The Old Pike: A History of the National Road, with Incidents, Accidents, and Anecdotes ThereonSearight, Thomas B. (Thomas Brownfield)
History
The Old Pike: A History of the National Road, with Incidents, Accidents, and Anecdotes Thereon
Searight, Thomas B. (Thomas Brownfield)
Cumberland Road; Pennsylvania -- Biography
The masonry of the bridges, culverts, and side walls, must be repaired,
when it may be required, in a substantial manner, and care must be taken
that the mortar used be of good quality, without admixture of raw clay.
All the masonry to be well pointed with hydraulic mortar, and in no case
must the pointing be put on after the middle of October; all masonry
finished after this time will be well covered, and pointed early in the
following spring. Care must be taken, also, to provide means for
carrying off the water from the bases of walls, to prevent the action of
frost on their foundations; and it is highly important that all
foundations in masonry should be well pointed with hydraulic mortar to a
depth of eighteen inches below the surface of the ground.
As the laws on the subject of this road do not seem to justify a
deviation from the original location, you will be careful to confine
your operations to the road as you find it located; but, as it is
believed that its axis may be dropped without adding much to the expense
in those places where its inclination with the horizon exceeds four
degrees, you are authorized, under the exercise of a sound discretion,
to make this change.
In making your contracts, it must be understood that you are to have the
general supervision of their execution, and that it will be your duty to
see that all labor and materials (provided for by them) be applied in
the most faithful and substantial manner. These contracts must provide
in their specifications for all the work that can be anticipated, and
should it happen that additional stipulations are afterwards found to be
necessary for either workmanship or supplies not originally provided
for, the facts must be reported to this department, and, with its
approbation, if obtained, new contracts will be made for the additional
services and supplies required; and it must be distinctly understood by
the contractors that no payment will be made for work not provided for
by their contracts.
Mr. L. W. Stockton, of Uniontown, has been engaged on this road and is
intimately acquainted with every part of it, as well as with the
adjacent country; and, as he has offered his services, you would do well
to call upon him and avail yourself of them in any capacity that may
seem to you best.
As soon as it can be done, a drawing of the whole road, with details of
construction, will be forwarded, to be filed in this office.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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