Transcript

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Jake:
[0:04] Welcome to Hub History, where we go far beyond the Freedom Trail to share our favorite stories from the history of Boston, the hub of the universe.
This is episode 293. Water for Boston part two. Hi, I’m Jake.
In the last episode, we talked about Boston’s first water sources from rainfall and natural springs to a simple wooden aqueduct connecting Jamaica pond to downtown Boston.
This time, we’re picking up where episode 292 left off as Boston’s population grew in the early 19th century.
It quickly outgrew its exi it quickly outgrew its existing water supply which was dreadfully polluted.
Anyway, the town was left looking outside its boundaries for a water source that was pure and plentiful enough to supply the needs of a growing American city, and debating whether that source should be owned by a governmental entity or a private company.
This week. We’ll look at the celebration that came with the solution to that problem and the drawn out debates and hard work that led up to it, enabling Boston to supply its citizens with a truly public source of water.

Gratitude to Patreon supporters

 

[1:19] But before we talk about Boston’s first public water supply I just want to pause and thank the dedicated listeners who support us on Patreon.
Besides the time I invest in researching and writing stories about Boston history, the biggest expenses that go into creating hub history are podcast media, hosting, online security, web hosting and some incidental costs for things like transcription A I and audio processing services.
While I’ve been struggling to make that investment in time to write podcasts.
Lately, the listeners who have gone the extra mile and contributed $2.05 dollars or even $20 a month mean that I don’t have to struggle to cover the show’s expenses, to everyone who’s already supporting the show. Thank you.
If you’re not yet supporting the show and you’d like to start, it’s easy.
Just go to patreon.com/hubor or visit hubor.com and click on the Support us link and thanks again to all our new and returning sponsors.
Now it’s time for this week’s main topic.

The anticipation builds for the water festival in Boston

 

[2:28] When the sun rose on October 25th, 1848 there was an electric current of excitement in the air in Boston.
This was it decades of debate and two years of round the clock work would all pay off today because today was the water festival.
For the first time, the waters of lake cons situate would be introduced into Boston.
And it seemed like half the city’s population was gathered on the common to watch the spectacle. And the other half was throwing the parade route leading to it.
The Boston evening traveler reported at an early hour, the common and the principal streets were thronged with masses of people.
They came in from every quarter and they came too with clean faces, pleasant countenances and apparently light hearts, the marshaling of the military and engine companies, the enlivening airs from various bands of music and the life and animation which pervaded every part of the vast concourse altogether.
Presented to view a living panorama which is not often witnessed in this short life of ours, on Tremont Street near the point where the procession started, a magnificent archway was erected extending from the museum across the street decked with evergreens and surrounded with a pyramid of evergreens and flowers.

[3:50] There would be a parade music speeches and the whole day would be topped off by the water itself.
Just before sunset, the tap would be turned and water would rise from the new fountain on the frog pond for the first time, thousands gathered early in the day, staking out good viewing angles around the pond that had only recently been a marshy afterthought and would now become a focal point of the common.

[4:17] The party started early in the day in his book, City, Water City Life.
Carl Smith describes the parade.
Boston celebration began with an early morning 100 gun salute and an exuberant cacophony of church bells, school and business were canceled and an enormous throng of residents and people from out of town including 2000 factory girls from Lowell assembled to witness a parade with so many marchers that it took over two hours for the entire procession to pass any given point on the route.
The parade comprised public officials and dignitaries from near and far clergymen, Harvard students, firemen, representatives of several trades and members of benevolent organizations, fraternal orders, and temperance societies.
They move variously on foot on horseback and in carriages, escorted by bands and military companies, floats, carried everything from livestock to fully functional printing presses to a complete three masted ship, towed up the streets from the harbor.
Finally, as the sun began to sink the multitudes leaned in closer on the speaker’s lectern at the frog pond.

