History of water
Quite an interesting
history of drinking water and its sanitation, filtration and chemistry from 500 B.C. forward.
A Brief History of Drinking Water
An abundant freshwater supply is a basic necessity for the development of human civilization. For thousands of years we have lived in cities built on rivers so that we could drink, wash, and move from place to place on these waters. Yet, only in the last 200 years have we seen rapid developments in water treatment. We have come a long way in the last century, and the future holds a lot of promise. This is a brief summary of where we've been and where we're headed.
A sample entry:
1800 A.D.
In 1804, Paisley, Scotland, became the site of the first filter facility to deliver water to an entire town.
In 1806, a large water treatment plant opened in Paris, using the River Seine as a source. Water was settled for 12 hours prior to filtration then run through sponge prefilters that were renewed every hour. The main filters consisted of coarse river sand, clean sand, pounded charcoal, and clean Fountainebleau sand. The filters were renewed every six hours. A simple form of aeration was also part of the process, and pumps were driven by horses working in three shifts (steam power was too expensive). This plant operated for 50 years.
A year later in Glasgow, Scotland, filtered water was piped directly to customers.
The year 1832 saw the first slow sand filtration plant in the United States built in Richmond, Va. In 1833, the plant had 295 water subscribers. The next US plant to open was in Elizabeth, N.J., in 1855.
A typhoid epidemic in 1850s London was associated with bad water, but the actual cause of the disease was unknown. British physician Sir John Snow traced the 1854-55 cholera outbreak in London to sewage contamination of a particular public well. His discovery became known as the Broad Street Pump Affair.
The name "Broad Street Pump Affair" comes from the fact that there were public wells and one well had become infected with Cholera. Dr. Snow tried persuading the city that the water from that particular well was responsible for the epidemic but they didn't believe him. He finally went in one evening and removed the pump handle, rendering the pump inoperable. The epidemic slowed and stopped. Case closed.
Posted by DaveH at August 2, 2005 2:32 PM