Logan's Hill on the York Road. Frightful accidents occurred in
attempting to draw out loads. Jonathan Tyson, for instance, in
1792, near Philadelphia saw a horse's lower jaw torn off by the
slipping of a chain.

Save in the winter, when in the northern colonies snow filled the
ruts and frost built solid bridges over the streams, travel on
these early roads was never safe, rapid, nor comfortable. The
comparative ease of winter travel for the carriage of heavy
freight and for purposes of trade and social intercourse gave
the colder regions an advantage over the southern that was an
important factor in the development of the country.

No genuine improvement of roads and highways seems to have been
attempted until the era heralded by Washington's letter to
Harrison in 1784. But the problem slowly forced itself upon all
sections of the country, and especially upon Pennsylvania and
Maryland, whose inhabitants began to fear lest New York,
Alexandria, or Richmond should snatch the Western trade from
Philadelphia or Baltimore. The truth that underlies the proverb
that "history repeats itself" is well illustrated by the fact
that the first macadamized road in America was built in
Pennsylvania, for here also originated the pack-horse trade and
the Conestoga horse and wagon; here the first inland American
canal was built, the first roadbed was graded on the principle of
dividing the whole distance by the whole descent, and the first
railway was operated. Macadam and Telford had only begun to show
the people of England how to build roads of crushed stone--an art
first developed by the French engineer Tresaguet--when
Pennsylvanians built the Lancaster Turnpike. The Philadelphia and