Arizona republican., 1920-12-28
Failure of Hotel Adams Private Water Works Means of Bringing
 a Municipal System to Phoenix

Every reform, great or small. re- ceives the impetus that puts it over, usually from some one incident. The need of it is felt and it may be talked about and urged by a large number of people. but there is no push behind it until something happens to make one or more men demand that something be done at once. That is the way Phoenix came to have municipal water works.
 General M. II. sherman owned the water works of Phoenix until about 20 years ago. They were conducted in about the same way that his street car company was then and has since been conducted. SO that this descrip ton of the mismanagement of the water works would seem adequate. The mains and pipes were of the most inferior character. The general was always an active collector of material from the garbage dumps of other cities. Much of the pipe was second hand. which had been discarded and would probably never have been put to any use if it had not been comman- deered by the general.
 They used to say that some of the pipe was really stove pipe, but per haps that is not so. But almost any day or any hour of the day a geyser might have been seen springing from the street where the pipe had given way under a too strong pressure. The arrangement was an economical one. The pipe did not cost much and it cost less to maintain all the pressure the pipe would stand.
 But J. C. Adams was the voice that was set crying in the wilderness for municipal ownership. Mir. Adams had lately completed the first Hotel Adams. and he. and for that matter, the whole town, was justly proud of it. It was by no means a re-proof structure, as was demonstrated one summer morning a few years later, but it was good and handsome hotel. Mir. Adams had fire fighting appa- ratus on every floor. There were long reaches of hose in gaily painted red racks which. with the always highly polished brass nozzles, lent an air of security to the guests as they retired that they would not be cremated dur ing the night.
 There was no other one feature of the hotel of which Mir. Adams was prouder. He used to march his friends up the stairs to inspect his fire fight ing apparatus and to listen to his ex- planation of the training of his force to become fire fighters on a moments notice. Every employe had a place as- signed to him in the event of a con fagration.
 Mir. Adams is not a man of strong religious tendencies. but I occasionally . thought that he sometimes wrestleC in prayer for a fire in the hotel that ht might demonstrate the efficiency o. his fire opposing machine.
 One morning a small fire broke ou in the Gooding buildi~~ across tn, street. It was not much of a fire: i could not have seriously menaced tn Hotel Adams if it had been allowed {, take its course. But fire engine re moved any possibility of damage t the hotel. The engine was attache, to a hydrant at the hotel corner.
 This was Mir. Adams's opportunity not much of one. but the best tha had yet been offered. The Hott Adams fire fighters were mobilizeC the hose on all the floors was unlim bered and the order given to drenc the porches on the Central avenu side. Not only was there no devastat ing stream of water. there was not
 drop. The fire engine in the stree below was using all the water in tn main. and in the absence of more ths it could have used it was sucking tn