The Smell of Success
C.Chad Martin September 17, 2016 I had a teacher that always hammered into us that to truly appreciate history you need to remove your modern biases and put yourself in the place of the people living at that time. I've always taken this lesson to heart when trying to understand a place and time. Trying to paint a picture of Palmerston long before any of us would have seen it is a monumental task. When researching a subject we can look at pictures, read diaries, touch and feel objects from that time period, we can even determine what the weather may have been like. All the senses can be a part of the learning process, all except smell. We can look at a photograph and think to ourselves how picturesque it is, how quaint the buildings are and how charming the life may have been. The so called "simpler time", that phrase so dreaded by historians. That opinion tends to be created in our minds when our modern biases influence the lens we're looking through. We naturally filter out the challenges of life that are rarely discussed, or at least avoided. Recently, I had the pleasure of listening to a podcast that discussed a crisis afflicting growing cities in the 1800's; a crisis of monumental proportions that many of us may have never considered. This got me thinking about whether or not |
something like this would have happened in Palmerston. What I quickly realized is that Palmerston had an even larger issue that would have made day to day life much different than what we may think.
Palmerston experienced an explosion in population and industry with the railway, the growth was so fast there was even mention of the area reaching the heights of size and economic power as Hamilton. While the initial boom seemed like a blessing, it came with its own challenges not only for the people but also for the environment. Between 1871 and 1881 Palmerston went from a hand full of farms to over 1,000 residents, by 1891 the population was over 2,000 people.
As we all know this rapid growth was precipitated by the railway which brought not only its economic benefits, but also its downfalls. In Mary Smith's dissertation she noted; "Every object in Palmerston was caked with soot from the engines in the railway yards. Picket fences painted white greyed within a month, and washing dried out more grey than white. One older Palmerstonian claims that as a boy he did not know snow was white until he visited a school friend who lived on a farm outside town. In Palmerston grey was a way of life."
Palmerston was dominated by the railway as evidenced by the grit and soot which covered the town, the grey denim overalls and peaked caps of the railway workers, and the constant sound emanating from the railway yards created a dirty and gloomy atmosphere.
On top of this industrial gloom, something that is often forgotten but should be considered just as important to the development of a rural community of the late 1800's is the horse. Until rail travel came along the fastest and most efficient method of transportation was the horse, but the horse was also a power source. It was also a mainstay in the workings of all communities. While the railway brought goods and people to a place like Palmerston, it was horses that took the goods and people everywhere else. Like the railway, horses were very positive in many manners, but they also brought their own problems.
It's extremely difficult to accurately ascertain how many horses may have been in and around Palmerston. The only statistics available are for major cities such as New York and London, the average was approximately 1 horse per 30 people. This includes working animals for public transit systems, livery stables and factories. Farms weren't included in those numbers. So, attempting to compile the numbers for a community like Palmerston while taking into account the various farms, factories and households I came up with a number of roughly 1 horse for every 18 people, which would mean there was potentially 110-120 horses in and around the town.
This may not seem like much, but the negative aspects of horses as many of us know is their by-product, manure. An average horse produces 25-35 pounds of manure on a daily basis, meaning the horses in Palmerston were producing upwards of 3,000 lbs of manure a day and 1,000,000 lbs a year. The sheer amount of waste is simply staggering when considering horses don't clean up after themselves. It's quite possible a programme was in place where much of the manure was used in local agriculture, but the effort of clean up and moving of such large amounts of waste must have been a daunting task. Many cities were known for simply dumping the waste in the most convenient spot which eventually became a massive problem. Not only from the smell, but as horse manure dries it turns to dust and becomes air borne. In combination with the soot and grit from the railway the added insult of manure stench would have been overwhelming at times.
It would be nice to say this was the worst of it, but sometime around 1890 to 1895 Palmerston really began developing a reputation as a place to avoid, another major problem was the sewage and water systems were essentially non-existent. Open sewers attracted disease and typhoid became an ongoing problem because of this. Aside from all of this the town street lights were never lit due to an ongoing battle between the town council and the private company paid to maintain them. The fire department lacked sufficient equipment after a disastrous mishandling of the purchase of a new fire engine and hoses from Waterous Engine Works. Lost buildings from fire made two of the largest non-railway employers pack up and move out of Palmerston at the time.
It wasn't until 1903-1905 the town made major efforts to clean up its streets. A municipal water and sewage system was installed, maintenance crews worked diligently on clearing the streets and a new hospital opened. The town itself made huge strides for the time to "clean up its act". Typhoid was eliminated entirely in a matter of a few years, the hospital became one of the first municipally owned in Ontario and Palmerston became renowned for its innovative and effective water and sewage system. The railway, well, it didn't change much. While the horse manure problem eventually disappeared with the introduction of automobiles (the first coming to Palmerston in 1911), cars brought their own unwanted pollution. But the effort was nonetheless to make the town more attractive to not only its citizens but the thousands of travellers passing through on an annual basis.
