Citation Needed - The Great Stink

Episode Date: April 11, 2018

The Great Stink was an event in central London in July and August 1858 during which the hot weather exacerbated the smell of untreated human waste and industrial effluent that was present on the banks of the River Thames. The problem had been mounting for some years, with an ageing and inadequate sewer system that emptied directly into the Thames. The miasma from the effluent was thought to transmit contagious diseases, and three outbreaks of cholera prior to the Great Stink were blamed on the ongoing problems with the river.   Our theme song was written and performed by Anna Bosnick. If you’d like to support the show on a per episode basis, you can find our Patreon page here.  Be sure to check our website for more details.

I'm just saying, if you want to show how super advanced your society is, keeping the monarchy by fight to the death part is a weird choice. That's true, solid point. Okay, but the lady with the wig? So good, yeah, right? With the car? Yeah, that's good. Guys, guys, don't go in there.

Oh, no, it's taking easy. What's going on? Okay, you know how Eli always opens our show with wacky shenanigans in the studio related to the topic of the week? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We were just in the middle of the intro pop culture thing we do before the door opens. Okay. Side note, I do the shenanigans sometimes too. It's right. Right. But it really originates with Eli most of the time. Guys, not the point this week show is about the great stink It's about a literal river of shit. Oh Jesus. So my studio. I can't Cecil just let it go bro

Yeah, I'm out of here. I'm taking off. Yeah me too. Now I'm gonna leave now. It's better I go You guys gonna open the door Guys Guys Well now I'm covered in shit for no reason Hello and welcome to Citation Needed! The podcast where we choose a subject, read a single article about it on Wikipedia and pretend word experts. Because this is the internet, and that's how it works now.

I'm Eli, and I'll be piloting this spaceship where no inclusionary pronoun has ever gone before, but I can't fly this ship alone. First up, someone who drinks enough scotch to be nicknamed Scotty, and our resident cling on Heath and Tom. And now we know how Eli got his rapper name, young gizmo. Oh, that's crazy.

That's crazy Eli. I've far too much money to be brown in any universe. It's not. Oh, it's not possible. And also joining us tonight, someone who would Vulcan explain to Spock and our number two, Noah and Cecil. OK, to be fair, Eli, even when you know what you're doing,

you managed to look like you don't. I always feel like I have to explain. How do I wake, et cetera? You always say that because of the beard. The beard filled with poop. I get it. I get it. Number two.

Now, before we begin today's show, I'd like to take a moment to thank our patrons. Hey, patrons, without you, there would be no five-year mission to explore strange new Wikipedia entries to seek out new topics that the dollop has already covered. We're the delidium crystals in our warp drive. If you're not a patron and would like to be, stick around till the end of the show and we'll tell you how. Or, if you're about to be assimilated into the Borg, give it a second, because that would

be like a ton of new pledges and Really use the money just to suggest it to the group at the meeting whatever they do and With that out of the way tell us Noah what person place thing concept phenomenon or event Will we be talking about today? Well thanks to patron Donovan We're gonna be talking about the creation of the modern London sewer system and the great stink so congratulations donovan this is what you brought into the world this is what you should be remembered for

the river is shit episode and ccil you tackled this public works project. Are you ready to flood us with your knowledge of poop? I am ready to get to the heart of the fecal matter. Nice. So Cecil, tell us what was the great stink. All right, so sat in the stage here, the city of London had a problem. They had a whole bunch of people, but a terrible system of getting rid of the human waste. Yeah, weird use of the of people, but a terrible system of getting rid of the human waste.

Weird use of the past tense, but okay. The population of London in the first half of the 19th century went from one million to three million. They also had a cobbled together series of sewers, but no real sewer system. The city also had 200,000 cesspit that were collecting human waste. A cesspit is like a septic tank without any mechanism to process the waste. It's like a holding tank for poop. Yeah, it's a shithole country.

That's why you don't make new countries with British immigrants. That's a terrible idea. Yeah, everybody knows you just find an existing country and call it part of Britain. Works out great for everybody every time. I'm confused. I thought those pits were just British restaurants. Each one's rated. So the poop pits would sometimes explode because memo digestion results in parts you can light. So London years also at this point in history started getting water

from iron pipes and not the wood pipes that they had used for centuries. And they started installing flushes too. Also there was no environment agency back then, so companies just ran all the wastewater from their operations right into the sewer as well. Yeah, nowadays they have to do that with an environment agency. It's a totally different thing. So as you can imagine, all that waste had to go somewhere and it wound up mostly going into the temps.

