one hundred dollars for a gravel road that, this movement for a gravel road will, in some * 'fiat way, not only pay both assessments but leave me dollars in cash clear gain. I am simply a farmer and can’t see it. I suppose that you do not wish to be one “that maketh or believe th,” as the Bible tells us all the power of the gospel cannot save such, for “H e that maketh or believeth a lie shall be dami ed. ’ .

J [?]MES W. COWDEN.