Report of streams examination, chemic and bacteriologic : of the waters between lake Michigan at Chicago and the Mississippi river at St. Louis, for the purpose of determining their condition and quality before and after the opening of the drainage channel / Made under the direction of Arthur R. Reynolds, M. D., commissioner of health ... pub. by authority of the trustees of the Sanitary district of Chicago.

  • Chicago (Ill.). Department of Health
Date:
1902
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Report of streams examination, chemic and bacteriologic : of the waters between lake Michigan at Chicago and the Mississippi river at St. Louis, for the purpose of determining their condition and quality before and after the opening of the drainage channel / Made under the direction of Arthur R. Reynolds, M. D., commissioner of health ... pub. by authority of the trustees of the Sanitary district of Chicago. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Of the facts demonstrated in the report, yonr attention is especially invited to that which shows that rnnnin streams, adequately diluted, do purify themselves from sewage pollution—a proposition first made by Dr. Keillv as a result of his collation of the reports of Prof. Long's investiga- tions of the water supplies of Illinois, 1888-89, and at a time when water analysts of the old school held that “no stream on earth is long enough to purify itself after once being organically polluted.” The demonstration is shown in the complete disappearance of any trace of Chicago sewage in the Illinois river long before it reaches Averyville and in the better quality of file Illinois river water as it empties into the Mississippi at Grafton than that of the ^Mississippi itself. -All talk of Chicago sewage injuriously aflfectiug the drinking water at St. Louis is thus completely and effectually disposed of by the work of these investigators. The benefit of the Sanitary waterway on the jiublic water supply has not vet been fully realized, and will not Ix^ until the intercepting sewers and other works necessary to the exclusion of all sewage from the lake in the vicinity of Chicago are completed. Put what may be confidently anticipated is foreshadowed in the great improvement of the sanitary quality of the water supply, under usual meteorologic conditions, since the Channel was opened in January, 1900. -As to the improvement of the river and the south branch, no one. who crosses a bridge from Rush street to Robey, or who lives, works or offices in the vicinity of the main river and south branch, can fail to notice the change in the atmosphere since that date. Concerning the benefits along the Desjdaines and Illinois rivers, the State b'ish Commissioner, Col. Bartlett, reports an enormous increase in the fish harvest—a croj) more remunerative, acre for acre, than an\’ other in the state. Fish that have been driven away from increasing reaches of the river year by year by the undiluted sewage of the Illinois and Michigan Canal and of the larger towns Ixdow Chicago are returning to the purified waters, and the deuizeus along the hanks of the Illinois, erstwhile hostile to the Sanitary District, arc now clamoring for the fullest flow of the channel in the interest of improved navigation. .As part of the history of the Sanitary District. 1 incorporate in this letter of transmittal the correspondence and other data ]X'rtaining to the streams examination of which I have had the honor of being the Director. This begins with the following; Chicago, November 28, i8(>8. To the nonoral)le, the Board of Trustees. Sanitary District of Chicago. Cicutlcmcu:—1 take occasion again to urge—as I have previously done verbally to some of the I'rnstees—the desirability of an exhaustive series of examinations, chemic and hactcriologic. of the waters between Lake Michigan at Chicago and the .Mississippi River at St. Louis, with the object of determining their condition :ind iinality before the completion of the Drainage Channel, for comi'arison with their condition and (piality under the dilution to be atYorded by the Channel.
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