Okay, sorry. I stopped listening after you said giant pulls a shit would explode. Is that real? Did they explode? Yes, yes, they bloated up. They explode. Yep. Wow. That it. Okay, that's a great excuse for some fetish people. Like, you know, you walk in a work all covered in shit just like hey buddy what happened is this cesspool explosion what yes again yeah okay it's happening blowing up my spot not cool okay again having eaten the food and bread and I'm gonna go ahead and say that exploding with shit is pretty par for the course that's's it. That's a menu item. Yeah.

Did a inevitable conclusion at the very least. Well, they put beans on every fucking thing. Yeah. I miss it so much. Marsha's so smart talking about science. Anyway, sorry. So, sizzle for Rizzle. I'm guessing the Tames wasn't very pleasant at this point.

The Thames at this time was a fucking horror show. Can you give me that on a scale from one to Trump administration? Like when Scarem Rouge took over his communication advisor. Okay. That's not doing it. Michael Faraday, the scientist conducted an experiment and then sent a letter to the editor of the Times.

Quote, the appearance and smell of the water forced themselves at once on my attention. The whole of the river was an opaque pale brown fluid. In order to test the degree of opacity, I tore up some white cards into pieces and then moisten them so as to make them sink easily below the surface and then drop some of these pieces into the water at every pier the boat came to before they had sunk an inch below the surface. They were indistinguishable. Though the sun shown brightly at the time when the pieces fell at ways, the lower part was hidden from sight before the upper part was under water.

It's an A. So interesting. I never knew Faraday was under water. It's an, so interesting. I never knew Faraday was into shit, play. Like, there was so much already. Wow, just, I mean, just the fact that pieces of paper would stick in the river edgeways, like chips and, not a great sign. We kept doing the experiment, but, you know I feel like it was done right after that.

It's like towards C H Hips and soft serve. You know, right? Like, I feel like I'm missing something. Like the river is that bad and you have to run a scientific test. Is this not self-evident? Like, was there some group in the river to splashing around? Like, come on in, the shit water. Fine. Where we convincing.

So Faraday and his letter remarks that, quote, the smell was very bad and common to the whole of the water. It was the same as that which now comes up from the gully holes in the streets. The whole river was for a, for the time, a real sewer." And the smell was so horrendous that the city poured chalk lime, which is basically bleaching powder into the river to combat the oil. It's a bunch of fancy British ladies carrying around a nose gay of hot garbage. Cool. I have soy fondue. You want to make a drink? I'll see. I'm honest. I try to take you somewhere nice for our mandate in the city,

and this is my reward. You can't do that. You could be to a place that was called a vegetable bar. I walked to the front door, it says a vegetable bar. We had a dessert tasting, it was lovely. So tell me, the dessert was made of dusted. I did lines of dessert with you. It was a little dusted.

It was a little dusted. That's on me. It was slightly dusted. It was a little dusty. That's on me. It was slightly dusty. So tell me, seashells, she sells by the seashore. Did it just smell bad? Or were there other problems? Some of yours before there were color outbreaks. In 1831, 6,300 people died.

And 1848, 14,000 people perished. And in 1853, almost 11,000 people died. There was a theory at the time of the first outbreak that the disease was caused by a miasma or contaminated air. Yeah. And you know how they combat it and put miasma back then with even foul or smelling air. That's what they thought worked.

So it was like the ax body spray, but it's a public health initiative. I got to say like I kind of love this. It's like you get cholera from getting shit in the water. And that in turn makes you shit until you die. And I know that's the actual mechanism for contagion, but it's sort of like being mauled to death by your own guard dogs. If your guard dog was made of shit and they missed their stack. Heath was still pet it. Yeah. Mr. Dinky. It's a great dog. It is a great dog.

Don't be an ass. In 1844, the government created the Building Act that said that no new buildings could just use sespits. They had to be connected to the sewer. And because the prevailing theory of the day was that measma called illness, they flush the sewers into the Th times regularly. Yeah, and it's not just smell. It's other senses. The sound of shitting causes illnesses too. So they built shit mufflers.

It was a fun invention, but also did not help because that's a stupid idea. I'm literally searching for these on Amazon right now. I don't know that it's just stupid idea. Why is sharp tank is calling us? Patreon is going through the roof. We're fine. During this, during the second outbreak of physician and warden of the North, John Snow recognized the pattern of deaths and concluded it was a waterborne illness caused by sewage, but it doesn't sound like anyone fucking paid attention to that guy.

You know nothing, John Snow, they said. They still didn't have to stab him though. That was a little harsh. I have to. No, but they got to. Yeah. Different. Also, in the 1840s, the city started redesigning the sewer system.

