Road Work

This notice in the Hobart Gazette of May 10, 1918, threw me for a loop:

All voters under the age of 50 years are compelled to do road work for two days or pay $3.00. Arrangements for work or pay can be made with the undersigned or with Wm. Tyler.

Fred Rose, Road Supt.

I don't know if this was something new, or something people needed to be reminded of.

In either event … well, it just seems so alien to the way we do things today. This, I take it, was in addition to jury duty. But you could get out of your road-work duty by paying $3.00 — about $44.89 in today's money, per the CPI Inflation Calculator.

And, of course, it didn't apply to women.