Sewickley Herald

              The Herald
The Sewickley Valley's Home-News Weekly
WHEN AUTOS WERE NEW
'Sam' Young's First Trip from Florida
"When Autos "Were New
The following story comes from the
Asbury Park, N. J., Sunday Press, written by a friend of Samuel 0. Young of
Glenwillard, which he calls a "Mud
and Sand Odyssey." It tolls of pioneering automobile trips.
Sam Young gazed upward in bewildered fashion from his luxuriously
soft seat of oozy, slimy Georgia mud.
In the ditch in front of him was mired
tho oar from which ho had just been
tossed. On the back of it was the legend, "Tampa to Pittsburgh." "Maybe
so," was his disconsolate remark as ho
dug himself out and sot to work with
his father to got the car back on tho
road. A couple of hours of heartbreaking work and off thoy chugged to complete what was a momentous task in
those days—tho iirst autotrip, as far as
known, from Florida north.
That was in 1910, when tho motor
car was still a curious and unknown
contraption in many sections of tho
country. Now ho is resting quietly at
his homo at Glenwillard, Allegheny
County, Pennsylvania, having just completed his 02nd jaunt back and forth
to tho southland since that record mak
ing trip years ago. The first took two
weeks or moro. The last trip a bit
over three days. Somo mako it in much
less time.
"Wo  not  only  made  the  first  trip
from Florida,"  said Young,  "but,  as
far as I can find out, wo mado the first
trip from our section of the country to
Asbury Park.    I wish we had made a
record of that journey, as wo did of
tho Florida expedition.   That was about
1903,   maybo   1905,   and  wo   went  by
way of what is now the Lincoln Highway.    There    wasn't    anything    high-
wayoy about it then—mud, sand, chuck-
holes, bridgoless streams to ford, rocky
mountain roads to creep up as you held
your breath, and then to slither down
whilo you hold your breath somo more,
"When we reached Asbury wo needed
tho entiro summer in which to recuperate.   Boy, if you didn't have an auto
in  thoso   days  you  tlon't know  what
motoring is."
He admitted that ovorybody thought
thoy wero crazy when thoy announced
thoy wero going north from their win-
tor homo at Dunodin, a village on the
west coast of Florida, by motor car.
"I thought thoy Woro right aftor we
onco got startod," ho grinned. "It
was ono Continuous battle. Thoro
weren't any roads, only narrow trails,
somo sandy, somo slick with gumbo mud,
the muddiest mud there is. There were
no garages, no roadside stands and few
road signs, no filling stations except in
cities. In most of the towns through
which we passed crowds thronged the
streets and gazed at us as though we
were visitors from anothor world, fit
subjects for a lunatic asylum, but we
got there."
Ho made the trip with his father,
Ezra P. Young, and "Rogers," thc
dog. Leaving Dunodin about 6 a. in.
on a bright March day tho adventurers
went to Oloarwater, three miles south,
filled thoir tank with gas and tool-
aboard pick, shovel, and block and
tackle. A sign on thc baek of tho car,
"Tampa to Pittsburgh," attracted attention all along tho road.
"Wo prayed for rain in Florida to
harden tho sand roads and for fair
weather in Georgia to keep tho mud
down," Young said, "But I guess wc
got our signals crossed, for wo got just
thc roverso.
"But anyhow wo zoomed along, sometimes in first and sometimes in second
speed, rarely in high. That was the
way it was about all tho way north with
numorous Stops to water and cool our
steaming motor.
"A map and compass helpod us a
lot, but it was surprising tho way towns
soomccl to disappear from our course.
'' I think I forgot to tell you that we
were driving a Thomas Flyer, made by
the E. R. Thomas Motor Gar Company
of Buffalo, N. Y. It was of tho narrow-
gauge typo and that added to our woe,
for thus we tracked only on one sido,
all the southern vehicles being of the
60-inch type, the northern being 50-
inch.
"The mayor of Live Oak entertained us, thinking us curiosities perhaps.
He said we were tho first northern
tourists the town had ever seen.
"Ono of the most exciting features
of tho entire trip was our crossing of
the Withlacoochie Eiver. It was nearly dusk as wo camo down a long, easy
grade. Ahead thero was a black
stretch leading to the bridge. 'Looks
like a paved asphalt road,' father remarked. It did, but it wasn't, I had
run about 100 feet out On—or iu it—
when father remarked, "Son, it looks
ns though tho ground is rising toward
us,' Ho was wrong.1* Wo woro sinking
into it for fully a foot. Wo woro hopelessly mired in tho messiest, blackest
oozo you ovor saw.
"Wo sat there speechloss. Then two
colored lads came along, Oiio of thorn
said, 'Mistah, you is about to cross tho
Withlacoochie Eiver and then you-uns
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