On Jun 4, 2008, at 2:46 PM, Meli Diamanti wrote:

> 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).
Presumably the thinking was that it no longer mattered as all drinking  
water was from city water sources.
>
> 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???
That's a time "honored" tradition in urban situations. I have dug  
Medieval British wells that were used as cess pits, but that cut  
through old cess pits during construction. No wonder life expectancy  
was short. One back yard had an estimated 3300 pits from the 1200's to  
the 1800's, all intercut. One pit had an entire horse in it with a 6"  
layer of sterile clay sealing it so one can only imagine the pong from  
that.

Pam Cressey at Alexandria, VA had, if memory serves, a wonderful slide  
of a 19th century well exposed in the side of about a 20 foot cut. The  
well shaft went down to water and then a 5 foot thick black layer  
extended out about 50' from the well edges. The well had been  
converted to a cess pit after the water went bad. The contaminant disk  
had to extend to the adjoining city lots and probably to any later  
wells on that property.
>
> 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.
I would think in terms of a posthole digger or similar which would  
leave quite minimal evidence, if the construction is post-1874.

Lyle Browning, RPA
>
>
> Meli Diamanti
> Archaeological & Historical Consultants, Inc