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Show I Trails of the Iroquois Motor Routes of Today Following the trails of the Iroquois J through the Hudson, Mohawk, Cham- plain and Genesee valleys of the Em- -l pire state, and comparing the paths I laid out by the first Americans with J the main-traveled roads of today is the 'J burden of Robert Bruce's exceedingly H interesting contribution to the March I number of American Motorist, just off I the press. Mr. Bruce probably is Am jj: eirca's foremost authority on old-time I J trails and modern automobile high- H ' ways, and his latest effort, "Ancient 'j I Trails Which Now are Modern Roads." i is interest-absorbing throughout. I Says Mr. Bruce: "The trails of the Iroquois and their f contemporaries have become the mo- I tor-car routes of today. What the H tourist in New York state owes to J the aborigines will appear as we fol- '1 I low the great northern and western 1 war trails of the Iroquois League from "f the eastern door to the western door T of the 'Long House' (as they called j the territory dominated by them), and J ! northward past Lake Champlaln to the 3 j Canadian boundary line. I I "We will also swing southward from M I the beginnings of the old war trails 3 I on the Hudson through the Southern 1; 1 Tier and westward, passing in turn M through the lodges of the Long House, jj When we have reached our journey's jj j end, we will better understand that 9 j the great central routes were not pri- 1 I marily a matter of survoyors' choice 3 or engineers' selection, but were laid H ij down and trodden deep by the feet of -I I the red men centuries before the white f I man's axe sounded in the virgin for H" 1 ests of New York State. I "Look where you will, from the I north to the Bouth, and from the east j to the west of the Empire State I wherever lae broad highway of today has become a main artery of traffic, I you may in fancy look beneath It or to the right or left, and there in your mind's eye picture the well-worn trail of the aborigine. "It is a far cry from the eighteen inch footpath through the solemn glooms of the primeval wilderness to the well-built and heavily iraveled State highway of today. The evolution evolu-tion has been from the trail to the tote road, to the turnpike, and finally to the modern thoroughfares which connect all parts of the commonwealth. common-wealth. "War, of course, made the warpath, military operations necessitated widening wid-ening of the warpath to the road; but commerce, progress and the requirements require-ments of peace have made more perfect per-fect roads than the troops of war ever dreamed of. Today the war trails of the tribes, dignified, enlarged and perfected, mean to America what they did to the people of the Long House, safety, open communication and pre paredness." |
