According to canon, in spring 1632, Boris Ivanovich Petrov observed a "horse-drawn device" in use outside the Ring for road improvement. (Huff and Goodlett, "Butterflies in the Kremlin: Part 1, A Russian Noble," Grantville Gazette, Volume 8). That description was a little vague, but the authors tell me that Boris had observed a "Fresno scraper" in action.
This was an 1883 device for smoothing out a road. It had a blade which could be tilted down to scrape up soil, pushing it into a bowl. The blade could then be raised so that the load could be slid without excessive force. Finally, the bowl could be rotated to discharge the soil. The rotation was limited by an adjustable crossbar, thus controlling the thickness deposited.
Except where the "legacy" equipment is in use, we can expect to see a gradual progression from manual to mechanized roadbuilding, and from use of a few general purpose machines (like tractors with various attachments) to the proliferation of specialized equipment. Equipment like scrapers will at first be hauled by draft animals. However, they will ultimately evolve into self-propelled vehicles.
Conclusion
There is no doubt that the USE needs to expand its road network. The first roads will necessarily rely heavily on local materials; and therefore may be macadam if they are traversing rocky country, and plank roads if they are piercing forest.
The Catch-22 of building asphalt highways is that we need the asphalt to make the highways, and we need the highways to transport the asphalt to the construction site. So we will probably start with graveled, stabilized soil, macadam, wood plank and concrete roads. Once we have road, rail or water links to an asphalt source, we can "tar" the macadam roads so that they last longer, and ultimately upgrade the primary routes to asphalt.
While concrete roads don't require exotic materials, it may be desirable to defer building them until we have significant motor traffic. Rigid pavements are better suited to autos and trucks than to horses.
Roadbuilding isn't "high tech," but it is nonetheless of tremendous military and economic significance. Of course, road improvement is not going to be limited to the immediate vicinity of Grantville. Magdeburg is the chosen capital of the USE because of its superior location. Once it is serviced by modern roads, it will be the economic and political center of the USE. I would not be surprised if, a century after the Ring of Fire, people were wont to say, "All roads lead to Magdeburg."
References
Encyclopedias
"Roads and Highways," "Macadam," "McAdam, John Loudon," "Telford, Thomas," "Asphalt," Encyclopedia Americana
"Public Works," subhead "Roads and Highways," Encyclopedia Britannica (modern).
"Highway Engineering," Collier's Encyclopedia
"Asphalt," "Roads and Streets," 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
Roads, Generally
Gregory, The Story of the Road (1938).
Hindley, A History of Roads (1971).
Belloc, Hillaire, The Road (1923).
Forbes, "Roads to c 1900," in Singer, et al., ed., A History of Technology, Vol. IV, The Industrial Revolution, c. 1750–c. 1850 (Oxford U.P.: 1958).
Agg, "Tractive Resistance and Related Characteristics of Roadway Surfaces," Iowa State College of Agriculture Publ. # 36 (Feb. 6, 1924)(TL 295 A45).
Borth, Mankind on the Move (1969).
Military Roadwork
[FM 5-430] Field Manual 5-430-00-1, "PLANNING AND DESIGN OF ROADS, AIRFIELDS, AND HELIPORTS IN THE THEATER OF OPERATIONS—ROAD DESIGN," online at http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/5-430-00-1/index.html
[FM 5-436] Field Manual 5-436, "PAVING AND SURFACING OPERATIONS," online at http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/5-436/index.html
[CMH] Center for Military History, CMH Pub 104-1, Military Improvisations During the Russian Campaign, Chap. 5,"Indispensable Expedients," (orig. 1951), online a t
http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/wwii/milimprov/ch05.htm
Cook, The Siege of Richmond (1862).
Roman Roads
Ramsay, "Viae," in Smith, A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (John Murray, London, 1875), online at
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/secondary/SMIGRA*/Viae.html
Margary, Roman Roads in Britain (1973)
Chevallier, Roman Roads (1976)
Von Hagen, Roads that Led to Rome (1967).
Pawluk, "The Construction & Makeup of Ancient Roman Roads"
http://www.unc.edu/courses/rometech/public/content/transport/Adam_Pawluk/Contruction_and_Makeup_of_.htm
Incan Roads
Von Hagen, The Royal Road of the Inca (1976).
Hyslop, The Inca Road System (1984).
English Turnpike Roads
Albert, The Turnpike Road System in England: 1663–1840 (1972).
Bogart, "Turnpike Trusts and the Transportation Revolution in Eighteenth Century England," http://orion.oac.uci.edu/~dbogart/paper.pdf
Crofts, Packhorse, Waggon and Post: Land Carriage and Communications Under the Tudors and Stuarts (1967).
Nusbacher, Aryeh J.S., "Civil Supply in the Civil War: Supply of Victuals to the New Model Army on the Naseby Campaign," 1–14 June 1645, Eng. Historical Review 115: 460 (Feb. 2000).
Walker, Haste, Post-Haste (1938).
Webb, The Story of the King's Highway (1963).
Early American Roads
Holbrook, The Old Post Road (1962).
