Gravel Roads

Osage County has to have more gravel roads than any place in the US.  But you could drive faster and never get caught unless you were unlucky enough to put your vehicle in the ditch.  And I know there were a lot more road graders working for the county but Cac (nickname) Harrington (Harvey Harrington's dad) took care of the NW part of the Osage and Dad thought he did a great job.

I remember when there were "wash boards" in the road and you would drive over it and your head and teeth would shake and rattle.  Or when Cac would grade one side of the road and there was a long pile in the middle of the road until he graded back the other direction.  If it was particularly big pile and there were pickups coming from both direction one had to cross over that pile.  It is one of the mysteries of the Osage that you just don't see in the cement cities of today.

Now I have to tell you one story of when Cac graded the roads while Dad (Cliff Olson) carried the mail.  Dad had just gotten a new set of 8 ply tires from Duvall's in Shidler.  Dad thought that his flat tires and just the wear and tear on the tires would be dramatically different.  Well that week Cac had freshly graded and someone had to have dropped a pile of nails in the roads over a long distance.  That week, only one week, Dad had 18 flat tires.  He got a new set of tires like the "good old ones".  And if you remember my dad you can see him shaking his head and saying a few choice words each time he got a flat.

Now another thing that was great about gravel roads is Dad hardly ever needed to purchase a wrench or screw driver as almost every day he would find some tool in the road. Now I have another story about Terrapins in the road but that will be later.

The thing I remember most is those 3 graveled hills between Eddy Harris's house and mine and how I road my bicycle up and down those hills hundreds of times so Eddy and I could get in mischief.

I bet if you think about it there are a million memories of events on those gravel roads.

What do you learn from gravel roads:

• don't drive a pickup with a horse trailer too fast or it will fish tail.
• How to drive
• How to navigate a bicycle as fast as possible going down hill in loose gravel
• Spot lighting - hunting at night

Thanks for you time,
gary@thepioneerman.com