Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1885-07-31
CALL A HALT.
A Very Serious and Plain Talk
Wi b Our ciy Authorizes and TAX
Payers About Purely Local
Matter.

in the right direction. But we fear that oui
authorities are about 10 commit blunder u
not a folly. In the published proceeding
of the city council yesterday morning. our
readers no doubt noted an action contem'
plating the commencement Of work on q
permanent sewage system for this city. In
the Rame OF the taxpayers, in the interest
of health an6 on basis of common sense,
the EAGLE here and now enters It's solemn
protest against any such scheme and earn
nestly calls halt.
And now for the talk. We ere well aware
that the local reporters of tine daily papers,
and some others, have been quite free with
very confident opinions touching the neees-
sity of thoroughly sewering the city, while
II is very probable that not a single writer
or talker entertained practical or expert
fenced idea on the subject.
Wichita does not need. nor does her peo-
pie want, the city severed. The construc-
ton of such systems have not only ruined
many young and promising city, but for
ever after proved bane to the health of
their peoples. These men who dilate so
knowingly about the necessity of sewer
system for Wichita don't know what they
are talking about. As rule, they are who'll
ly uniformed on the subject, and the prin-
cples and details involved, and strangers
as to any statistical or other knowledge
drawn from either experience or books.
They don't know that the dangerous and
malignant epidemics recorded in vital statis-
tics-and we might add also contagious and
:nfectious-occur and flourish in severed
cities and towns with more viruience than
in any other place. They don't
know that there are towns and
cities Of fifty thousand TO two
and three hundred thousandpeople without
any sewer systems whose inhabitants are just
as healthy as the people Of the rural dis
tricis of the same countries. In fact those
who are talking of sewering Wichita the
most persistently either know nothing about
it or else they are or expect to get pecuniary
benefit. It's one or the other. Sewers,
however perfect the walls, pipes, connec-
tons and traps are deadly and noxious gas
generators. A main sewer trsversing this
than half the volume OF the Little Arkansas
river running through il continually, and in
the absence Of q continual pressure-fow Of
water from every house through their pipes,
and that supplied only by the water works,
We say any sewerage less effective snd less
strong than such system, would mean
disease aud death hundred fold
in excess of anything If the kind ever e1pe-
rien,--d heretofore. Such r system rs tina;
would mean wsterworks of five or ten times
tn capacity ct those now in service, TO say
NOT hing of bonded debt that would bank
rupt the city.
Wichita don't want any sewer system.
Wichita is one Of the healthies cities in Kan |
sas. or of which We have any knowledge. |
With from three To six times the population |
of many high rolling prairie Kansas town
whose death rate We have been inquiring in
TO and looking up, there are actually fewer
deaths in Wichita than in some Of these /
smaller towns, especially of children who
are most subject TO disease from bad water
and unhealthy and uncleanly surroundings.
The greatest disinfectants, and they are
are open sunshine and free circu-
ded TO them an unfsiling in
underfow Of water. Wichita
has never had, nor is she likely to have, but
one agency that might cause disease. That
agency is privy vaults. But the Eagle
pointed out a cheap remedy for these long
since. A dry-earth and movable box reg
ulation, and an ordinance to enforce it,
would effectually reach and wipe out that
danger. Dry streets, dry cutters, dry earth
privy vaults. with our constant
sunshine and constant winds and thirteen
hundred feet elevation and strong flowing
river, and there can be no more than ordi-
nary danger Of epidemics, even though
within the present plated city limits there
were living one hundred thousand people,
while with a fiat, level, Intellectual, expensive
sewer system, but lily supplied with pure,
running water, diseases, epidemic and spo-
radio would eternally threaten our homes.
What we want, as we have said, is dry
streets and cutters. For this reason we OPP
posed water works and we have two or
three times pointed out the utter foolishness
Of the so-called gutter-fushing business.
Done as it is the work is a score times worse
than nothing. and the man who suggested
il together with those who insist upon it
5lgh. TO have their heads soused into it i'm
after each so-called Gushing Gutter
flushing with such cutters as we have means
There are large number of cities, even
here in America, which were healthy and
prosperous until they got into and carried
out the ida Of a sewer craze. This is not
only true Of southern but of northern cities
The interest on the money necessary 10 con-
struct a single half mile of one of these
death breeding tunnels would pay for not
only keeping Wichita's public thorough
fares as clean and wholesome as country
road, but for sprinkling and sweeping the
streets and cleaning out every privy vault
IN town monthly.
Again We say that the men who are sdvo-
eating sewerage system don't know what
hey are talkiug about. The sensible, the
only commonsenced thing for Wichita in
this direction is clean, smooth cutters and
bitches and perfect surface drainage
Willie on this sanitary suhjec. we will
AXE occasion to speak of another bugaboo,
and TINT is, Wichitt.'s shade trees. The
;ame owl-eyed prophets find our shade
.recs a perpetual theme for criticism. They
ion't know what they nre talking about in
his instance either. So far ms the shade
.reees are concerned, and the EAGLE bias
laid this over and over again. il to trim
from the bottom up to height sufficient to
ei in the sunlight on the sidewalks and
yards and permit free circulation Of air.
for trees, and all extraordinary vegetable
growth, not only scientific observation but
teaches that their roots take up,
absorb and utilize sewage. "a green turf"
says our authority, FACTS in the interest of
sanitation, and the roots Of all soft woods,
specially, follow up and utilities
Suufowers are good
and only good about outhouses Maple and
roots have been known in many
Instances to follow sewagc-escapes for up
wards of one hundred feet. One of Which,
ta's distinctive and most attractive features,
aud feature about which every traveller
and visitor talks and remarks, is her beauti-
lifully shaded avenues. While there can be
no particular objection to cutting out every
other tree along some of the streets we say
to those who don't want TO give up the
trees, to trim up twenty, to thirty feet, even,
SC that the air nor sunshine can be obstruct-
ed and let your trees stand, stand as the
adornment of your home surroundings and
rs the glory of the town,
For the present, and in conclusion. as in
the sewage project, we say let well enough
alone.