[5:30] The Handel and Haydn Society sang a hymn that had been specially composed for the day.
The Reverend Daniel Sharp gave a prayer about water. And then the first comments were from Nathan Hale, not the revolutionary war spy who regretted that he had but one life to give for his country.
But that Nathan Hale’s nephew, who was the publisher of the Boston Daily advertiser, and one member of the three man commission that had been in charge of selecting a water source for Boston at the water festival.
He focused on the great public benefit that the new constituent water would provide.

[6:05] Boston. In the periods of her early history was celebrated for the abundance of her springs of pure water.
But in the progress of a great community, nothing essential to its growth can be stationary or limited.
These springs are no longer sufficient for the nourishment of the vast population which commerce, industry and liberal institutions have planted on this peninsula.
The same principle which compels us to seek for food and for articles of luxury beyond the products of the neighboring country leads us to look abroad for a more ample supply of water.
We at the same time avail ourselves of one of the most obvious benefits of a compact society in making use of its combined resources to provide this necessary of life to every family, and to relieve them from the labor of drawing it from the recesses of the earth or of gathering it in cisterns as it falls from the clouds.

[7:02] Coming to the lectern. Next Mayor Josiah Quincy gave an address.
Now, I don’t mean Colonel Josiah Quincy. Abigail Adams uncle who the town of Quincy is named after.
Nor do I mean that Josiah Quincy’s son, Boston mayor Josiah Quincy, whom Quincy market is named after, but rather, Mayor Josiah Quincy’s son, Mayor Josiah Quincy junior, whose grandson would also one day be Boston Mayor Josiah Quincy.
That’s clear enough, right?
Mayor Quincy had been one of the earliest advocates for a truly public water supply for the city.
And he proudly described the work that had been done to bridge valleys and tunnel through mountains and the craftsmanship reflected in beautifully pointed masonry, buried where the human eye would never again see it.
He acknowledged the great cost of the project, but he told the citizens that both the cost and the benefit were shared by all Bostonians binding them together as one body.

[8:03] Pipes from the mains are inserted at the expense of the city into every house.
The water rent is placed at a price that renders it economical for everyone to take it all citizens, whether they take it or not will.
After the expiration of two years. From the completion of the work, be obliged to make up the deficiency of the rent and the general tax.

[8:25] All therefore are called upon by the natural desire of enjoying what they are obliged to pay for.
From economy and from public spirit to take the water and receive a blessing which after enjoying it for one year, neither they nor their families would abandon for 10 times its cost.
If it is generally used, the tax will be a burden on no one. At present.
The city lands will rapidly extinguish the principle and our posterity will enjoy free water on a free soil as the sun began to sink slowly below the horizon.
Mayor Quincy had to cut his planned remarks short to allow time for the water itself to take center stage, wrapping up his remarks by saying fellow citizens, our great work is accomplished.
Our bread shall be given us. Our water is made sure the next day’s Boston evening traveler describes the scene that follow the mayor arose and said fellow citizens.
It is proposed to admit the waters of lake cons situate into the city.
All those in favor will say, ah, the response was in a voice of thunder.
The signal was then given an upward gush, the pure water to the height of at least 70 ft.

[9:43] The cheering of the people at this moment was perfectly overwhelming.
The schoolchildren who were assembled in great numbers on the north side of the pond, raised their voices and to the music of the falling water sang an ode all this time.
The procession was marching upon the comet and the music of the distant bands, the tramp of men, the chants of the Children and the interested and almost hushed look of the vast audience as they look with interest upon the falling waters formed a scene of unparalleled sublimity.

[10:15] This scene of unparalleled sublimity marked the culmination of decades of debate among Bostonians.
In our last episode, we heard how Boston’s early springs and wells ran dry by the early 19th century.
But private companies were able to deliver water to the richest Bostonians.
By the 18 twenties, the private water companies and their investors were locked in debate with advocates for a public water supply who wanted to provide free water on free soil as one of the benefits of the Social Compact.
In his book, Eden on the Charles, the making of Boston historian Michael Rawson describes how the idea of a publicly funded water supply for the city started gaining traction.

