2019.033.001

This is a large, comprehensive scrapbook focused on the Municipal Water Department in Lawrence and other cities in the Merrimack Valley. The book is a collection of articles from the Eagle Tribune and Sunday Sun that serve as a chronology of the water department from 1925 to 1928. During this time period, Lawrence was in the midst of a water crisis. As the articles in this scrapbook state, the Merrimack River was far too contaminated by the nearby mills and citizens dumping contaminants in the water, so the plan of the water department to use the river as a mainline for drinking water was off the table. They tried it once, and many citizens who drank the water became quite ill, so by the order of the new superintendent in 1925, Patrick Nugent, the city was to work with the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania water department to create a filter for the river to make the water palatable. This project, though it seemed like a decent solution to the problem, was far too complicated and expensive to continue at the capacity the water department required. This filter system was eventually updated to the point that it was serviceable, but only for short periods of time. The next step for the Lawrence Water Department was to ask for help from their surrounding city neighbors, and from legislatures, but both denied the city any access to water outside of the Merrimack River. Eventually, Methuen, Dracut and Lowell joined Lawrence in contacting the Massachusetts governor for a meeting to solve this problem, and though Lowell dropped out of the agreement at the last second, Lawrence was given limited access to a water main outside of the Merrimack River. Patrick Nugent was fired from his position at the Water Department following these events.

Large, green, hardcover scrapbook