Barry,

Regarding the grade of the roads, could be that I put the comma in the wrong place on one of the notes--
"at Edward Cato's Place 2, No. Grade" possibly should be "at Edward Cato's Place, 2 No. Grade", which might make
more sense.

I tried without success to find the previous discussion on "Roads and Revenues" to which you referred before responding, so if this has already been said, please excuse.

"...but a thought may be that in some instances, the overseers may have been assigned a longer term to see the completion of a road to its end and the men assigned to the construction and maintenance may have recieved the shorter 10 day terms that Mr. Nobles spoke of."

Your thought makes sense to me. I thought the date of 1863 for that particular note might be significant. I don't know if courts continued to hold their meetings as frequently during the war years or not. (Seems I recall some estate settlements dragging by slowly or being postponed.) Might have just been easier to put one person in charge as overseer for an extended period due to the war.

Seems I've read somewhere that all men had a responsibility for the roads, as you indicated Mr. Nobles said. What comes to mind is that the men could physically perform their duties, pay a substitute to do the duties for them, or provide the labor (slaves) to do the work for them. Don't recall if they could just pay a flat amount to get out of the duty or not.

Wish I could recall where I read this, and I'm hoping that my recall is fairly close to what I read.

RE:
"My daughter and I were discussing the plight of 3rd world countries the other night and I pointed out this requirement and willingness of our ancestors to build a quality community and a stable way of life as one of many good examples as to why America has evolved into the great nation we are today while other nations who attempted to carve their paradise out of the western jungles have fallen into poverty and disrepair....another reason to be proud of our ancestry and heritage. They sacrificed in many ways building the foundation of what we have today."

Most fortunately, we have had extended periods of peace in which to build our nation. I agree willingness and sacrifice are major components of the results.