[10:59] Reformers claim that access to sufficient clean water was a right rather than a privilege.
This was the argument most welcomed by the working classes and it was the most controversial.
It was probably the most heartfelt as well for the city’s doctors were among the few upper class Bostonians who routinely visited the city’s slums and saw firsthand the consequences of an inadequate water supply.
Reformers often based this argument on a deceptively simple analogy between water and other parts of nature to which humans seem to have a clear, right, particularly air and sunshine, avarice cannot withhold, it cannot stay it in its mission to all mankind to bless all conditions of men.
Wrote Boston author John Stowell Adams.
It comes down from above like sunlight and like that is free to all water’s essential qualities made the comparison seem reasonable.
Rain, air and sunshine seemed to come unbidden from the sky to form a trinity of resources without which humans and many other forms of life could not survive.

Boston’s Desperate Need for Water

 

[12:08] They also renewed themselves with unfailing constancy and without human assistance, one could always trust breezes to freshen the air, sunlight to reappear each morning and rainfall to refill depleted ponds and lakes.
As we discussed in the last episode. By the time, the debate between public and private water supplies reached its peak.
Boston springs and wells were long polluted by human waste.
And the water they gave had long been too mineral laden to be useful for washing or cooking along with washing, cooking and drinking.
There was another important reason why Boston was desperate for water in his ambitious history of Boston recent podcast guest, Daniel Dane notes, water was also needed to fight fires.
There were 16 major fires in the city in the 18th century and a fire in 1825 consumed 53 homes.
When firefighters lacked a sufficient water supply.
That fire would have been fresh in the mind of the first mayor to urge a public water supply for Boston before Josiah Quincy took up the mantle of public water.
Harrison Gray Otis was one of the first and loudest voices calling for publicly provided water.

[13:23] A 1916 financial history of Boston prepared by Charles Hughes for the Harvard Economics Department describes the early arguments for public water, in the inaugural of Mayor Otis in 1829 and again, in the address of Theodore Lyman Junior in 1835 the introduction of city water was strongly urged, Mayor Lyman succeeded in obtaining the appointment of a committee under whose direction Colonel Loammi Baldwin made the survey.
As a side note, Loammi Baldwin was a trusted voice. Because he also surveyed the Middlesex Canal in the 17 nineties.
As we learned back in episode 225 his report favored the use of Long Pond in Natick, the present constituent lake estimating the cost of obtaining the supply at $750,000.

[14:16] This survey marks the beginning of a discussion of the subject which continued with but little interruption for 12 years.
In 1837 a commission was appointed to make further investigations.
Two commissioners, Daniel Treadwell and Nathan Hale urging the adoption of Spot and Mystic Ponds.
While the third member of this body, James F Baldwin strongly favored the use of Long Pond.
Historian, Carl Smith’s book on water and urban infrastructure.
City, water city life describes the debate between two sources of water.
Long Pond, which would eventually become lake constituent and Spot Pond.

Debate on Boston’s Central Water Supply Options

 

[14:58] Although there was now a consensus that Boston had to do something about water.
There was still no agreement as yet on the best source for a central water supply or on how it should be funded and managed among several options under discussion, there were two leading contenders.
The first was to construct a publicly owned system that would bring water from Long Pond located about 19 miles west of the city in Framingham and Natick.
The other was to entrust Boston’s needs to a private company whose main source would be Spot pa about 10 miles north in Stoneham.
Both sources were at a higher elevation than Boston. So no pumping would be necessary though each would require the construction of an aqueduct to carry its water to the city.

[15:45] In part because of the personal beliefs of Treadwell and Hale, that water should be a public right?
And the fact that James Baldwin was an investor in the private company that owned the water rights to Spot Pond, the two water sources became a proxy for the argument between water provided by a private corporation or by a public utility.

[16:05] After years of debate in the legislature and in the editorial pages of Boston’s newspapers and probably in the taverns and parlors of Boston, a series of studies were published by the Water Works Commissioners.
In 1825 1834 1836 and 1837 these studies were followed by public referenda in 1836 and 1838.
And in both cases, voters defeated the idea of a public water supply support for the idea was growing.
However, and in 1845 voters faced a new referendum on a public water supply based on Long Pond in Framingham.
While the legislature debated a water act that would empower the city to take on this project if the voters approved it.

