168 ILLINOIS STATE ACADEMY OF SCIENCE 



STREAM POLLUTION, A GROWING MENACE TO 

 WATER SUPPLIES 



Fred R. Jelliff, President Knox County Academy of 



Science 



The pollution of the streams of Illinois by sewage and 

 factory waste has reached a point where a statewide pro- 

 test should be formulated and a campaign organized to 

 reduce the present eYil and to prevent further increase. 

 The public must be informed and positive action must 

 be taken. We seem to have ample law and no fault is 

 found on this score; we have a State Board with power 

 to act, and we have no desire to criticize the Board. 

 Stream pollution is largely the result of indolence and 

 ignorance, which do not take into account the effects, 

 and which seek the easiest way of getting rid of waste 

 and sewage. A. late report of the Illinois Department of 

 Health says: "Contaminated water is a mighty danger- 

 ous enemy." It is time that attention be given in every 

 institution and every commercial body of the State to 

 the menace that this indiscriminate practice constitutes. 



First I will emphasize the fact that the time is ap- 

 proaching when as much as possible of the water that 

 falls from the clouds must be conserved for animal and 

 vegetable and industrial consumption. 



In my own county last year a great railroad company 

 was forced to haul water from an artificial reservoir 

 forty miles away; an electric light and power company 

 was reduced to an extremity to procure an adequate sup- 

 ply of the right kind of water; farmers were compelled 

 to haul water for stock, streams were so dry that one 

 could walk on their beds, and municipalities were at their 

 wits' ends to obtain water fit to use and in ample quan- 

 tity. The procuring of unspoiled supplies is each year 

 becoming more difficult. 



The source of our supplies is the rain. Is it possible to 

 formulate a policy by which a larger quantity of this 

 may bo made available before it is contaminated with 

 organic, animal or mineral impurities? Authorities give 

 the average annual rainfall for the State at thirty-five 

 inches. In years of maximum rainfall, a total of fifty 



