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put a nation on wheels
But neither roads nor ferries were of themselves sufficient to
put a nation on wheels. The early polite society of the settled
neighborhoods traveled in horse litters, in sedan chairs, or on
horseback, the women seated on pillions or cushions behind the
saddle riders, while oxcarts and horse barrows brought to town
the produce of the outlying farms. Although carts and rude wagons
could be built entirely of wood, there could be no marked advance
in transportation until the development of mining in certain
localities reduced the price of iron. With the increase of travel
and trade, the old world coach and chaise and wain came into use,
and iron for tire and brace became an imperative necessity. The
connection between the production of iron and the care of
highways was recognized by legislation as early as 1732, when
Maryland excused men and slaves in the ironworks from labor on
the public roads, though by the middle of the century owners of
ironworks were obliged to detail one man out of every ten in
their employ for such work.

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accomplish this end, in spirit he saw the very America that we
know today; and he marked out accurately the actual pathways of
inland commerce that have played their part in the making of
America
Crude as were the material methods by which Washington hoped to
accomplish this end, in spirit he saw the very America that we
know today; and he marked out accurately the actual pathways of
inland commerce that have played their part in the making of
America. Taking the city of Detroit as the key position,
commercially, he traced the main lines of internal trade. He
foresaw New York improving her natural line of communication by
way of the Mohawk and the Niagara frontier on Lake Erie–the
present line of the Erie Canal and the New York Central Railway.
For Pennsylvania, he pointed out the importance of linking the
Schuylkill and the Susquehanna and of opening the two avenues
westward to Pittsburgh and to Lake Erie. In general, he thus
forecast the Pennsylvania Canal and the Pennsylvania and the Erie
railways. For Maryland and Virginia he indicated the Potomac
route as the nearest for all the trade of the Ohio Valley, with
the route by way of the James and the Great Kanawha as an
alternative for the settlements on the lower Ohio. His vision
here was realized in a later day by the Potomac and the
Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, the Cumberland Road, the Baltimore and
Ohio Railway, and by the James-Kanawha Turnpike and the
Chesapeake and Ohio Railway.

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