THE KANSAS UNIVERSITY 

 SCIENCE BULLETIN. 



Vol. X, No. 2.] January, 1917. .[volI'xx^no.I 



An Investigation of the Condition of the Drinking Water 

 on Trains Operating In or Through Kansas.* 



BY X. P. SHERWOOD. 



(From the Department of Bacteriology- of the University of Kansas, Lawrence. i 



AT the request of Dr. S. J. Cinimbine, secretary of the Kansas 

 State Board of Health, an examination of the drinking 

 water on trains that operate in or through Kansas was begun 

 on May 23, 1912, at the Kansas City union station. A similar 

 examination was made at Wichita on ^Vlay 29 and 30. Fifty-four 

 samples were taken at Kansas City from trains on the Frisco, 

 Santa Fe, M. K. & T., ^Missouri Pacific, Burlington and Union 

 Pacific railroads. The samples were plated on plain agar immedi- 

 ately after collection, and a set of six fermentation tubes contain- 

 ing .Jackson's lactose-bile^ were also inoculated. Five of these 

 tubes were each inoculated with 1 cc. of the sample of water, and 

 10 cc. of the sample was planted into one large fermentation tube. 

 This was done in order to determine approximately how many, if 

 any, B. coli were present. These plates and tubes were then incu- 

 bated for twenty-four hours at 37° C, and counts made. 



There are present, even in good drinking-water, a few harmless 

 bacteria, the number varying largely with the source of supply. 

 These haiTnless water bacteria, however, thrive best at room tem- 

 perature, and are, as a rule, inhibited when incubated at 37° C., 

 or body temperature. 



]\Iathews,- in 1893, showed that in streams presumably exposed 

 to pollution the coimt at 37° C. was in the neighborhood of 100 

 per cc, while for unpolluted water from wells, springs and taps 

 the count was under 30 per cc. Gage^ has shown that- for clean, 



*Read before the Kansas State Board of Health, June 6, 1912. 



1. Jour. Infec. Dis., March, 1906. 



2. Technologj^ Quarterly \^, 241. 



3. A Study of the Number of Bacteria Developing at Different Temperatures, and of the Rela- 

 tion between such Numbers with Reference to their Significance in the Interpretation of Water 

 Analysis. — Biological Studies by the Pupils of William Thompson Sedgwick, Boston, 1906. 



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