Mayor Davis Orders Water Samples for Public Viewing

 

[16:53] Carl Smith writes as the referendum approached, Mayor Thomas Aspinwall Davis ordered that samples be taken from Spot Pond, Jamaica Pond and the Charles River, which had long been a favorite alternative of some Bostonians.
In spite of the low quality of its water as well as long Pa, Davis had these placed where citizens could view them so that the people might know the truth as to the comparative merits of the water and to rebut the influence that it has been attempted to create prejudicial to the water of Long Pond.
The popular source, Winston is proposed to obtain a supply.

[17:33] At this time, water that looked clear and was free of objectionable odor was usually assumed to be fine for domestic use, especially if its mineral content did not make it hard.
There were some who were concerned about the tiny organisms often called animalcules that are visible in virtually all water when examined under a microscope.
But physicians were generally able to allay fears that these were abnormal or harmful the water from long and spot ponds passed inspection and both were deemed superior to the Charles.
But when a delegation visited Spot Pond on September 30th, 1845 the pond’s low water level cast enough doubt on its adequacy as a supply to effectively doom its chances, after decades of hard water with too many dissolved minerals to be able to boil vegetables or dissolve.
So it was also so polluted with human waste that it made people sick.
The clean water of Long and Spot ponds was incredibly attractive to Bostonians.
The final decision for Long Pond was reinforced by a Professor Silliman as quoted in the Boston evening transcript.
The lake constituent waters are entirely in odorous, perfectly soft and pleasant to the taste.
And when tested by soap, it is hardly rendered in any degree turbine, not more so than is usual with the purest rainwater.

Clearing the Way for Boston’s Water Act and Referendum

 

[18:58] Finally, the Water Act and the referendum both passed clearing the way for Boston to bring the waters of Long Pond to the thirsty city.
A report prepared by the water commissioners in 1844 proposed a route for the new aqueduct.
It started at Long Pond followed the course of a brook across Natick and then picked up the route of the Boston and Worcester railway in Needham.
It wound its way through downtown Newton and was planned to end a new reservoir on Corey’s Hill in Brighton.
The report states a line has been surveyed between the termini above described on which it is ascertained that there is no formidable obstacle to the construction of the work.
There will be several places of deep cutting, none however, exceeding 36 ft in depth and several large embankments will be required for sustaining the level.
The heavy excavations will mostly be through earth consisting apparently in great part of sand or gravel of easy excavation.
And there are no indications of rock to any great extent on the lie.

Design Changes and Obstacle Overcoming

 

[20:04] The initial route measured out to 16 miles. But some design changes would allow two miles to be trimmed from the plan.
May. Quincy’s comments at the 1848 opening ceremony describe how hard work in modern technology allowed the aqueduct to go through obstacles that it had been originally laid out to avoid, by tunneling through two hills in Newton and Brookline.
The length of the aqueduct was reduced.
A high and costly embankment over lands of great value in Brighton was dispensed with and the necessity of conveying the water and pipes across the Brighton Valley was avoided.
The route of the aqueduct crosses the summit of land which intervenes between the Concord and Charles rivers and also that between the Charles River at Newton Lower Falls and the tide waters at Brooklawn.
In cutting through these summits, it was found necessary to perforate ledges of porphyritic rocks of the hardest description.

[21:01] Instead of eventually turning left around heartbreak hill to the originally planned terminal reservoir at Cory’s Hill.
The final route turned right starting the west side of what’s now Chestnut Hill reservoir before heading southeast along reservoir road to the smaller and older Brookline reservoir just off route nine where its end gatehouse is located, in City Water City life.
Carl Smith describes the last leg of the journey.

