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The great hindrance to the development of pioneer society
earliest felt, is the lack of ready intercommunication. A struggling
settlement located on some convenient stream gathered about it the
necessities of pioneer existence, and was in a large measure
independent of the outside world. Several such isolated communities
made up the county of Todd, and while visits were interchanged by
families the only opportunity to come together in friendly emulation
was on court days. But the nature of the early political status was
such as to concentrate the vigor and executive power at the county
seat, and the county really formed only one large community, which
needed to come in contact with other county communities to beget
that emulation which leads to rapid progress. Before the formation
of the county the main road, which the first settler found only a
trail, was a nearly direct route from Russellville to Hopkinsville.
Roads from these points to Clarksville, Tenn., opened an outlet
southward, and in the November term of 1820 the County Court ordered
the road to Greenville laid out to connect with the one which led up
to the county seat from Guthrie. Other roads were subsequently laid
out for neighborhood convenience, but these two main lines of travel
were the only. means of reaching the outside world. With them
opened, however, the community was practically fenced in by the
difficulties of ordinary travel. The roads were narrow, a
thirty-foot space only being allowed, which the elements soon
converted into an impassable morass, under even the light travel of
that day. Journeys were therefore undertaken only at the bidding of
an obvious necessity. At a later day, when stores were established
here, business paid tribute to this condition of things in a way
that robbed the merchant of; a considerable profit, and the consumer
of many advantages. When the building of the line of railroad, now
known as the Memphis Branch of the Louisville & Nashville road, was
projected, Todd County took a lively interest in it, and petitioned
the County Judge, according to law, to subscribe $300,000 to secure
its passing through the county in a central direction. The majority
for the subscription was only one vote, and the judge arbitrarily
decided not to make the subscription. No legal measures being taken
to reverse his action, the county lost whatever hope there was of
speedy rail-road connection with the world. In 1860 the railroad
touched the eastern edge of the county, leaving the county still at
the mercy of nine miles of bad road. In 1867 the line to Henderson,
Ky., was built along the southwestern portion of the county with
much the same result as the earlier railroad, absorbing considerable
local subscription without materially benefiting the whole county.
In the meanwhile progressive citizens had not been inactive. The
county paper contained long articles by various contributors on the
subject of road improvement, the building of pikes, etc.;
representatives in the Legislature secured the passage of enabling
acts, and about a mile of pike was built on each of the roads
leading out of Elkton. In 1869 the aid of the railroad was again
invoked, and $400,000 subscribed in aid of a road to be built from
Greenville or some other point in Muhlenburg County on the Owensboro
& Russellville Rail-road, through Elkton to Guthrie. Hopes of
success were high for a time, but it proved to be only a ruse of the
railroad managers to stimulate Logan County to greater activity to
retain the original project. Thus disappointed, the people quietly
submitted again for several years to the exactions, of the mud. In
1883 a stone pike was projected from Elkton to Allensville, but was
defeated by the failure of the Elkton District to vote its support
as required by the law. This, however, will prove no great loss to
the county at large, as the active, persistent demand for better
facilities for travel and shipping has crystallized in a new
railroad project. This contemplates the construction of a road from
Elkton to Guthrie, to be operated by the Louisville & Nashville
Company. Its estimated cost is placed at about $40,000, the larger
proportion of which is already subscribed. The route is fixed, and
the preliminary work of the engineer nearly done, and sanguine
friends of the enterprise predict that it will be completed in time
to obviate the mud blockade of the coming winter. The advantages of
such a road are weighty and apparent. All goods brought to the
merchants of Elkton cost an average of 25 cents per hundred for
wagoning, and even at this rate cannot be secured in certain times
of the year without vexatious and sometimes expensive delays. Much
business that would otherwise come to Elkton now goes elsewhere,
while the merchants fail to get the benefit of the competition that
a larger number of commercial travelers would create. All this the
proposed road will tend to correct, but there will be still a large
need for pikes. To make the contemplated railroad of the most
benefit to the whole county, good roads should lead to the county
seat as a central shipping-point, and this necessity will become
more apparent when the railroad becomes a fixed fact. Good highways
are a necessity to the prosperity of the county.
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