Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1892-09-10
A Dangerous Nuisance.

To the Editor of The Evening Star:
should like to draw attention to a nuisance
which has long prevailed in Washington and
which seems to have the sanction and protec =
ton of the authorities. l mean the surface
privies that are in use all over the city. These
receptacles of stagnant filth, alive with disease
germs emit their heavy, sickening odor night
and day all summer long, and when they are
cleaned or emptied the stencil is abominabie
Take case with which l am only too familiar
as an illustration: "The dining room Of house
on street, nearly opposite the Italian legation,
just west of 14th. is in an extension, the east
front of which faces an alley. The alley is ten
feet wide, and there are close to it's east line
and within twenty feet of this dining room two
OF these surface privies, or outside water
closets. looked into one Of them this morn
ing and found it more than half full Of liquid
Nth Of the most offensive and disgusting kind.
When the dining room windows are open and
the inmates are taking their meals especially
when the weather ia hot or ''muggy," the air is
fetid and the odor sickening. These legalized
pests lin which the responsible authorities
should be shut up for an hour or two) are in
full view from the upper stories, and suggest
their hideous contents and deadly effects to the
unfortunate residents whenever they look out
of their bed room windows.
Some three or four years ago. when typhoid
was doing its deadly work in this central and
eligible part of the city, visited the health
office to complain of these nuisances, with the
idea that they were liable to abatement, but
found, to my astonishment, that they were per-
mitted. L was told that they were Cleaned
emptied-when they were found to be full or
very offensive. 'But.' I said, '.they are always
offensive in not weather, and the emptying Of
them is itself a horrible nuisance; besides,
they are Immediately in use again, and their
contents tester in the heat and faint the air
that people breathe while asleep all through
10. u,<.lA - r =
typhoid which had occurred in the section
bounded by 14th and 18th. H and IA more
deadly disease than Asatic cholera, and, like it.
a creature Of uncieanliness. But nv inter-
locutor declared that there had been no such
cases, and took me upstairs and produced a
map, which, he said, showed what diseases had
prevailed in different sections Of the city, and
sure enough, there were no signs of typhoid
there. But two Of the victims Of that familiar
scourge were friends Of mine, and knew of
other cases in the same vicinity very serious if
not fatal. On further inquiry it appeared that
these fatal cases Of typhoid had been reported
by the physician under some other name
heart failure" shortness of breath or some
other convenient synonym for dying!
The effects of such nuisances, especially in q
damp climate and clay soil imperfectly
drained may not show themselves in a plague
or death rate over fifty to the thousand, but
they are the insidious foes of good health =
that rare blessing-and make themselves seen
in the saffron or cafe au lait compilations and
felt In the rheumatism, biliousness and bowel
complaints that are so prevalent.
The remedy for this particular nuisance is in
our own hands. No surface privy or outside
water closet, containing a receptacle for the
accumulation of filth. should be allowed
within certain considerable distance Of a
sewer. No owner of a lot should have the right to
maintain a nuisance that poisons the air and
spolls the comfort and endangers the health OF
his neighbors, who have been taxed for the
construction of sewers and have furnished
themselves with sanitary plumbing at no
little expense. 1t is monstrous that such a
state of affairs should exist, and the cholera
scare, or a touch of cholera itself, would not be
toe high price to pay for permanent relief
from such evils if nothing short of such vista
ton can insure their removal C.K.
Washington, Sept. 2. 1892.