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to Ciaciiniati, Louisville or Evansville, and as the former are much 

 the larger, contributing tlierefore a much larger amount of sewage and 

 wastes, active steps toward an abatement of the problem at tliese two 

 places will have to be taken before Indiana is affected. The question of 

 the disposal of manufacturing wastes is a comparatively easy one for 

 Indiana manufacturers. It is an individual prolilem for each concern to 

 solve, but there are very few where a treatment of the waste would be 

 required, and then only after the problem has been taken up at all points 

 along the river. 



In the report made in 1911 it was said that the problem was not one 

 for the individual states, but that it would have to be controlled by the 

 federal Government, and preparations are now being made by the Gov- 

 ernment for a thorough survey of the entire river. 



Continuing the policy of surveying our rivers, and therefore our 

 natural water supplies, a survey of the Wabash River was made in the 

 summer of 1912. From the experience gained the previous summer, a two- 

 roomed houseboat was built, one room to be used for the laboratory work 

 and the second for living quarters. The work covered the river from 

 Bluffton near its source to tlie mouth, a distance of 450 miles. Because 

 of the shallowness of tlie river at the upper end, this portion was covered 

 in a rowboat, and samples shipped to Lafayette to the houseboat labora- 

 tory. From this point down, the houseboat was used. Eight hundred and 

 twenty-three samples were collected for a chemical and bacterial analysis, 

 696 of them from the river. 



At no point was the river seriously polluted; i. e., a nuisance did not 

 exist. At a few places, however, as at Wabash, where a large strawboard 

 l)lant is located ; at Lafayette, where there is another one ; at Terre 

 Haute, with many manufacturing concerns, and at Yincennes, with its 

 strawboard works and distilleries, considerable pollution was found. As 

 this condition was always below the cities and they were not bothered, 

 and the natural purification of tlio river remedied this condition before 

 the cities and tow ns below were reached, no complaints were heard. The 

 population on the watershed is not large in comparison with its size, and 

 the flow is sufficient to care for the sewage and wastes by dilution. 



Although from a physical standpoint the river was found to be in 

 good condition, the analyses showed that it was unfit in its raw state for 

 drinking and domestic purposes, and th.'it it would be necessary to filter 