[21:29] The 14 mile aqueduct ran from long pond to a holding reservoir just south of Boylston Street in Brookline.
From there, the water flowed to a pair of distributing reservoirs.
One behind the statehouse on Beacon Hill and the other on Telegraph Hill in South Boston.
The aqueduct that would carry long pond water to Boston had to be built on a slightly different scale than the hollowed out logs of the Jamaica Pond aqueduct.
Instead of pine logs, these new pipes were built out of brick laden marine cement in cross section.
They were egg shaped with the wide end at the bottom inside.
The pipe was 5 ft wide and 6 ft four inches tall.
The water level started at 3 ft off the bottom of the pipe at the Long Pond Inn.
According to the 1844 report, the commissioners recommend this form of the structure as well adapted to give it strength, and these dimensions is sufficient to afford sufficient capacity and also to admit of its being easily entered for the purpose of examination and repair should it become necessary?
They proposed that the brickwork shall be eight inches in thickness and that the whole structure should be covered with an embankment of earth, 4 ft in depth in every part this embankment would protect the water within from freezing in a New England winter.

Construction Details and Winter Protection

 

[22:52] Led by Josiah Quincy. The city broke ground in Natick on August 20th, 1846 and Long Pond was officially renamed Constituent on the same day, in Eden on the Charles Michael Rawson describes the army of laborers who descended on the hills of Newton, Needham and Nick to do the precise and sometimes backbreaking work required to carry Boston’s water.
The city hired a number of contractors and 3500 men. Most of them Irish immigrants to complete the job.
Carpenters, blacksmiths, bricklayers, stonemasons and countless laborers moved soil and rock to construct a brick egg shaped aqueduct.
5 ft in width, over 6 ft in height and 15 miles long, miners worked around the clock in eight hour shifts to carve two tunnels from solid rock so that the bed of the aqueduct can maintain its gentle fall of three and one half inches per mile.
From the moment of its commencement, the mayor would later boast the work has been unin intermitted by day and by night from noon to midnight and from midnight to noon, the labors of the hammer and the spade have been incessant.

The Aqueduct’s Appearance and Crossing the Charles River

 

[24:05] A fall of 3.5 inches per mile is basically imperceptible on the ground.
Today. The aqueduct looks like an abandoned railroad grade being roughly the same width and running just as level mile after mile.
Only when the long pond water had to cross the water of the Charles River.
Did the form of the aqueduct differentiate itself from a railroad with the 1844 report by the water commissioner suggesting, it is proposed to suspend the brick aqueduct at the crossing and to convey the water across instead by means of a double line of iron pipes, each of 30 inches in diameter to be laid near the natural surface of the earth and to be covered with earth to a depth of 4 ft.
The result is a stone arch bridge over the Charles that looks similar to a railroad bridge from the same era, but the span across the top of the arches is thicker than the span of a railroad bridge.
And instead of railroad ties and tracks, it’s topped by the grass and trees that now grow out of the earth that once insulated the aqueduct construction of route 128 is mostly hidden this stone bridge from view.
You can glimpse it through the trees as you merge onto 128 from Washington Street and Newton or from a trail that starts behind a Wellesley office park.

[25:24] In city. Water city life. Smith includes the Charles River bridge and the catalog of technical challenges that the project had to overcome the unevenness of the terrain.
The aqueduct crossed required the construction of two bridges over which water was carried in inverted siphons and two tunnels to make possible.
The building of the ladder laborers had to sink seven vertical shafts along its route.
Seven steam engines ran constantly in order to pump water from the excavation which was bedeviled by patches of quicksand before Long Pond water was let into the aqueduct.
An inspection of the tunnel portion revealed cracks that had to be repaired.

Legal Work and Challenges Faced During Construction

 

[26:08] These technical challenges weren’t the only hurdles that had to be overcome with Smith continuing.
The city broke ground at Long Pond on August 20th, 1846 there was some complex legal work to be done before construction could begin.
Boston compensated owner wh Knight for exclusive rights to the water of Long Pond and nearby Doug Pot, for two water power privileges on a nearby stream and Ford Knight’s manufacturing establishment including mills, machinery, fixtures and worker housing.
The commissioners agreed to rent night the site for three years and to install a steam engine large enough to power his factory.

