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Un-Polluting Chicago's Dirty Air 
by MRS. DOROTHY FROMHERZ 
In the past few years, the word “pollution” has become as familiar to 
Americans as “ice cream” or “orbit.” We constantly hear about the pollu- 
tion ruining our lakes and streams, and we are all aware of smog and 
exhaust fumes present in the air we breathe. 
As the late Rhode Island Congressman John. E. Fogarty commented 
in a 1965 speech at a White House Conference on Health: “None of us 
lives in a world of JUST auto exhaust, or JUST polluted water, or JUST 
pesticide residues in our food. We ... eat, breathe, work, play and remain 
in constant contact with an atmosphere that endlessly mixes and changes 
and presents to us the sum of every contaminant that is put into it.” 
Congressman Fogarty added, “We have had to admit to ourselves that 
during recent history we were so intent on pressing immediate needs that 
we neglected to give serious attention to long-range problems of what 
the people of this nation were doing to their own environment.” 
But much earlier—in 1958—the city of Chicago had begun steps to do 
something about its air pollution. That year, a city ordinance transformed 
the Department of Smoke Abatement into the Department of Air Pollution 
Control, thus strengthening its administrative and enforcement powers. 
In 1962, the new department joined with the U.S. Public Health Service 
in developing a five-year plan designed to handle the problem. A grant 
of $1,000,000 under the Clean Air Act was used to provide scientific per- 
sonnel and to research new methods of enforcement. 
The plan itself sought eight goals: 
1. To determine the extent to which air pollution contributes to res- 
piratory diseases and, possibly, to death. 
2. To determine all potential sources of air pollution. (Questionaires 
were sent to 7,300 manufacturers, and inspecting engineers personally 
visited over 3,600 plants.) 
3. To improve the monitoring of pollutants. An extensive network of 
monitoring stations now exists in the area, collecting data and conducting 
studies. 
4. To improve analysis of pollutants, through experiments in the 
department’s laboratory. 
5. To determine the transporting of pollutants. A professional meteor- 
ologist, assisted by two weather technicians, was employed the study the 
eifects of weather on air pollution. 
6. After accomplishing the first five steps, the sixth goal was to be 
a recommendation for effective legislation. (Such legislation has now 
begun, and will be discussed further in this article.) 
7. To increase regional control of air pollution. For this program, two 
projects were inaugurated: a study conducted jointly by the Northeastern 
Illinois Planning Commission, the State of Illinois and the City of Chicago, 
plus an interstate compact between Illinois and Indiana, providing common 
agreement on a basic policy for interjurisdictional control. 
8. To provide the public with a thorough understanding of air pollution, 
its sources, effect and dangers, and the work of the department in com- 
batting it. 
