Meli,
 
Actually, this sounds a lot like a septic leach system. The ones today are  
concrete tanks that receive the immediate effluent, but then bleed out into  
segmented clay pipes that are often salt glazed on the exterior. The theory was  
the tank drains out into the leach field via the joints of the pipes and 
soaks  into the ground. I used to inspect properties with those fields and it 
always  amused me that people grew roses, fruit trees and vegetable gardens over 
the  leach fields. Ironically, a 1890s house I visited last Summer has a modern 
 septic leach field that impacted a 1900 vintage privy full of bottles.
 
Ron May
Legacy 106, Inc.
 
 
In a message dated 6/4/2008 11:47:03 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time,  
[log in to unmask] writes:

I've got  a question that relates to the transition from wells to city 
water in the  late 19th or early 20th century.
I've got examples from two urban house  lots in Braddock, Pennsylvania.  
In both cases, there was first a  circular brick well. Excavation of the 
fill in each well revealed the same  treatement: a ceramic segmented 
drain pipe coming into the well through a  break in the side wall, and 
then extending down through the fill, beyond  the limits of our 
excavations (about 5-6 feet).
Putting your sewage  down a former well seems like a really bad idea - in 
terms of polluting  the drinking water. Is this what people were doing in 
the early 20th  century as they refitted their houses for city water???
Also, if the drain  pipe was put in after the well was filled, there 
would have been evidence  of a pipe trench, but none such was found.  but 
if the drain was put  in before the well was filled, how were the 
segments kept together,  running down the center of an open air shaft? I 
didn't find evidence of  any supporting frame either. does this mean the 
drain and fill were put in  simultaneously, filling the well as the pipe 
was laid (from the bottom  up)?
Any information on construction practices or sanitation rules of the  
period would be helpful.

Meli Diamanti
Archaeological &  Historical Consultants, Inc





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