The Colorado statesman., 1916-10-21
PURE WATER PUTS
TYPHOID TO ROU1
Cities Which Have Improved
Their Supply Have Reduced
Death Rate.
Big SUMS ARE Being SPENT
More Than Billion Dollars Now In.
vested in Plants Owned by
Larger Cities, Says Uncle
Sam,

That the people of the United States
are spending larger sums every year
to obtain pure water supply and that
the obtaining of such a supply by the
operation of publication plants is con-
quering typhoid fever in the larger
cities of the country are among the in
teresting facts brought out by Uncle
Sam in recent bulletin.
The bulletin also shows that great
majority of the larger cities of the
country now own their own water
supply systems. OF the 204 cities hav-
ing more than 10000 inhabitants in
the fiscal year 1014-15, 1856, or 76 per
cent, owned their water systems. Sew
enty-three of these cities were operat-
ing publication plants in that year
and OF this number 81 had either built
or improved and enlarged their plants
since 1903.
During this same period" contin-
ues the bulletin, "there has been
throughout the country remarkable
decrease in the death rate due to ty-
phoid fever. Although this decrease
mas taken place in both urban and
rural localities, it is noteworthy that
in most of the large cities which have
recently built or improved and en-
larged their publication plants the de-
cline has been greater-in some cases
very much greater-than the average
decline elsewhere. For example, in
Cleveland the typhoid death rate fell
from Ill per 100000 population in
1903 to 81 in 1914; in Philadelphia,
from 1913 to 76; in Pittsburgh, from
1927 to Is; in Cincinnati, from 42.2
to, g.; in Chicago, from 32.5 to 6.6;
in st. Louis, from 52.6 to u; in Wash.
ington, from 4S.5 to 11.9; in Minneap-
oils, from 41.1 to 12.5, and in New
York, from III to 6.3.
Filtration Dates Back 60 1929.
"The history of the publication of
water for public use dates from 1929,
when some filter beds were used in
connection with the water supply of
London, England; but the discovery
that slow sand filtration not only re-
moved inorganic matter, turbidity,
color, state, odor, etc.-acting merely
as a strainer-but also removed near.
ly all the bacteria, was not made until
about sixty years later.
1 1.-The first publication plant con.
structed in the United States was put
in operation in Washington, D. c., in
1858. This was of the "sedimenta-
ton type, which depends upon the
force of gravity to carry down and
deposit the clay and silt. Similar
plants We're installed in Louisville,
Ky, in 1879; Council Bluffs, Ia, in
1888; Dallas, Tex, in 1889, and Omaha,
Neb., and Oshkosh, Wis, in 1890.
I'm 1900 plant for the publication
of water by chemical sterilization was
built at Mobile, Ala. This process con-
sists in the addition to the water of
various chemicals which either kill the
bacteria or make it possible to remove
them by subsistence or filtration. From
1908 to 1914, inclusive, chemical ster-
ilization plants We're built in 40 other
cities of over 10000, and at present
time more than half of the municipal
ly owned water-supply systems having
publication plants are using this meth
cd, either exclusively or in combina-
tion with one or more of the other
| processes.
"Of the 73 cities employing purifica-
ton systems, 60 obtain their water
supply, wholly or in part, from rivers
and other streams, II from lakes, and
one-Lincoln, Neb.-from wells.
Cost of Water-Supply Plants.
THE growing solicitude for the pur-
ity and adequacy of the water supply
Is further indicated by the very con-
siderable increase which has taken
place during recent years in the
amount invested in municipal water
supply plants. The total capital in
vested in these plants in 1904, in the
1O5 cities of over 10000 which owned,
either wholly or in part, and operated
their water systems, and for which
data are available, was, in round num-
bers, $513,000,000, representing a per
capita investment of approximately
500. In the fiscal year 1914-15 the
number of such cities owning their
plants had increased to 155, the total
| investment to $1,071 100000, and the
per capita investment to approximate
ly $3S. The increase in the per capita
investment during the IL years thus
amounted to 81 per cent
while 1t is, of course, quite true
that an adequate supply of pure water
can be provided for one city at far
less per capita cost than for another,
by reason of differences in the con-
struction problems involved or in the
nature of the sources from which the
water is obtained, the fact of prime
significance brought out by the report
is that an efficient system is now re-
garded by most cities as an aconomic