In 1858, London Was Caught in the Grip of a Deadly Health Crisis: Its Largest River Was Overflowing with Poop

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In 1858, London was caught in the grip of a deadly health crisis: Its largest river was overflowing with poop. By Allison Friedman

UP years, Londoners have been dumping human CLOSE Synthesizing As you read these articles, think about how big problems can waste into the Thames [temz], the great river spark the creation of new inventions. that rushes through the city. Now, London is suffering the hottest summer in recent history. LOOK FOR WORD NERD’S 10 WORDS IN BOLD The steaming heat is cooking the filthy river into a bubbling, foul-smelling stew. Newspapers Let’s journey to the city of London, England, are calling this situation “The Great Stink.” in the summer of 1858. Horse-drawn carriages The problem isn’t merely gross. It’s also clip-clop through the streets. Ladies wearing deadly. Over the past 50 years, tens of thousands giant, tentlike skirts glide past shop windows. of people have died from drinking the polluted Kids stand on street corners, selling newspapers water of the Thames River. Can the Great and cigars and fried fish. Stink force the city to clean up the river before But you don’t notice any of that. All you thousands more are sickened? can think about is the overpowering, stomach- turning, eye-watering smell of poop. The Problem of Poop As you will soon discover, the entire city For as long as humans have walked the

is caught in the grip of a stinky crisis. For earth, figuring out what to do with human GARY HANNA BY ILLUSTRATION

10 STORYWORKS ILLUSTRATION BY GARY HANNA

TUERIS/SHUTTERSTOCK.COM (BACKGROUND); SCIENCE HISTORY IMAGES/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO (CARTOON); OTTO HERSCHAN COLLECTION/HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES (SEWER SYSTEM); SSPL VIA GETTY IMAGES (TOILET) they were built to drain rainwater they werebuilttodrainrainwater never designedforhumanwaste— creaky oldsewers.Butthesewerswere to emptytheircesspoolsintothecity’s it. Moreandmorepeoplewereforced collect andnotenoughfarmerstobuy world, with2millionpeople. the century, Londonwasthebiggestcityin more thandoubled.Bythemiddleof 1800 and1850,London’s population to workatfactoriesincities.Between Thousands wereleavingtheirfarms and allofEngland—waschanging. disturb people.) wouldn’tnight, whenthepowerfulodor it wascartedawayinthemiddleof (Poop wasknownasnightsoilbecause sell ittofarmersuseasfertilizer. man” wouldshoveloutthewasteand 4 feetwide.Whenfull,a“nightsoil cesspools wereusually6feetdeepand underground pitcalledacesspool.These with aholethatsatabovean box business onawooden bathroom. Peopledidtheir simple. Mosthomeshada with wastewasfairly London’s systemfordealing waste outofthecity. the ancientcityofRometotake of stonesewerslayunderneath from homes.Anintricateweb channels carriedwasteaway Asian cities,claypipesandbrick challenges. InancientSouth waste hasbeenoneofourgreatest Soon, there was too much night soil to Soon, therewastoomuchnightsoilto But inthe19th-century, London— Until theearly1800s, 1865, it was considered a technological marvel. It 1865, itwasconsideredatechnological marvel.It When London’s new sewer system opened in When London’snewsewersystem openedin was designed to prevent human waste was designedto prevent humanwaste from flowinginto theThamesRiver. A DazzlingWonder captures the public’s fear of cholera. It depicts the captures thepublic’sfearofcholera.Itdepicts Thames as the River Styx. In Greek mythology, Thames astheRiverStyx.InGreekmythology, the Styx divided the world of the living from the the Styxdividedworldoflivingfrom This cartoon drawn during the Great Stink This cartoondrawnduringtheGreatStink

A RiverofDeath These fancy toilets These fancytoilets world of the dead. world ofthedead. were wealthy and were wealthyand one showed you one showedyou were all the rage were alltherage London. Having London. Having in 19th-century in 19th-century modern. STORYWORKS.SCHOLASTIC.COM animal bones. broken dishes,moldyfood, everywhere therewasgarbage: A WhiffontheWind

smell of sweat. And smell ofsweat.And apartments thickwiththe Families crammedintotiny thousands ofhorseschokedthestreets. the air. Mountainsofdungfrom to filth.Sootfromfactoriesblackened the Thames grew thick, brown, and foul. the Thamesgrewthick,brown,andfoul. 1858, itbecameacrisis. Over time, the smell became a stench, Over time,thesmellbecameastench, Londoners back then were no strangers Londoners backthenwerenostrangers summer of And then,inthescorchingsummerof and thestenchbecameunbearable. Overloaded with human waste, Overloaded withhumanwaste, But toiletsusedalotofwater, so magic with the pull of a chain. magic withthepullofachain. now be washed away as if by now bewashedawayasifby the flushtoilet. Waste could becoming increasingly popular: becoming increasinglypopular: a dazzling new invention was a dazzlingnewinventionwas therefore totheriver. flooding. into theThames,toprevent directly to the sewers—and directly tothesewers—and connecting theirtoilets To makemattersworse, they caused the cesspools they causedthecesspools goopy mess, people began goopy mess,peoplebegan to overflow. a To avoid •MAY/JUNE 2020 the North Pole to the NorthPoleto That’s about the That’s aboutthe the SouthPole! roughly 13,000 roughly 13,000 miles of pipes. miles ofpipes. London’s new London’s new distance from distance from sewers had sewers had 11

