Subjects Public Health

Includes activities to maintain the healthfulness of the city, and the animals (such as pigs) and diseases (such as cholera, yellow fever, and typhoid fever) that were the objects of public health efforts.

Laboratory Alkalinity test, ca. 1943

Water History: Making It Safe to Drink

Water History: Rebirth of the Rivers

Thomas Meehan

Thomas Meehan, city councilman

Dobson FLP

You would not have wanted to drink it: Philadelphia’s water supply in 1884

Color image of a grassy field with trees and buildings surrounding it and white lines drawn on the grass mimicking the path of a creek.

Drawing Dock Creek

Image shows three bottles of water, one clear, one dark and one with sediment floating in it.

Bottled vs. Tap in 1906

MEET YOUR ENEMY: THE RAT

Board of Health Newspaper Clipping Scrapbooks at City Archives of Philadelphia, 1891-1908

Typhoid Fever and sewage tainted drinking water: An 1889 report from the Philadelphia Board of Health

Kensington Water Supply in 1883

Sewers, Pollution, and Public Health in 19th Century Philadelphia

Black-and-white image of a creek with people around it and a large building behind it

Dock Creek Sewer in 1849

CITIZENS’ BUSINESS: 1939-1946

State of the Schuylkill River in 1876: Sewage pollution and possible remedies

Drainage and Sewerage Report, 1853

Dealing with the city’s wastes in the mid-19th century

Oak Lane Reservoir pipeline, 1904

The Water and Drainage History of Philadelphia

Down Under!

Birkinbine Schuylkill Hydrographical Survey 1861-66

Two reports on the state of the Schuylkill River, 1867

Black-and-white image of an ornately lettered document with a decorative border

Images from ‘The Water Supply of the City of Philadelphia by a proposed Aqueduct from Norristown Dam’

Pen and ink drawing of the proposed Delaware Seventh Street Sewer

Plan and profile of proposed Delaware Seventh St. Sewer, 1850

1830 plan for the Pine Street Sewer

Plan of Pine Street Sewer, 1830

Diagram showing the Philadelphia Water Department's water treatment process

PWD Drinking Water Treatment diagram

Cartoon depicting William Penn toasting the Devil with a glass of filtered water

“Speeding the Parting Guest,” Feb. 25, 1909