[26:51] The city also purchased another pond in nearby Hopkinton for $25,000 to use as a compensating reservoir.
And in 1847 alone, the water commissioners reached terms with the owners of more than 60 different properties near Long Pond and in the path of the aqueduct.
During the following year, they settled with the Selectmen of Brookline for encroaching upon local roads and they consented to erect an aqueduct for Newton.
After residents there claimed that the construction of the underground portion of Boston’s aqueduct had dried up their wells while these legal challenges and setbacks were ongoing.
Mayor Quincy spoke at a November 1847 groundbreaking for the Beacon Hill Distributing Reservoir that marked the halfway point of the project.
In his comments, he reminded the public about the expected benefit that the constituent water would bring.

[27:44] After just over a year of round the clock labor, the first public water supply for Boston was almost within reach and Quincy announced that it will aid the poor woman toiling for her Children at the wash tub.
It will minister to the proudest beauty in the luxury of her chamber.
It will cool the fevered brow of disease and will be a cordial to the parched lips of the intemperate.
It will promote moral as well as physical well being for cleanliness.
According to Whitfield stands next unto godliness.
Its treasures will preserve our habitations from fire will impel the giant strength of the steam engine.
We’ll accompany our navigators to the remotest climbs will dedicate the infinite.
The altar will give beauty to the cheek of youth, strength, to the arm of manhood.
Comfort to the decline of age.
Nor will the blessing be confined to man. Nothing that enjoys animal or vegetable life will exist on this peninsula for centuries without sharing its benefit.
The gift of water to cool earth’s fever and to cleanse its stains.
As a blessing is second only to the revelation of that living water, of which if a man drink, he shall never thirst.

Progress on the Aqueduct Project

 

[29:04] In conjunction with the Beacon Hill groundbreaking and the halfway point of the project.
A November 1st 1847 article in the Boston Advertiser reported on the progress of the project to that point, a portion of the party being furnished with lamps, walked through a finished section of the aqueduct, three quarters of a mile in length.
There are now finished nearly 6.5 miles in length of the brick aqueduct of which finished parts about a mile on that part of the aqueduct north of the Boston and Worcester railroad.
Three miles are in Needham, one and a quarter miles in Newton and more than a mile in Brighton and Brookline.
It was stated that the two tunnels through the rock ledges in Newton and Brookline 1 2300 and the other 150 ft in length are more than half finished.

[29:54] In another news report. A few months later, two inspectors in a skiff floated over two miles through the completed sections of the aqueduct before clambering back out through an access tunnel.
Finally, just a week before the grand water celebration was planned on Boston Common.
The aqueduct was ready to carry the pure constituent waters all the way into the city.
On October 17th, 1878 the New York Herald reported we announced yesterday the introduction of the water of cons situate lake into the aqueduct on the preceding day and stated that it would reach the reservoir in Brookline.
At about 10 o’clock in the evening, we learned that the current arrived at the gatehouse at the entrance of the Brookline reservoir at quarter past nine.
In the evening, the first current consequently flowed through the aqueduct a distance of nearly 15 miles in about 10.5 hours.

[30:49] Now that the water could flow freely from Natick all the way to the Brookline reservoir.
It was almost time to make the connections to people’s homes in Boston at the water festival on October 25th, Mayor Quincy would point out the water mains that the city brought to each Bostonian’s doorstep to make that happen.

Water mains to be laid for distribution in Boston

 

[31:09] The report by the water commissioners in 1844 proposed, it is computed that for the distribution of the proposed quantity of seven millions of gallons per day, it will be necessary to lay two iron pipes of 30 inches diameter each from Cory’s Hill to a part of Tremont Street near the Roxbury boundary.
That a branch from one of them of perhaps 12 inches in diameter shall be carried from this point in the most direct and eligible course to Dorchester Heights for the supply of South Boston, that one of them shall be continued through Tremont Street to Boylston Street.
That branches shall be carried thence to the reservoirs on Beacon Hill, Fort Hill and Copps Hill.
And that such other branches shall be laid for the conveyance of water to all parts of the city shall be found on a careful study of the best system of distribution to be necessary.
It is proposed that the water should be delivered at the reservoir on Beacon Hill at the height of 100 11.61 ft above the marsh level, 4.68 ft above the level of the statehouse floor.