Rae, The Road and the Car in American Life (1971).
Shumway, Conestoga Wagon 1750–1850 (1968).
Settle, War Drums and Wagon Wheels (1966).
Tarr, The History of the Carriage (1969).
Huston, The Sinews of War: Army Logistics 1775–1953 (1966).
Wixom, ARBA Pictorial History of Roadbuilding (1975).
Meyer, History of Transportation in the United States Before 1860 (1948).
Klein, "Private Highways in America, 1792–1916," The Freeman, 44(2): ?? (Feb. 1994), online at
http://www.libertyhaven.com/theoreticalorphilosophicalissues/privatization/privatehighways.html
Hulbert, Pioneer Roads and Experience of Travelers, Vols. 1 and 2 (1971).
Plank Roads
Majewski, et al., "Market and Community in Antebellum America: The Plank Roads of New York, Working Paper No. 47, Univ. California Transportation Center (August 1991).
Clarke, Charles E., "The Construction of Plank Roads: Plan, Materials, Cost, Durability, originally published in the Prairie State newspaper (Jersey County, IL)(Sept. 14, 1850), online at www.rootsweb.com/~iljersey/JCHistory/JC-Plank.htm
Stoddard, "Riding on the Plank," online at
http://www.michigan.gov/hal/0,1607,7-160-15481_19268_20778-51814—,00.html
Luedtke, "Ten Mile Trip," Colburn Chronicle Special 125th Anniversary Edition (June 27. 1984), www.cramahetownship.ca/community/history/tmile.htm
[WHS] Watertown Historical Society, "The Story of the Watertown Plank Road," www.watertownhisoty.org/Articles/WatertownPlankRoad.html
{ISM] Illinois State Museum, "The Canton to Liverpool Plank Road Toll Road and Toll House," http://www.museum.state.il.us/RiverWeb/harvesting/transportation/plankroad/canton_liverpool.html
[WiscHS] Wisconsin Historical Society, "Plank Roads," http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/archstories/early_roads/plank_roads.asp
[Cook County] Forest Preserve District of Cook County (Illinois), Nature Bulletin No. 739, "Early Cook County Roads – Part Two – The Plank Road Era" (January 18, 1964), http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/natbltn/700–799/nb739.htm
Baxter, History of the City of Grand Rapids, Michigan, Chap. XLVI, "Early Highways, Stages and Plank Roads," pp. 523–529 (1891), online at
http://www.rootsweb.com/~mikent/baxter1891/46highways.html
Mason, "The Plank Road Craze: A Chapter in the History of Michigan's Highways," http://www.michigan.gov/hal/0,1607,7-160-17451_18670_18793-52863—,00.html
Halstead, "The Northern European Timber Trade in the Later Middle Ages & Renaissance"
http:
//www.medievalwoodworking.com/articles/lumber_trade.htm
McAdam and Telford
Tames, Transport Revolution in the 19th Century, a Documentary Approach (1970).
Smiles, Lives of the engineers, with an account of their principal works: comprising also a history of inland communication in Britain (J. Murray, London: 1861–62)(Telford in vol. 2).
Telford, Life of Thomas Telford, civil engineer, written by himself; containing a descriptive narrative of his professional labours: with a folio atlas of copper plates (Payne and Foss, London: 1838).
Reader, MACADAM: The McAdam Family and Turnpike Roads, 1798–1861 (1980).
Modern Roads
WAPA Asphalt Pavement Guide, "Asphalt Pavement History,"
http://www.asphaltwa.com/wapa_web/01_history.htm
Earle, Black Top: A History of the British Flexible Roads Industry (1974).
[U. Texas] "Roads and Pavements," Univ. Texas Bull., #1922 (April 155, 1919)(TE7 R6 1919).
Oglesby, Highway Engineering (1982).
Wignall, Roadwork: Theory and Practice (1999).
Gillette, Handbook of Construction Cost (1922).
Morrison, Highway Engineering (1908)
[NAPA] National Asphalt Pavement Association, "History of Asphalt," http://www.hotmix.org/history.php
West Virginia Highways
2002 General Highway Map, Marion County, West Virginia, http://www.wvdot.com/3_roadways/rp/2004%20traffic%20maps/marion1.pdf
"Welcome to Mannington Online,"
http://www.cityofmannington.com/citydept.html
West Virginia Construction Manual (2002)
http://www.wvdot.com/engineering/files/CM2002/Welcome.pdf
Miscellaneous
Kezdi, Handbook of Soil Mechanics (1990).
ASTM, "The Fresno Scraper" (1991) http://files.asme.org/ASMEORG/Communities/History/Landmarks/5550.pdf
THE FEAST
by Anette Pedersen
Guildmaster B in a fair-sized northern European town is giving a party to celebrate his second son's engagement to the daughter of another guildmaster. Come and let me show you what's going on.
The Street
The street leading past the house is not one of the main streets through the town, so it's paved with un-cut cobbles. On each side of the street the pavement slopes from the foundations of the houses toward the gutters to catch the runoff from the roofs, as well as any refuse thrown out the windows. The traffic—walking, riding or driving—follows the single row of big, flat stones down the middle.
