Editing Squeegee (section)

== Street cleaning ==
[[File:Rotating squeegee street washing machine.png|thumb|Kindling Street Washing Machine, also known as the Kindling Squeegee, c. 1911]]
Squeegees on broom handles were used for street cleaning in the later nineteenth century. This was the case in [[London]] by 1873.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PNpMAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA325|title=Once a Week|first=Eneas Sweetland|last=Dallas|date=February 3, 1873|publisher=Bradbury and Evans.|via=Google Books}}</ref> In the early twentieth century some cities in Europe and North America used horse-drawn machinery with rotating rubber squeegee blades on rollers behind a water tank connected to sprinklers. In 1911, this was described as "a German invention which has been for some years in successful operation in leading German cities".<ref name=grig>{{Cite web|url=http://archive.org/details/modernmethodsofs00grig|title=Modern methods of street cleaning|first=Marion William|last=Grigsby|date=February 3, 1911|via=Internet Archive}}</ref> A US version of the rotating squeegee machine, known as the Kindling Squeegee or Kindling Street Washing Machine, was in use by the time of that description.<ref name=grig /> It was manufactured in [[Milwaukee]] by Louis Kindling  who had migrated from Germany to Wisconsin in 1873.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Records/Property/HI101582|title=2433 N WAHL AVE &#124; Property Record|date=January 1, 2012|website=Wisconsin Historical Society}}</ref> 

By 1915, some streets in [[Paris]], [[Washington DC]], and [[Philadelphia]] were being cleaned by this kind of machine, while London still depended on men with hand brooms and squeegees.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/002017365 |title=Elements of highway engineering |first=Arthur H. |last=Blanchard |date=February 3, 1915 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons; etc., etc. |via=HathiTrust}}</ref> In 1919, Kindling got a US [[patent]] for a design with "new and useful Improvements in Squeegee-Rollers",<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.uspto.gov/patents/search |title=Search for patents|website=www.uspto.gov}}</ref> following another "improvements" patent for squeegee street cleaning machines filed in 1915 by the inventor and civil engineer Samuel Whinery (1845–1925) (resident of [[East Orange, New Jersey]]) and published in 1916.<ref>{{cite web
|url=https://patents.google.com/patent/US1191489|title=Street cleaning or washing machine - Patent US 1191489 A|website=Google Patents|access-date=31 July 2016}}</ref>

In 1914, William H. Connell (Chief, Bureau of Highways and Street Cleaning in Philadelphia) explained that the street cleaning was done in batteries of "two and three squeegee machines preceded by sprinklers" reportedly about {{convert|200|yd|m}} ahead. The American Highway Engineers' Handbook of 1919 reveals that this method was used in order for the water:

{{quote|text=[...] to loosen up the dirt on the pavement without giving it time to evaporate. [...] The idea of sprinkling is to soften the surface and enable the squeegee to cleanse the streets of all slime as well as the coarser materials. The squeegees are followed by two men, whom immediately sweep up the windrows of dirt into piles, and a sufficient number of carts follow to remove the dirt from the streets.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.phillyhistory.org/blog/index.php/2014/11/south-street-squeegee/|title=South Street Squeegee|last=Finkel |first=Ken|date=11 November 2014|website=The PhillyHistory Blog. Discoveries from the City Archives|access-date=31 July 2016}}</ref>}}

The need for supporting labour and foot was seen as a disadvantage. Furthermore, the squeegee machines were pulled by horses, which would defecate on the streets which were attempted to be cleansed. Therefore, they were gradually replaced by mechanical street cleaning devices, which were introduced as early as 1911.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.phillyhistory.org/blog/index.php/2014/12/when-mechanization-took-command/|title=When Mechanization Took Command|last=Finkel|first=Ken|date=13 December 2014|website=The PhillyHistory Blog. Discoveries from the City Archives|access-date=31 July 2016}}</ref>