[32:13] The Beacon Hill reservoir while high enough to distribute water throughout the original Shame Peninsula and the filled land spreading out from it was still a good 12 ft lower than Long Pond.
Now, of course renamed Lake Kitu.
That means that a drop of water would be carried from the inlet and Nick to the Tapa, a north end tenement house, a distance of about 15 miles without any pumping.

[32:39] Over the course of less than 11 hours gravity alone was enough to carry the pure clear water to Boston taxpayers.
Well, at least it would become clear in time for the water festival.
Those first drops of water that arrived in Boston the previous week may have been somewhat less pure and less clear as also reported in the New York Herald on October 17th, 1848, on Saturday, about two o’clock in the afternoon, the first water from Lake K situate reached Boston through the aqueduct.
The pipe on the common near the pond was open for the passage of water, but the first issue was that of a current of air nearly strong enough to knock a man down, the water soon made its appearance rising in a jet several feet high by its color.
Some of the Spectators mistook it or pretended to mistake it for cognac or old pork.
It was of a deep red hue probably from the rust of the iron pipes.
It is now running through the main pipe through the northern part of the city into the harbor. At the lower end of Hanover Street.
A few days will suffice to clear the pipes and render the water fit for use.

[33:54] In their comments at the water festival, Nathan Hale and Josiah Quincy both stressed the enormous public benefit of the new waterworks.
And their comments about the cost of the project emphasized that it was a worthwhile investment in the future.
There was good reason not to delve too deeply into the details.
In their 1844 report, the water commissioners gave this estimate of the budget for the project.
This is the general outline of the plan of a work which the commissioners recommend as in their opinion best adapted for bringing the water of the pond into the city and on which they have made an estimate of the cost.
This estimate including an allowance for contingencies, amounts to $2,118,535.83.

Construction of the Reservoir and Aqueduct System

 

[34:42] The final cost of the constituent reservoir and aqueduct system was just over twice.
That initial estimate that 1916 financial history of Boston that was prepared for the Harvard Economics Department explains the construction account was closed.
April 30th 1851 with a total cost of $5,397,490.
This sum was twice the figure given in the original estimates though it should be said that the system when completed was on a larger scale than was originally contemplated.
The reservoirs at Brookline on Beacon Hill and at South Boston had been quadrupled in capacity and the dimensions of the iron pipes used had been increased.
Beyond the original figures, moreover, the system had been extended to East Boston at a cost of $313,000.

[35:36] The fact remains. However, after admitting the advantages to the city of a more adequate plant that the financial burden imposed upon Boston by the introduction of water was almost twice that expected at the start, cost overruns aside, the project was a smashing success as described by Carl Smith in city water city life.
Boston’s works encountered numerous financial difficulties but Bostonians took to their new water supply quickly.
In its first calendar year of operation, the system delivered an average of more than 10 million gallons a day via 80 plus miles of pipes to over 900 hydrants and more than 12,000 customers.
In their last report issued early in 1850 the original water commissioners expressed their great pleasure and the abundance of the supply and the manifest improvement in the transparency and purity of the water since its introduction.

Transfer of Responsibility and Future Water Needs

 

[36:35] Two years after the water festival, celebrating the opening of the cons situate aqueduct, the water commissioners were ready to declare victory and go home.
As noted in the 1916 financial history of Boston.
On the fourth of January 1850 the commissioners having completed the task of bringing water to Boston and South Boston turned the care of the department over the constituent water bore.
This new body consisted, this new body consisted of an alderman, a member of the common council and five citizens at large elected annually by concurrent vote of the city council.
One of the original members of the commission, Nathan Hale had made a bold prediction for the future the new aqueduct he said was big enough to provide for Boston’s water needs indefinitely.
We have not been unmindful of the progressive character of this community and of the rapid increase of its population and its wants.
The number of our citizens has been twice doubled within the space of 40 years and it may be again doubled in the 20 years to come.
We have looked therefore not merely to the present demands of the city for water but to its prospective wants.