Despite all of these factors and what to us today must have been a horrendous stench, we need to remove our modern biases and remember that it was just something you lived with as it was an ongoing element in daily life. So much of these elements have tended to be ignored or more likely "thankfully forgotten" by the historians of their time, it is unfortunate we have lost so much of that "dirty" history as it would have been a major component in daily life. This is where I find history the most fascinating; when looking at a picture or an artifact you only see a small portion of history, it's when you start looking for the pieces that can't be seen or touched that help make the entire story come to light.
Palmerston experienced an explosion in population and industry with the railway, the growth was so fast there was even mention of the area reaching the heights of size and economic power as Hamilton. While the initial boom seemed like a blessing, it came with its own challenges not only for the people but also for the environment. Between 1871 and 1881 Palmerston went from a hand full of farms to over 1,000 residents, by 1891 the population was over 2,000 people.
As we all know this rapid growth was precipitated by the railway which brought not only its economic benefits, but also its downfalls. In Mary Smith's dissertation she noted; "Every object in Palmerston was caked with soot from the engines in the railway yards. Picket fences painted white greyed within a month, and washing dried out more grey than white. One older Palmerstonian claims that as a boy he did not know snow was white until he visited a school friend who lived on a farm outside town. In Palmerston grey was a way of life."
Palmerston was dominated by the railway as evidenced by the grit and soot which covered the town, the grey denim overalls and peaked caps of the railway workers, and the constant sound emanating from the railway yards created a dirty and gloomy atmosphere.
On top of this industrial gloom, something that is often forgotten but should be considered just as important to the development of a rural community of the late 1800's is the horse. Until rail travel came along the fastest and most efficient method of transportation was the horse, but the horse was also a power source. It was also a mainstay in the workings of all communities. While the railway brought goods and people to a place like Palmerston, it was horses that took the goods and people everywhere else. Like the railway, horses were very positive in many manners, but they also brought their own problems.
It's extremely difficult to accurately ascertain how many horses may have been in and around Palmerston. The only statistics available are for major cities such as New York and London, the average was approximately 1 horse per 30 people. This includes working animals for public transit systems, livery stables and factories. Farms weren't included in those numbers. So, attempting to compile the numbers for a community like Palmerston while taking into account the various farms, factories and households I came up with a number of roughly 1 horse for every 18 people, which would mean there was potentially 110-120 horses in and around the town.
This may not seem like much, but the negative aspects of horses as many of us know is their by-product, manure. An average horse produces 25-35 pounds of manure on a daily basis, meaning the horses in Palmerston were producing upwards of 3,000 lbs of manure a day and 1,000,000 lbs a year. The sheer amount of waste is simply staggering when considering horses don't clean up after themselves. It's quite possible a programme was in place where much of the manure was used in local agriculture, but the effort of clean up and moving of such large amounts of waste must have been a daunting task. Many cities were known for simply dumping the waste in the most convenient spot which eventually became a massive problem. Not only from the smell, but as horse manure dries it turns to dust and becomes air borne. In combination with the soot and grit from the railway the added insult of manure stench would have been overwhelming at times.
It would be nice to say this was the worst of it, but sometime around 1890 to 1895 Palmerston really began developing a reputation as a place to avoid, another major problem was the sewage and water systems were essentially non-existent. Open sewers attracted disease and typhoid became an ongoing problem because of this. Aside from all of this the town street lights were never lit due to an ongoing battle between the town council and the private company paid to maintain them. The fire department lacked sufficient equipment after a disastrous mishandling of the purchase of a new fire engine and hoses from Waterous Engine Works. Lost buildings from fire made two of the largest non-railway employers pack up and move out of Palmerston at the time.
It wasn't until 1903-1905 the town made major efforts to clean up its streets. A municipal water and sewage system was installed, maintenance crews worked diligently on clearing the streets and a new hospital opened. The town itself made huge strides for the time to "clean up its act". Typhoid was eliminated entirely in a matter of a few years, the hospital became one of the first municipally owned in Ontario and Palmerston became renowned for its innovative and effective water and sewage system. The railway, well, it didn't change much. While the horse manure problem eventually disappeared with the introduction of automobiles (the first coming to Palmerston in 1911), cars brought their own unwanted pollution. But the effort was nonetheless to make the town more attractive to not only its citizens but the thousands of travellers passing through on an annual basis.
Despite all of these factors and what to us today must have been a horrendous stench, we need to remove our modern biases and remember that it was just something you lived with as it was an ongoing element in daily life. So much of these elements have tended to be ignored or more likely "thankfully forgotten" by the historians of their time, it is unfortunate we have lost so much of that "dirty" history as it would have been a major component in daily life. This is where I find history the most fascinating; when looking at a picture or an artifact you only see a small portion of history, it's when you start looking for the pieces that can't be seen or touched that help make the entire story come to light.