Still, the Great Stink of 1858 was an odor microscopic germs that can cause dozens of more putrid than the city had ever experienced. diseases, including cholera. The poop-filled Grown men and women fainted in the streets. Thames was London’s main source of drinking People miles away threw up after catching a water. People had been gulping down poison. whiff on the wind. Government leaders, who worked in a building beside the Thames, fled Something Had to Be Done with tears streaming from their eyes. Even if government leaders didn’t understand Londoners weren’t just disgusted by the exactly why the Great Stink was dangerous, stink—they were terrified. At the time, it was they knew something had to be done—fast. widely believed that diseases spread by miasma: With handkerchiefs pressed to their noses, they dirty, smelly air. And the most feared disease of quickly passed a law ordering the construction of all? Cholera [KAH-ler-uh], a violent stomach a new sewer system. The new sewers would run sickness that could kill a person within 24 hours. underground alongside the river rather than into London had already suffered three major cholera it, carrying waste out past the city and away from epidemics. More than 30,000 people had died. where people lived. Londoners worried that the Great Stink would It took thousands of workers, 318 million unleash a new wave of death across the city. bricks, 670,000 cubic meters of concrete, and What few people in 1858 understood was what would be $6 billion in today’s money to that it wasn’t the smell of the river that was construct London’s new sewer system. The deadly; it was the water. Poop is crawling with system officially opened in 1865. Soon, the Thames was poop-free once again. Sewer Monsters This hunk of yuck is called a fatberg. Fatbergs are a A New Crisis problem in cities with older sewer systems. When cooking oil and grease are poured down the drain, they end up in London’s new sewer system inspired similar sewers, where they harden into fat. These sticky blobs trap building projects in cities around the world, all kinds of stuff: baby wipes, cotton balls, food scraps. This stuff should be recycled or placed in the trash, not including cities in the U.S., like New York. flushed. If a fatberg gets big enough, it clogs pipes and Many parts of those systems are still being used causes sewage to overflow. today, more than a century later. Over the years, however, these antique sewers have started to fall apart. Since the 1800s, the population of many cities has continued to multiply. Climate change has triggered heavier storms that overload pipes with rainwater. Under these pressures, the original sewers— once a modern wonder—have begun to leak, break, clog, and overflow. In some places, waste has been oozing into the Removing drinking water supply. fatbergs from clogged Many experts say we may sewers takes an enormous amount of be approaching a new sewage time and millions of crisis. And if we don’t take dollars. One fatberg that was removed in action, we could soon be London stretched three holding our noses through city blocks and weighed

more than 19 elephants. the Great Stink Part 2. n TUERIS/SHUTTERSTOCK.COM (BACKGROUND); MIRRORPIX/NEWSCOM (FATBERG) SHUTTERSTOCK.COM (ALL IMAGES)

12 STORYWORKS TUERIS/SHUTTERSTOCK.COM (BACKGROUND); MIRRORPIX/NEWSCOM (FATBERG)

SHUTTERSTOCK.COM (ALL IMAGES) explain how thissayingappliesto theGreatStinkandtoday’s sanitationproblems. invent waystosolvea problem whenthereisaverystrongneedfor it.Inashortessay, There isasayingthatgoes “necessityisthemotherofinvention.”It meansthatpeople T H challenges? toilets bethesolutiontotoday’ssanitation them. from thestrainoftoomanypeopleusing too. Someagingsewersarecrumbling countries don’t haveenough ofeither. build andwatertooperate.Manydeveloping But sewersystemsrequirealotofmoneyto sewers mightseemlikeasimplesolution. have highpoverty.Buildingmoretoiletsand developing countries,whichtendto more aresickened. related tounsafesanitation.Millions people dieeveryyearfromdiseases water sources.Manythousandsof environment. Itendsupinfoodand waste withoutharmingpeopleorthe world donothaveawaytogetridofhuman like therewasinLondon162yearsago. Before long, therewouldbeacrisis,just one? Wherewouldallthatwastego? What ifnohomesinyourtownhad what ifyourhomedidn’t haveatoilet? These toiletscouldhelpsolveoneoftheworld’smostseriousproblems: Could oneoftheseinnovativewaterless The U.S. facessanitationchallenges This problemmainlyaffects Today, 4.5billionpeoplearoundthe oilet we flush, we wash our hands. But we flush,washourhands.But don’t thinkmuchabouttoilets.We go, ere intheU.S., mostofusprobably how tosafelygetridofhumanwaste. MAKE ACONNECTION! INFORMATIONAL TEXT s F STORYWORKS.SCHOLASTIC.COM t

o he f COMPOSTING TOILET fertilizer thatissafetouseforgrowingfood. careful: Notallcompostingtoiletsproduce as fertilizeringardensandbackyards.Butbe over time.Eventually, what’sleftcanbeused grow—bacteria thatnaturallybreakdownwaste heat, alongwithoxygen, makescertainbacteria like, say, yoursmartphone. power thetoilet,aswellother, smalldevices whole processproducesenoughelectricityto poop—is burnedintoash.Thebestpart? that canbeusedasfertilizer. SELF-POWERING TOILET WORM TOILET dioxide, andsomeharmlesswormpoop fertilizer byusingheat.Here’showitworks: but not fordrinking.not Anysolidwaste—aka but end, allthat’sleftisamixofwater, carbon with worms.Beneaththetoilet,andout waste byburningit.Whenyouclosethelid, waste, harmfulgermsareremoved.Inthe of viewfromusers,livesaclustertiger inside thecontainerisveryhigh.Thishigh including poop.Asthewormsdigest waste— worms. Thesecritterseatorganic waste dropsintoapan.From there,liquid water thatcanbeusedforwateringplants waste—aka urine—isfilteredintoclean attached tothetoilet.Thetemperature Human wasteiskeptinacontainer The Tiger Toilet breaksdownwaste uture Other newtoiletsturnwasteinto The NanoMembranetoiletgetsridof by Mackenzie Carro •MAY/JUNE 2020 13