=Eastern Friends of the West.=—­Fortunately for the nation, there were many Eastern leaders, particularly from the South, who understood the West, approved its spirit, and sought to bring the two sections together by common bonds.  Washington kept alive and keen the zeal for Western advancement which he acquired in his youth as a surveyor.  He never grew tired of urging upon his Eastern friends the importance of the lands beyond the mountains.  He pressed upon the governor of Virginia a project for a wagon road connecting the seaboard with the Ohio country and was active in a movement to improve the navigation of the Potomac.  He advocated strengthening the ties of commerce.  “Smooth the roads,” he said, “and make easy the way for them, and then see what an influx of articles will be poured upon us; how amazingly our exports will be increased by them; and how amply we shall be compensated for any trouble and expense we may encounter to effect it.”  Jefferson, too, was interested in every phase of Western development—­the survey of lands, the exploration of waterways, the opening of trade, and even the discovery of the bones of prehistoric animals.  Robert Fulton, the inventor of the steamboat, was another man of vision who for many years pressed upon his countrymen the necessity of uniting East and West by a canal which would cement the union, raise the value of the public lands, and extend the principles of confederate and republican government.

=The Difficulties of Early Transportation.=—­Means of communication played an important part in the strategy of all those who sought to bring together the seaboard and the frontier.  The produce of the West—­wheat, corn, bacon, hemp, cattle, and tobacco—­was bulky and the cost of overland transportation was prohibitive.  In the Eastern market, “a cow and her calf were given for a bushel of salt, while a suit of ‘store clothes’ cost as much as a farm.”  In such circumstances, the inhabitants of the Mississippi Valley were forced to ship their produce over a long route by way of New Orleans and to pay high freight rates for everything that was brought across the mountains.  Scows of from five to fifty tons were built at the towns along the rivers and piloted down the stream to the Crescent City.  In a few cases small ocean-going vessels were built to transport goods to the West Indies or to the Eastern coast towns.  Salt, iron, guns, powder, and the absolute essentials which the pioneers had to buy mainly in Eastern markets were carried over narrow wagon trails that were almost impassable in the rainy season.

=The National Road.=—­To far-sighted men, like Albert Gallatin, “the father of internal improvements,” the solution of this problem was the construction of roads and canals.  Early in Jefferson’s administration, Congress dedicated a part of the proceeds from the sale of lands to building highways from the headwaters of the navigable waters emptying into the Atlantic to the Ohio River and beyond