The chief engineer was Frank Foster, but the job must have been pretty hard. And this is a quote from Wikipedia. Quote, the stress of his position was too much for Foster and he died in it's in 52. And, well, see, that's why you need a squatty potty, people. It's really just smooth. It's done from stool oremia, aka the brown plague. Shit, pun. That's a lot of pressure.

Best of just relax a little, eat some vegetables. Save everyone the straight. It's fine. Don't need to die. Squatty potty, man. It falls out of you like an Italian woman's baby. It's amazing. She's waving her hands at her husband's, telling her she had another one.

All right. So his assistant enters the story here. She's waving her hands at her husband telling her she had another one. All right. So his assistant enters a story here, a guy by the name of Joseph Bazel, yet he's promoted to chief engineer the sewer system at that point. His plans call for smaller sewers to connect to the neighborhoods, which connect to much larger outflow pipes. These pipes would then transport the sewage to the east part of the city. Oh, let me guess the east part. That's probably where the rich people was.

So when he submitted the plans, they're rejected because the wastewater wasn't pumped out of the city. So the plans were resubmitted and the new discharge points were 15 miles farther than the original plan. This had also bumped up the cost significantly from 2.4 million pounds to 5.4 million pounds.

And in today's money, that would have been 200 million and 450 million pounds respectively. Okay. Coincidentally, 450 million pounds is also the perceived weight of a single shit taken after an English breakfast. Makes sense. That toast okay, yeah. So, the great stink, just the river? No, we haven't actually got to the great

stink part yet let's take a break and when we come back I'll explain how this really nasty dirty sewer pit that was the tams became the great stink I say rental beddie oh yes this car has taken the bedder class right by the... Sir, sir. Pardon me sir, pardon me sir. You have some feces on your brows. Oh, do I? Oh yes sir, it's right there.

Ah yes, I walked by the river for a bit today. Anyways, this caller has taken the bedder class under the capital W, has it not? Oh indeed sir, it has. What do you think could be the cause of it? I'm sorry, pardon me sir. Your shoe sir, I'm sorry, but your shoe. Oh yes sorry, stepped into the street for a bit. Do you mind wiping those off with this cloth you carry around with you at all times and often touch your face with? Oh of course sir, no problem. Okay, oh is that my tea? It is sir Oh, and you've put a biscuit in it.

I have not, sir. Oh. Anyway, about this cholera. A mystery of the highest order, sir. Indeed. And we're back. When last we left London, it was full of shit. Cecil, how else was London like me?

They drive on the wrong side of the road. So in July of 1857, the plans were presented to the higher ups. A new government is elected and Basil Jett gets a new boss in February of the next year. Lord John Manners. Oh my God, a British guy named Lord Manners. You're fucking nose full of shit. It sounds like there was not a huge rush to get this work done. Insufficient fiber, probably. As most people weren't actually blaming the Colorado Desson contaminated drinking water.

So even though the TEMs looked really gross and smelled pretty bad, it wasn't enough to act. There's no evidence that the river full of shit is caused by humans moving off. Jim M. Hoff's great grandfather throws a piece of shit at someone in parliament. See? See? What am I proving? So they did act until June.

That June was unseasonably hot. Temperatures in the shade were in average of 35 Celsius, which is about 95 degrees Fahrenheit. And in the direct sunlight, it was 48 Celsius or 118 degrees Fahrenheit. This happened to coincide with less rain. So the temperature level started to drop. And as the water evaporated, it basically made a shit slurry consummate. Okay, that's what Keith called my vegan fondue. I'm still healing. See so Okay, so maybe you stay away very I'm going to all right Eli for the last time you cannot invite us over for dinner and not serve us a single dead animal It's that is how you lose pugs. Yeah, you want to lose another plug

Okay, Cecil so the vaporized shit was literally hitting the fans I'm assuming the entire city has a violent pink eye at this point. Yeah, brown eye. So Charles Dickens wrote that the Thames was a quote, deadly sewer in place of a fine fresh river. And quote, he added, quote, I can certify that the offensive smells, even in that short with have been of a most head and stomach-dustending nature." And journalist George Godwin said, quote, the whole of this is thickly impregnated with impure matter.

I'm sorry, the sole silver lining of this story to me is listening to all the ways these Victorian gentlemen found to say this city smells like shit, but with propriety, it's amazing. I say good sir, it's impregnated with impu-mata. What? Fuck you. So, see, so it's a little hard to believe they still weren't interested in doing anything about it.

What changed? Did like big shit run out of money to buy politicians what happens? Well, you know, Rich people got mad. Just so happens that the royalty at the time, Queen Victoria and Prince Albert decided to take a pleasure cruise on this open sewer pipe at the height of the drought. That cruise lasted minutes. Okay, we forgot to bring paddles for a literal. It's actually pretty funny. You got it.

