Editing Cesspit (section)

=== United States ===
The typical American urbanite in the 1870s relied on the rural solution of individual well and outhouse (privy) or cesspools. Baltimore in the 1880s smelled "like a billion [[polecat]]s" according to [[H. L. Mencken]], and a [[Chicago]]an said in his city "the stink is enough to knock you down." Improvement was slow, and until the end of the [[19th century]], large cities of the East and South were mainly drained through open gutters. Pollution of water supplies by [[sewage]] as well as dumping of [[industrial waste]] accounted in large measures for the public health records and high mortality rates of the period.{{Citation needed|date=October 2017}} <ref>{{cite book|title=The National Experience}}</ref>