year because of the bad condition of her roads. This took no account of the losses to farmers and manufacturers. Other States began figuring. Senator John H. Bankhead, chairman of the Committee on Post Offices and Post Roads, who had been practically standing alone in his fight for road legislation, found the good wind veering in his direction and began to fight anew. It was estimated that the parcels post and rural free delivery routes could be doubled and a saving of $300,000,000 annually be secured, if the roads of the country were put in good condition.

Figures and facts prevailed. The Federal Aid Road Act was passed, carrying with it an $85,000,000 appropriation, $10,000,000 of which is to be devoted to forestry roads.

At the subsequent meetings of their legislatures, road building was taken out of the jurisdiction of the county and vested in State highway commissions, with an engineer to direct the actual construction, and to consult with the Federal department. The impetus this has given to the movement can be best demonstrated by citing accomplishments. In some of the States good-road schools have been established, in connection with other institutions of learning chiefly. The course includes care of roads. maintenance, construction, drainage, road systems, planning and location, grading and alignments, highway bridges and culverts, and a study of the differing soils and other features of economic road construction, including labor and the standardizing of roads and road materials. Governors appointed good roads days during which the men labored on road improvement and the women in the white, ashing of walls and fences and the putting of gardens in trim. Plans for road construction in every direction sprang into being and, strange to say, roads began to appear, bad stretches to disappear. In the past very few years hardly three-seven trunk highways across the continent from New York to San Francisco have come into existence and are practically completed and six overland routes from the North to the South.

Of the great trunk lines from East to West, the Lincoln Highway is the nearest to full completion, offers the greatest scenic values, and is the most marvellous example of the subduing of nature to man's desires that can be found. It leads from New York to San Francisco, via Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Omaha, Denver, Cheyenne, Ogden, Salt Lake City, and Reno, thence across the State of California. Whereas, before the European war not more than 50 tourists a year essayed this trip, which was really one of considerable danger and required a real love of adventure, last year upward of 10,000 enjoyed a fairly comfortable trip with nightly hotel accommodations if they so desired, and daily views of scenic splendors not to be surpassed anywhere in the world. Descriptions are impossible in a limited account, but some idea may be gained of the enterprise when it is known that the altitude of the Lincoln Highway in some parts is over 11,000 feet. In the three years of its building, hills have been dumped into valleys, the sides of gigantic mountains shaved to leave a ledge for the hanging of a roadway. Man's ingenuity has overcome all barriers saving the one of mud. The greatest difficulty the road builders have had to contend with in the great middle western sections has been the heavy rains which sometimes in a night have destroyed thousands of dollars of road work which had to be done over again when the roads had dried out.

These things, however, will be overcome in good time. Through the farming country of the States of Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska the roadways are nearly all natural dirt although the people are beginning to appreciate now that this is the most expensive kind of road. The Lincoln Highway has followed the famous "Overland Trail" very closely, going in the pathway of Indian and stage coach and prairie schooner. It opens up marvellous insight into mountains, lakes, valleys, plains. forests, and desert. It displays to a beginning comprehension the vast possibilities of the various industries scattered between the bordering oceans, really only in their infancy.

Yet the Lincoln Highway is only one of seven to guide the traveler through the nation and introduce its marvels. The Pike's Peak Ocean-To-Ocean Highway starts

Bird's-eye view of the road leading to the famous Roosevelt Dam in the mountain region of Arizona. The section of the roadway shown above descends 1,000 feet in a distance of a little more than a mile.

The several transcontinental highways offer a variety of scenic wonders. In crossing the Rocky Mountains during the colder seasons vast stretches of snow and ice surround the traveler, extending in every direction as far as the eye can see. Good roads have made this picturesque region accessible to automobilists, and now many thousands of tourists annually visit places that a few years ago only the most daring could reach.