For the past few days—and all morning today—the local people going about their daily errands have often been forced to step aside for wagons and riders bringing food and other goods to Master B's house. At the moment, chopped tree bark is being spread across the street to dampen the noise from passing wagons during the feast, while another wagon with milk, cream and other last minute deliveries is trying to get past.
The House
The house itself is one of the bigger and newer houses in town. It has two floors plus an attic and cellar, is half-timbered, and is build of mortared red-painted bricks in a frame work of tarred timber—also painted red. There's no roof gutter or drain pipes, but each floor of the house slightly overhangs the floor below, keeping the rain away from the walls.
The Kitchen Yard
At the right end of the house a gate leads to the backyard and kitchen entrance. Master B has no need for a horse, thus there is no stable by the house, and the guests arriving by horse or in wagons must stable these with Master B's neighbors.
The backyard is usually a fairly spacious place with a few outbuildings and storage sheds around the edge, but still enough free space in the middle to turn a wagon. Today, however, it's packed with bundles, baskets, tubs, crates and barrels, and servants are jostling each other as they carry items in and out of the house.
To the left of the gateway along the backside of the house are the big, lidded water barrels. They are filled from the fountain at the nearby street junction every morning. Next to them is the handcart used to transport the water and other heavy objects needed in the household. Then comes the door leading to the kitchen via the scullery, and—below the kitchen windows—sturdy benches and bins used to temporarily store vegetables and other items that don't mind the damp. Then there is the slanted door down to the cellar, and at the end of the yard, a small chicken run and the washhouse.
In many smaller houses the washing must be done in the kitchen, thus greatly disturbing the routine of the household and dampening the walls until the lime wash runs in streaks, but in Master B's house there is a separate building for this. Normally the washing woman comes for a week four times a year, but for the feast she has been hired for four extra days to wash, iron and repair all the fine linen usually stored in the great cedar chests. Mistress B still isn't happy; the linen should have been bleached by being spread out in the sun, but, alas, the weather did not cooperate and her best white tablecloth is slightly yellow along one side.
In the corner, as far away from the door to the house as possible, is the small midden and the latrine. Usually the night man comes to remove the refuse once a week, but as with the washing, Master B has paid for an extra removal yesterday. Still, it's piling up already.
Right across from the kitchen entrance is a lean-to with peat and firewood beside the wood chopping block. Finally—on your right when you enter the gate—is the shed where the rushes to spread on the floors are usually stored, along with big bundles of gorse used for baking. But today they've been displaced by an extra load of the expensive charcoal used in cooking the many delicacies planned for today's menu.
In addition to the permanent structures the yard today features:
A tub of live eels and one of carp over by the water barrels. The displaced rushes and gorse are piled almost completely across the gateway.
Hooks on each side of the kitchen door hold the linen-wrapped cured and smoked meats delivered last week.
A big basket of cauliflower with big bundles of dried lavender on top (to mix with the rushes spread on the floors) and three smaller baskets with peas, spinach and raspberries leave little room on the bench below the kitchen window for one of the two maids borrowed from the neighbors. She is plucking the feathers of two big geese, while the youngest of the two cats that keep the house free from mice and rats twines around her feet and bats at the feathers. The older cat has climbed on top of the hand cart, and is staring at the eels that are being killed and cleaned by the old porter, who's usually in charge of water, firewood and other rough jobs.
By the open cellar door is Master B, carefully carrying a hay-packed crate with six big clay bottles down the steep steps to the cellar. All the wine and beer barrels have been in place ever since the old guildmaster died—just in case—but the best quality Sack (Sherry) had to be ordered especially and it wouldn't do to seem too sure he'd get the position.
In the washhouse, two fires have been lit and two big iron cauldrons are bubbling under the supervision of the second of the borrowed maids. Because of the crowding, the cook must twist her way around the empty crates and other refuse overflowing the midden. She had prepared several lidded pots filled with rabbit meat, butter and herbs to produce jugged rabbit. She then sealed the pots completely with strips of pastry, and had only intended for the maid to watch the fires under the cauldrons, where the pots simmered half submerged in the boiling water, while she was cleaning and chopping roots and other vegetables. Unfortunately, the fires in the kitchen have no room for cooking vegetables, so nets containing whole cabbage heads stuffed with minced meat, celery and parsnips have to be boiled in the washing room. They must be watched carefully so they don't overcook and split.
The Scullery
Inside the house, in the scullery, the kitchen maid is cleaning carrots and onions on the table below the open window. The scullery is really just a small passageway between the yard and the kitchen and normally just contains a table with three washing basin
s and a big pitcher, plus some half-empty shelves. But today every shelf is filled to overflowing with cooling cakes and pies, while a big pile of bread loaves on the table is threatening to tumble into the water basin. The maid has been jostled by the passing people until she has nicked her finger and is crying. That may, of course, also be from peeling the onions.
The Larder
Aside from the door to the scullery, two more doors lead from the kitchen, one to the larder and one to the pantry and the rest of the house.