We'll be a little bit faster. Oh, wait, please tell me this is another two part of where Tom's going to tell us next week about their trip back from the shit flow. Don't want to hear about what they had to eat to survive. Twiler, it's poo. Yeah, I didn't know. It was poo. Yeah. It was poo. Keister seals. This is where the press starts calling the whole

debacle, the great stink. One reporter called the Thames a pestiferous and typhus breeding abomination. Okay. Were you at dinner with Ethan? I cause you were invited. You can just come to our table you heard everything He said an article in illustrated London news said quote we can colonize the remotest ends of the earth We can conquer India we can pay the interest of the most enormous debt ever contracted We can spread our name and our fame and our fructifying wealth to every part of the world, but we cannot clean the river tams.

I just love that their version of we put a man on the moon was just a list of like a best of list of imperial racism or something. Okay. All right. Easy to judge Noah. Where's your list of imperial racist colonialism? That's out. No quiet.

That's what I thought. None. That's what I thought. Yeah, none. That's why he has heathen eyes. I call him a nice, detropical nation once it can. You don't know it. That's by Niagara Falls, you would go. So at this point, Parliament is forced. This is great.

This is fucking great. I love this. At this point, Parliament is forced to close the curtains on the reverse side of the building. And I might have the curtains were soaked in the bleaching powder I mentioned earlier, totally not helping by the way and not helping in a way that they considered moving temporarily. Okay guys, so you know how when you take a shit on your floor, you cover it with a towel, it's no problem. These curtains are basically giant shit towels. Yeah, like, like, I don't think that not being able to see the shit is going to fix the

smell. That's how senses work. I just, the guy who took over his basil jets boss, Lord Manners, is getting shit on at this point by a bunch of lawmakers. And how are they dumping on him, Cecil? Most of the people are asking him similar questions, but this one asked by a member of parliament there, really frames it well. Quote, by a perverse ingenuity, one of the noblest rivers has been changed into a cesspool. And I wish to ask whether her majesty's government intend to take any steps to remedy this evil.

This typical response to questions this nature was quote, her majesty's government has nothing, whatever to do with the state of the Thames. What they didn't shit. I mean, I feel like they just just fucking queens out there fake news. She's just got Sean Spicer on a boogie board by the town's force to smile. Obviously, she just let the invisible hand guide the market to fix the problem, right? The invisible left hand in many So they were dumping that lime all over the river where the sewers had fed into it.

As much as 1500 pounds worth a week, which is something like 130,000 pounds in today's currency, the government that sat on these plans for a year then passed a bill to go forward with Basil Jets sewer system. Well, are they waiting on during that year, an entire year? Okay, let's see how this river of shit plays out. Okay, badly. This is a bad year. I see that now. I see that now. We're going to do the sewer thing. Yeah. At least we tried tried exactly. Thank you. Positive. This plan was extensive. It called for 1100 miles of additional sewers and 82 miles of interconnecting sewers.

It took 400 draftsmen to complete the plans. Basiljet, as you can imagine, was pretty anal. That's weird. I wouldn't describe anal as pretty necessarily, but that's not so much a visual thing. All the truth. That's true. And he actually set up some standards

with the construction and selection of materials. He set up a testing process for concrete that gave feedback to the manufacturers. And the metropolitan board of works, the branch of government he worked for was the first governmental body to do this sort of thing. Sounds like you really knew a shit. Yeah. So the project was over budget because of the construction costs. Yes. And embarrassing case of the overruns cost.

I'll live into the pros. Let me give you the wiki article's description of the two major buildings that had to be put up to handle the pumping of the sewers. They describe cross this pumping station as quote, a building in a Romanesque style and the interior contains architectural cast iron work. And quote, and if you look at the picture this place, it looks like a hotel lobby and not a fucking super ace. Yeah, the shits Carlton, I believe they call it. Okay, I gotta say like for this one, it made me look up hotel slogans and you actually be surprised at how many are fitting for this project. But in particularly, And particularly I like I'd rather like the slogan for the Ramada. You do your thing. Leave the rest to us.

Yeah. Howard Johnson's is go happy. Go Hojo go anywhere. That's a problem they were trying to fix. I've never heard of Jackson Hole resorts, but their slogan is get further away. I'm a big fan of a bidet's in. Eat spray loves. I said, the other day, the other building Abbey Mills pumping station is described, thusly, quote, above the center of the engine house was an ornate dome that gives the building a superficial

resemblance to a Byzantine church and quote, I think that kind of foul where you might have won over budget. Yeah, right. The outhouse of worship. Yeah, that was expensive. This is really your real house. Ethan Proudy. Thanks.

