Monastery at Large

“A Suggestion About Water” by W.W. Goodrich (1890)

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The Background

July 1890 wasn’t a good time for Atlanta’s water supply. At the start of the month, a lack of rainfall caused the city’s reservoir to drop nearly 6 inches in 3 days. “This looks a little scary,” remarked The Atlanta Journal.1 By mid-month, the water was 27 inches below capacity.2

Days later, the city’s artesian well failed, with the waterworks superintendent, W. G. Richards,3 quietly fashioning a makeshift connection between the well and the main hydrant. The Constitution later explained: “those who drank the water at the hydrants, soon detected the difference, and the failure of the well became public.”4

Then on July 10, 1890, disaster struck: a nearby refinery burned to the ground,5 releasing over 200,000 gallons of refined oil — cottonseed oil, that is — into the reservoir.6 7 8 A 2 to 3-inch layer of cottonseed oil floated on the surface of the water, killing hundreds of fish,9 multiple birds,10 11 and possibly several cows.12 13

The president of Atlanta’s board of health, Dr. James Baird, along with the state chemist, declared the municipal water was safe to drink as workers began pumping oil from the lake.14 15 An investigation later determined the oil never entered through the city’s supply filters, which were located 15 feet below the water’s surface.16

Although public officials were as deceitful then as they are now, Dr. Baird was correct: Refined cottonseed oil is safe for human consumption, even if it isn’t especially healthy. Today, it’s commonly used in processed foods.

However, that didn’t stop W.W. Goodrich — ever the attention-seeker — from claiming to have become severely ill after drinking a glass of tainted tap water at his office. He certainly felt well enough to run to the Journal, whose coverage of the waterworks incident was predictably more sensationalist than the rival Constitution.

The Journal described Goodrich’s purported illness in robust detail:

“In about half an hour, he had a violent attack of vomiting which lasted until he was almost completely exhausted. He then took the electric car for his home, when he began to vomit again.”17

The Journal writer asked Dr. Baird about Goodrich’s illness and reported flatly: “The doctor thinks that the water could not have caused the sickness.”

Atlanta was still a small city at that point, and if the doctor knew anything about Goodrich, he must have known the man was a gigantic bullshitter. Only a few weeks earlier, Goodrich claimed his entire family was poisoned by eating canned tomatoes and corn18 — two poisoning stories within a month is a little suspicious, don’t ya think?

A few days after his so-called sickness, Goodrich wrote the following “suggestion” to the Journal about how to filter water with slabs of marble. Because, of course, he was also a hydrology expert.

A Suggestion About Water.

To the Editor of The Journal:

Apropros of the waterworks question there is a remedy for aiding the filtration of water, in the use of thin slabs of marble hung on wire at the surface of the water level. The test of the effectual usefulness of this cure remedy has been proven to be a positive destroyer for all dust organisms that are in water. They are attracted to the marble, live in its pores. The gradual detrition of the marble by the action of the water causes the acid of the marble, which is carbonic, to kill all dust germs of dust germ life.

Thus the gradual formation of that greenish fungoid growth which we see on marble, in water, or in damp places, is this same fungus. Settling basins of marble, and filters of marble slabs, perforated, with small holes between the regulation layers of filtration material, are of a more specific precipitate for foreign matter than alum. Whereas alum, while it is a specific in a certain sense, still it will permeate and be taken up in the water, and of course used by the public. There are stringent laws against the use of alum by bakers in the making of bread in many cities, on account of its action in the stomach. Alum is known to be a nerve destroyer, and if its use is persisted in the system soon becomes a subject of severe nervous prostration.

W.W. GOODRICH.19

References

  1. “The Water Falling.” The Atlanta Journal, July 2, 1890, p. 3. ↩︎
  2. “The City Water Is All Right.” The Atlanta Constitution, July 15, 1890, p. 7. ↩︎
  3. “At The Waterworks.” The Atlanta Journal, July 9, 1890, p. 2. ↩︎
  4. “The Water Failed”. The Atlanta Constitution, July 5, 1890, p. 5. ↩︎
  5. “A Fierce Fire.” The Atlanta Journal, July 10, 1890, p. 5. ↩︎
  6. ibid. ↩︎
  7. “$100,000 Fire”. The Atlanta Constitution, July 11, 1890, p. 4. ↩︎
  8. “Danger In Water”. The Atlanta Journal, July 11, 1890, p. 2. ↩︎
  9. “The Fish Are Dying.” The Atlanta Journal, July 12, 1890, p. 9. ↩︎
  10. “The Oil on the Water”. The Atlanta Constitution, July 13, 1890, p. 17. ↩︎
  11. “Removing The Oil”. The Atlanta Journal, July 14, 1890, p. 2. ↩︎
  12. ibid. ↩︎
  13. “About The Water.” The Atlanta Constitution, July 17, 1890, p. 6. ↩︎
  14. “The Oil on the Water”. The Atlanta Constitution, July 13, 1890, p. 17. ↩︎
  15. “Barrels Of Oil”. The Atlanta Journal, July 15, 1890, p. 2. ↩︎
  16. “The City Water Is All Right.” The Atlanta Constitution, July 15, 1890, p. 7. ↩︎
  17. “Made Sick By The Water.” The Atlanta Journal, July 15, 1890, p. 3. ↩︎
  18. “In Two Great States.” Weekly Columbus Enquirer-Sun (Columbus, Georgia), June 14, 1890, p. 3. ↩︎
  19. Goodrich, W.W. “A Suggestion About Water.” The Atlanta Journal, July 24, 1890, p. 1. ↩︎

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