had given up the struggle before that competition arrived. It was simply a case of not enough demand to make the investment pay. A great difference naturally existed in the earning powers of roads in different sections, and it would manifestly have been unfair to allow the same rates of toll in the Berkshires, on a road built under engineering difficulties and through sparsely settled districts, as were granted to a route tributary to Boston and connecting several prosperous communities. Hence a variety of authorized charges can be found by detailed search but a fair average can be given. The Massachusetts custom generally was to allow the erection of gates at intervals of about ten miles, and in the eastern part of the state the traveller would be apt to find the following displayed on a sign board at each gate "fairly and legibly written thereon in large or capital letters": Rates of Toll For every coach, phaeton, chariot, or other four- 25 cts. And if drawn by more than two horses, for each additional horse 4 For every curricle 17 For every cart, wagon, sled, or sleigh, drawn by 10 And, if drawn by more than two, for each horse 3 For every chaise, chair, or other carriage drawn 10 For every sled or sleigh drawn by one horse 6 For every man and horse For all oxen, horses, mules, and neat cattle, led 1 For all sheep and swine, by the dozen 3 Adjacent to the New York line, in the town of Hancock, would have been found a sign board on which the rates would have run from twenty-five to fifty per cent higher than those just given. But the usual manner of giving relief to companies in receipt of insufficient tolls was not to allow an increased rate, but to authorize additional gates, thus giving extra collections of the same amount. For local reasons a company was often allowed to establish two gates within the limits of one, collecting one-half the allowed rate at each. Such were significantly known as "half gates." Under authority of these turnpike charters roads were built all over New England, except in Maine, where few obtained a footing. Every town of any importance, and many of none, had its turnpike connections, often radiating in all directions, while the routes leading from the more populous centres were frequently paralleled and but a short distance apart. The common form of turnpike was merely a dirt road, costing from six hundred to a thousand dollars a mile, and a few had macadam surfaces. The turnpike era began in New England in 1792, when the first turnpike in America was established between New London and Norwich, and it can be said to have ended about 1850, although several scattered roads continued in business for many years longer. In fact there are two still collecting tolls in the White Mountains, and the Peru Turnpike in Vermont only ceased within a year. Coming as they did, before the inception of railroads and when the demands for easy transportation were imperative, those old roads played a most important part in the early development of our country, and the story of the turnpikes and the old Conestoga wagons, in which the freight was hauled, is deserving of more recognition than history has accorded to it. |