No, that's awesome. That's my time to watch you. I'm glad you're highlighting it. Well, I got to say though, if they were pumping tons of shit through this thing, the resemblance to a church was more than superficial. Oh, really? Because did the giant shit dome also rape kids? Because if not, the shit dome is still better than the church. I didn't say it wasn't bad.

It's true. Definitely better. I mean, it made processes shit. It does true. I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better

, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I've been a a better, I've been a better, I've been a better, I concrete and mortar. When it was all said and done, the project cost 6.5 million pounds or 535 million pounds in today's currency.

She's settled. Basil Jett was knighted in 1874. Oh, so is that the end of the story? In 1866, there was another cholera outbreak. And this one took place in an area, London, that was not connected to the under construction sewer system. They traced the cause of the epidemic to sewage that was discharged too close to a reservoir. It was this that caused the people to reject that it was spread by measma and the Lancet stated that it was water supply contamination that caused cholera. There has not been another outbreak of cholera

in London since. And if you had to summarize what you've learned in one sentence, what would it be? Londoners take shit really seriously. I'm ready for the quiz, by the way, you don't have to ask. I'm just ready. I'm just ready. You don't have to ask. And are you ready for the quiz? I am totally ready.

I'm holding it in an episode. I was ready for you to ask the 10th round. So all right. See, so what's amazing about this story is that it had to get as bad as it did before anyone thought to take this problem seriously and make it a priority. So what were Londoners preoccupied with at the time? Hey, mummy unrolling. Be, corset tightening. See fasting as sport, D, sayances, or E, anthropomorphic taxidermies.

It's F, all of these, all of these are real things that Victorian era people did for fun. I mean, instead of fixing their ribs full of shit. Was mummy unrolling like botchy ball? You just try to roll it. And the other is as important. I just feel like it was just, you try to get it to spin as fast as you can or something right? It's like a dreidel.

It's like a blade. I made a table. I got it. Side note, never play botchi ball with heath. He takes it super seriously. It is not fun. It's like that thing. All right.

So considering that our last two episodes have now been about a corpse fucker and a two trillion gallon shit loose, what's the most likely topic for next week's show? A ball fungus. P that thing Eli keeps asking if he should have frozen off. Yes, by the way. You have to tell me show me your deck. It's called cool sculpting. Look at you. And there's your love handles. Is it see vegan fondue or D. God's not dead three. A light in the darkness. I'm going to say D because I really want to do. Oh, you

got it. No, you got to go over to the God awful movies, which sits out now by the time this episode goes on. All right. What was the biggest obstacle in getting Parliament to fund a solution to the great stink problem? Was it a legislative gridlock by conservatives or neoconstitutations? or neo-con's to patience. Not spilling this. Puh. Be concerned over the environmental disinfect statement. What is that?

Or see religious groups objected to any sort of tems smell research. Who's really interested? Who's really interested? Tems smell research. I couldn't tell when I just saw it written down.

Rhymes with tems smell research. Puh. They're all amazing, but I'm gonna go with A. I love Neocons, Neoconsipation, Flock of Kills. Well Cecil, everybody fooled you. Okay, I didn't tell, I didn't say which the fucking answer was. I didn't even know. Deep down. Okay, well, you were right, he got it.

Right now. Exactly got it right now. Exactly. Everybody fooled you. Which means we're going by best puns this episode. So he, if you win. Great. Okay. Well, I'm going to announce Eli for next week as the essay.

Blue Eli's bad at these. So now I'll toss it over to Sarah for this week's Twitter question. This week's question is, what would the great stink be called if it happened today? Other than the Trump administration? Just retweet her Facebook share this episode with your answer for a chance to be next week's winner. Back to you Eli. All right.

Well for Heath, Cecil, Noah, and Tom, I'm Eli. Thank you for hanging out with us today. We'll be back next week and by then he'll be an expert on something else. Between now and then, you can check out my blog at elibosnic.com. That's elibosnic.com. And if you'd like to help keep the show going, you can make a per episode donation. Patreon.com slash citation pod. Or leave us a five star review everywhere you can.

And if you'd like to get in touch with us, check out past episodes, connect with us on social media, or check the show notes, be sure to check out citationpod.com. You know what, Randall Berry? I think I'll have a bath. Are you enjoying your salsa? Yes, I've just found the sponge.

Nope, nope, that's human shit again. Are you enjoying yourself, sir? Yes, I've just found the sponge. No! No, that's human shit again.