Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1893-12-07
Deaths RenDrted.
Reduction of Animal Refuse Within
Corporate Limits.

To the Editor of Tie Evening Star:
Inasmuch as the reducing factory situated
at the foot of South Capitol street has been
destroyed by fire, and permission to rebuild
has been requested, and probably granted,
while a committee of citizens inhabiting
that section earnestly protest against the
continuance of the Sanitary Company's"
operations in South Washington. as an in
fringement of their rights, and greatly to
their discomfort it will not be untimely to
briefly consider this subject from an inn
partial and unprejudiced point of View.
While the board of health has declared
the factory not to be n nuisance, the citi-
zen's committee insist that it is. The def
milton of Q nuisance cannot rest on it's effect
on the individual; it must be something an
noying and injurious to the comfort and
health of a number, and it is Furthermore
quite true that some nuisances are the re-
suit of essential conditions upon which the
welfare of the community la -gely depends
Such, for instance, are the smoke of manu-
featuring towns, the noise of the railroads,
the dust and dirt of the street, the result
of traffic and commerce; clearly these things
are the inevitable result of our civilization
and cannot be abolished.
The legal definition of nuisance is such
as will embrace trivial discomforts.
Burrill Dictionary of Law Terms) defines
public nuisance" IAN annoyance to the
whole community" but assuredly a nuis-
ance can be public without affecting a whole
city. Tracy Bucks Hygiene and Public
Health) defines a nuisance, more from a
sanitary standpoint, anything that inturi-
ously affects the health and comfort of the
occupants of two or more premises, other
than that on which it exists Accordingly,
from a legal and sanitary standpoint we
must conclude that the reducing factory is
nuisance, and We ask, should the nuisance
continue as necessary pro bono publico"
or should it be abated, or abolished?
the ableSI writers on sanitary matters
are of the decided opinion that the smell OF
factories for reducing bones, fat, offal and
other refuses, which are made into soap,
S!ycerine glue, fertilizers, etc, are not d.
rectly injurious to health but no one ia
millar with the case in point can deny tina I
the foul doors ana the unbu-nt gases must
be an agent of disease indirectly. These
gaseous Combina lions of sulphur and am
monia (the latter is usually in bad company,
or soda, and phosphate works, are SO bad
in LONDON as to destroy the vegetable and
produce an appreciable deterioration in ami
mai life. France is ahead of all countries
IN her appreciation of the importance of
this question. During the first empire an
imperial decree ordered all establishments
causing injury to health or Inconvenience
to be divided IN three classes. The FIRST in
CluUeu all business Wnlcn must De removed
from the neighborhood of dwelling houses
and in this class we find "Done fat, manu-
facture off, bones, drying for manure
bones fresh, depotS Of and we can safely
put in the same class "a sanitary company
which bolls unStead of incnerates) QecC1n-
posing animal refuse. The stencil emanat-
ing from the works of the Sanitary Com
pany was perceptibie in the cold weather
prior to the burning of their plant.
In warm, sultry, summer weather the odor
is often of u pungent (ammonia) and nau-
reumatic 8asesD Character. 50 great is the
disco mort that many prefer to close their
windows opening to the south and west,
from which the prevailing breeze3 come,
rather than have them enter laden with
such noNiouS emanatiOns.
TO those below par to invalids, and, in
deed, TO healthy individuals, these conditions
disturb sleep. destroy the appetite and dis
tres the senses, and certainly thus become
remote if not proximate causes OF disease.
1T Is submitted that the refuse OF q great
capital is carted the length OF the CITY, and
treated WITHIN its limits. to the distress of
many of the inhabitants. The company is
as private Individual reaping an income
( for WORK which should be done by plant
under District concrol, Immediately under
the supervision Of the health authorities q
place where the gases are burnt, and above
all, placed beyond the limits of the city,
and not in a locality which is to winiward
III the hot weather of summer
JOHN c. WISE.