The Washington times., 1895-01-13
DISEASE IN CANAL WATERS
Fearful Condition Of the Seven
teenth Street Sewer.
NOXI0Us yAPoRs AND GASES


vironed by Mud, Debris, and Several
Hundred Loads Of Garbage-Sunken
The mouth OF a sewer Is not q nice place at
any time, but is particularly offensive when
for any reason it is not effectual to disgorge
its complex contents. The Seventeenth street
sewer is case in point. and has been con-
spicuously so for good many years. This
sewer, which was completed in 1880, empties,
or tries to empty, into canal about 600 yards
long and from sixty to seventy feet wide.
There is practically no "head' to the tide
which flows ard refiows through this canal,
and the discharge through the sewer has no
momentum, so that vast deal Of the dead
dying, putrescent, or decomposing things
which roll laziiy, or ooZe into this saltwater
receptacle, stay there. until they escape in
noxious vapours and disease-engendering
gases into the atmosphere.
reporter for TIE TIMEs visited this dis
nal region yesterday afternoon and took a
few observations which will be found inter-
a.
sewer are mud and debris. The Seventeenth
street extension to the mouth of the sewer is
narrow cartway. which is mud, deep, thick
mud, in which cart wheels stick and the
horses and mules strain and
sTAGGER UNDER THEIR LOADS.
A eoiored man lives in an old shanty in the
middle OF the mud. He was asked how peo-
pie got in and out to the canal. He said he
M he r;,r =
Seventeenth street for 300 or 400 yards next
TO this nasty locality is itself mire, and it
has been made infinitely more so by the off,
ciai dumping OF about $50 loads of garbage
right into tho street. leaving only carriage
way along that thorougbfare.
1t would be hard to find in any city place
SO thoroughly alive with things that NAV kill
as this whole region. The tide was ebbing
through the mouth of the sewer yesterday
afternoon, and the whole surface of the water
was covered with grease, reminding one OF
that peculiar appearance OF dishpan in
which the dinner things have been washed
with its oieaginous scum. Then came along
a distended rat flanked by pieces OF rotting
cabbage leaves. and then other things which
may be seen any time there,
BUT ARE DESCRIBED NOWHERE
They say at the canal, the very few who
live in that vicinity. that the offaI which gets
into the sewer sticks there.
The Inability OF the sluggish waters TO
carry off their tainting contents appears to
be increased by the use of the canal as a
navigable river. Nearly the whole length OF
the canal was strung with scnws belonging
10 private corporations, laden with sand, riff
raj and pebbles, for use on the public works
of the city. In the middle OF the stream the
end of sunken scow projected, and it is
said that there are Others imbedded out OF
sight in the mud below, which act as bar
riers to prevent the outflow, when possible,
of the garbage which creeIs at the bottom.
The scows which were there yesterday were
however. drawn up on the right bank of the
canal That there is stratum OF sediment
on the bottom is proved by the fact that
occasionally when it decomposes parts of it
rise 10 the surface, and in the summer time
the effect OF such exposure is too well known
to need much comment. 1t is also fact that
either by the backing of water into the sewer
by heavy rainfalls, or internal distractions
the water is forced out of the sewer-traps in
the White Lot and on the wall.
The District Commissioners have been
aware of the nuisance for years. The con-
dition OF the sewer as described was reported
yesterday afternoon to Capt. Beach, Assistant
Engineer Commissioner, and he regarded it
Us an
80
He said that the condition was about as de-
scribed, but he was not of the opinion that
the scows offered much of an obstruction
The fault lay rather in the fact that there was
not sufficient tidal force or current velocity to
move the accumulations. Capt. Beach read
from the report of Capt. Derby, late Assistant
Engineer Commissioner of the District, and
published last November. in which that
official makes an urgent appeal for the appli-
cation OF remedy in this very spot.
Capt. Derby said that even casual glance
here would be sufficient to convince the most
skeptical that it would be impossible TO main
tain these open cesspools" without dis
astrous consequences resulting.
He thought that if there was not prompt
remedy applied there was no reason why
there should not be q recurrence of the cpl
demic of 1899. Congress was asked for S4,-
600, 900 for an improved sewerage system. and
it granted $3.50 900. 1t has been estimated
that at the rate Congress is providing for this
work it will take half century 10 complete it.
The Commissioners have undertaken to do
the best they can for this Seventeenth street
sewer by the construction of one from Easily
Point along G street to Nineteenth, to ID, and
across the White House lot. 4 connection is
TO be made with the Seventeenth street
sewer, which will thus discharge through two
mouths. This new sewer is in process of
construction, but will not be finished until
the 30th of next June.
There is also a reprehensible condition Of
affairs at the mouth of James Creek Canal
and Rock Greek Canal, but the Commission
ers have not money enough to perfect the
system, SO that there is still an answer wanted
to that question. What are you going to do
about it?
Salmon Fishing at Yaquina.
Mr.. L. W. Moody, of Portland, Ore, went
to Yaquina the other day, says the Oregonian,
with an eighr-ounce trout rod, ordinary silk
line and an automatic reel. The fishermen
at the bay, who have been used to having
hand lines and hauling in the salmon hand
overland, laughed at his outfit and predicted
disaster.
However, he caught twenty-one salmon,
averaging fourteen pounds in weight with
his gear before the disaster came, and had
more sport with each Of them than would be
gotsout of whole boatload caught with a
hand line His automatic reel worked like a
charm and would let fish have about 100
feet of line and then the way he leaped and
danced around that bay was caution
''That three days fishing was the greatest
sport OF my life.'' said Mr.. Moody, 'and 1
can shut my eyes now and see those fish leap
ing and racing Some may suppose that the
salmon did not find it rs much spor. as Mr.
at~-a n