[37:50] Despite Hale’s confidence, Boston would be on the hunt for more water sources before too long, between rapid immigration, land making and the annexation of surrounding towns, Boston would outgrow the constituent by 1870.

[38:08] Through the annexation of Charlestown, we inherited the Mystic Lakes water system, but the search was already on for a new water source.
Another pond was located in Framingham just a few miles from Lake ca situate and water from the Sudbury River watershed was diverted through it and into a new aqueduct that nearly paralleled the Kitu aqueduct across Wellesley and Newton.
They run so close together that a motivated walker or runner can make a loop of anywhere from 5 to 15 miles by going out one aqueduct right away, crossing to the other, one of the Newtonville trader Joe’s and eventually finding your way back to the starting point.
I’ll include a few suggested roots in the show notes this week.

The Sudbury Aqueduct: A Historical Water Source

 

[38:51] The Sudbury aqueduct ended at the New Chestnut Hill reservoir on the Town line between Newton Brookline and Boston.
A massive new pumping station delivered water against the forces of gravity starting in the late 18 eighties.
Now standing as the waterworks museum, you can learn a bit more about the Chestnut Hill waterworks and the mind behind its giant steam engines.
In episode, 137 Boston kept growing and the city would again be on the search for new water sources.
Before the end of the 19th century, work on the Wachusett reservoir started in 1897 and the modern Quabbin was completed in 1939.
And we’ll hear about those in a future episode with the newer larger water system in place.
The original aqueducts were no longer useful. By the mid 20th century.
In 1951 the cons situate system was taken offline and in the decades since parts of it have been cut off or filled in severing the constituent from Boston.
In 1978 the Sudbury Aqueduct was mothball.
It was no longer in daily use as part of Boston’s water supply, but it was kept in good working order so it could serve as a backup system in case of emergency.

[40:12] In 2010, that emergency finally came on May 1st, a 10 ft diameter water main that carries water from the Quabbin to Boston ruptured right where it crosses over the Charles River near Recreation Road in Weston.
A press release from the MWR A stated this 120 inch diameter pipe transports water to our communities east of Weston.
As far north as Wilmington and south of Stoughton, water is leaking into the Charles at a rate of over 8 million gallons an hour.
Crews are on site and engineers are assessing the situation to determine next steps within hours.
The emergency system was up and running with an update announcing MWR A is activating its emergency water supplies such as the Sudbury Aqueduct, Chestnut Hill Reservoir and Spot Pond reservoir.
This water will not be suitable for drinking but can be used for bathing, flushing and fire protection.
A boil order was issued for Boston and for all MWR A communities east of Weston.
But a later study revealed that even our untreated, untested backup water supply had been safe for drinking all along because Boston has had the best Dagon water supply in the country since 1848.

[41:32] To learn more about the Kitu aqueduct.
Check out this week’s show notes at hubor.com/two 93.
I’ll have links to some suggested walks along the Sudbury and Constituent Rights of Way in Newton and Wellesley, as well as links to news stories about the 2010 water main break.
There will be links to our past episodes about the Chestnut Hill waterworks, the Middlesex Canal and the first part of the series about Boston’s earliest water supply.
I’ll have links to purchase Eden on the Charles and City water city life as well as links to read.
The 1844 water commissioners report the program of the 1848 water festival and the 1916 financial history of Boston online.
Along with all the news reports that I quoted from.
You’ll also find pictures of the Giant Water Festival and a map of the route of the aqueduct in the show notes.

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[42:29] If you’d like to get in touch with us, you can email podcast at hubor.com.
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The easiest way to reach me is to go to hubor.com and click on the contact us link while you’re on the site, hit the subscribe link and be sure that you never miss an episode.
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Music

Jake:
[43:18] That’s all for now. Stay safe out there listeners.