HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY                          125

    The early condition of the streets, as to pavement and drainage, has
been referred to. The younger generation of citizens can remember the
discomforts of that time. It is one of the most pleasant features of this
municipal history that Brazil can now be spoken of as a city of well
improved streets. The last report of the engineering department estimates
that nine and a half miles of the streets are surfaced with brick pave-
ment. There are no better streets than these to be found in any
city. About a third of the streets of the city are brick paved, while a
large proportion of the remainder are covered with a gravel or cinder sur-
face. Also, the city has approximately forty miles of sidewalks: 32.2
miles of cement walks; 6.3 of stone walks, and 1.4 of brick. In earlier
years the stone flagging was the favorite material for sidewalks, but in
the past ten years the cement walk has become the usual type. A feature
not often seen is the impression, at street corners, of the names of the
intersecting streets in the pavement, these being almost the only means for
displaying street names. At the present time about three-fourths of the
city has the benefits of the sanitary sewerage system. There are 11.7
miles of vitrified pipe sewers and 1.1 miles of cement sewers (these figures
covering both storm and sanitary sewers).
    The improvements mentioned in the above paragraph are in the
class of “special improvements.” Though constructed under the super-
vision of the city, their cost is assessed mainly against the adjacent prop-
erty owners, being paid for by special assessments.
    A paragraph in the Enterprise in May, 1886, stated that there was
“not a rod of gravel road in the county nor a rod of decent street in the
city. We here go on from year to year hauling cinders on our streets and
hauling them off at the rate of two off to one on.” A similar indictment
of the state of public improvements was contained in the nature of a
prophecy, in the same paper, in October, 1893: “Five years hence,”
declared the writer, “Brazil will have no fish ponds in its streets after the
rain, the sidewalks will be clean and smooth, the alleys wide and odorless
and free from boxes and all sorts of rubbish. Garbage will be hauled
from the city limits instead of piled in back yards, sewers will drain the
streets of their mucky accumulations, and the water supply will be ade-
quate. The little one-story buildings on Main street will be supplanted
with modern business blocks, street cars will be running, etc.”
    At the time it was written the prophecy was in way of fulfillment. A
street-car line was at that time in process of construction on Main street.
On June 20, 1893, the council had authorized the paving with brick of
Main street, though it was not until the following year that the pavement
was laid. This was the first paved street, but others followed, and this
class of improvement has been going on every year since. In 1895 and
1896 plans were authorized by the council for the paving of Meridian
street and also part of Church street. In 1895 specifications were drawn
for the construction of a brick sewer along Walnut street, from Main to
Birch creek. This was essentially a storm sewer, but it may be considered
the beginning of the sewer system of the city.
    The lighting of the streets has always been provided by private enter-
prise. The Brazil Electric Light Company, of which J. E. Sherfey was
president and George A. Byrd secretary, built a plant and began supply-
ing electricity for lighting purposes to private homes and business houses
in 1885. The city at that time was embarrassed for revenue, and did not
accept the proposition of the company to supply street lights until the