https://steppingintothemap.com/anthropocene/files/original/accd071b247ae2369fbcc1674273b2de.jpg bf31567dce618b9369418e57ba3b1def Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Living in a World of Our Own Making Subject The topic of the resource <a href="http://www.igbp.net/images/18.950c2fa1495db7081ebd1/1421396650502/GreatAcceleration2015igbpsrclowres.jpg" title="IGBP - The Great Acceleration Dashboard" target="_blank">The Great Acceleration</a> <img src="https://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4721/40562555551_972c132773_o.jpg" 100="" width="100% height=" /> <span style="font-size: 3;"> </span> Description An account of the resource The Anthropocene means “The Age of Humans,” but what does it mean to live in a world of our own making? Humanity has flourished in past two centuries. Two thirds of every person ever born lived between 1945 and today. Scientists call this era of expanding population, economic development, and environmental impact the “Great Acceleration.” People are now more numerous and powerful than ever before. Mining moves more rocks and soils than all of the worlds rivers combined. Artificial fertilizers have doubled the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus in our soils. Plastics can now be found on mountain tops and the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Paradoxically, many of the most profound changes to global environments pass virtually unnoticed. Nuclear fallout, for instance, is invisible to the naked eye, but radioactive evidence of cold war weapons tests remains in soils around the world. Until recently, lead was one of the most common materials in industrial use. It was used to seal our foods, paint our homes, and power our cars. Lead is toxic, especially for children. Although invisible, lead is now in our soils, in our cities, and even in our blood. By contrast, concrete is virtually everywhere, yet we rarely think about it. We drive on it, work in it, and the foundations of this very museum are built using it. More than half of the concrete ever produced was manufactured between 1995-2015. Concrete requires enormous energy to mine, transport, and produce. These consequences are as invisible to us as the material is abundant. As you finish your journey through the exhibit, consider how many other “invisible” materials influence our lives and connect us to the global environment. Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Pumping Station Description An account of the resource The geoengineering of natural waterways has been a long-standing hallmark of the global Anthropocene.1 In fact, Donald Worster, a leading figure in environmental history, considered water management to be “the dominant symbol of humankind’s power over nature.”2 From ancient Mesopotamia to the 20th-century American city, the environmental histories of nearly every rapidly growing urban metropolis revealed some form of manipulation of hydrological systems.3 These modifications consistently raise questions about the power dynamics of resource ownership and management, specifically regarding private and public ownership models. The water municipalization debates in Omaha, Nebraska mirror these broader global discussions about public and private water ownership. As a result of growing sanitation concerns, the city of Omaha commissioned the development and construction of the Florence Water Works and Minne Lusa Pumping Station. Constructed approximately seven miles north of downtown Omaha in the town of Florence, the new water management facility included multiple high-service pumps and boilers that filtered out sediment, chemically treated, and dispersed clean water to meet the growing demand for water in Omaha.4 At its peak, the water treatment plant supplied upwards of 28 million gallons to the citizens of Omaha per day.5 The plant’s ability to provide water resources at a substantially lower cost, along with its improved quality, ultimately enabled the continued growth and development of the city of Omaha. However, as the rapidly urbanizing Omaha continued to grow, the privately owned and operated plant could not keep up. This contributed to rapidly declining infrastructure, sewage leaks, enormous amounts of wasted water, and, most concerning to the public, rising prices. As the problems continued to worsen during the early 20th century, the citizens of Omaha campaigned for the municipalization of Omaha’s water resources. This culminated in the creation of the Metropolitan Utilities District and their subsequent acquisition of the assets of the Omaha Water Company in 1912. This transition ultimately contributed to improved operations and crucial cost reductions, which expanded clean water access in Omaha. The story of the municipalization of the Florence Water Works and Minne Lusa Pumping Station revealed the growing desire across the United States and the globe for publicly owned and operated water resources. These global and national transitions demonstrated the comparative advantage of municipalized water, which consistently contributed to lower costs for households and improved service quality. These crucial improvements expanded water access to marginalized communities, who were otherwise unable to afford this basic necessity under the private, corporate model. Ultimately, with 21st-century initiatives to return to the corporatized natural resources model, ownership and distribution of water will continue to be one of the unique challenges faced throughout the Anthropocene, especially in the face of environmental degradation and the global depletion of freshwater resources. Making Minne-Lusa: The development and construction of the Florence Water Works and Minne Lusa Pumping Station reflected the importance of artificially controlled water resources for urban expansion and population growth. Throughout the late 1800s, Omaha’s population increased by 360%.6 This contributed to a hyper-concentrated urban center that lacked adequate sanitation systems to accommodate the growing, densely packed population.7 The absence of a working sewage system led residents to dump garbage and human waste into the streets.8 Furthermore, current waste management, primarily taking the form of privies and cesspools, contaminated the local drinking water supply.9 Public accounts from Omaha in the 1870s and 80s noted the rapid spread of communicable diseases such as dysentery, diarrhea, and typhoid fever, all of which finally prompted locals to draft over one hundred petitions and complaints aimed to garner the attention of the city council.10 The public upheaval generated by the contaminated drinking water convinced local politicians to commission the construction and development of the Florence Water Works and Minne Lusa Pumping Station in 1888. Constructed six miles up the river from Omaha due to the danger of contamination from the city, the plant was both an essential piece of infrastructure and an architectural marvel. Designed by the architectural firm Mendelssohn, Fisher, and Lawrie and managed by the American Water Works Company, the Pumping Station was constructed using Warrensburg sandstone: a material commonly found on the Missouri River and used frequently in construction throughout Missouri River states during the late 19th and early 20th century.11 With a distinctive four-story central tower and granite fountains adorned with monster heads, the facility’s architecture reflected the classical stylings of the 1898 Trans-Mississippi Exposition.12 In addition to the actual pumping and treatment station, the compound also included a superintendent’s mansion and numerous worker housing units.13 Figure 1, taken by photojournalist of the Omaha World-Herald Robert Paskach, depicted the unique architecture of the main treatment facility along the Missouri River, the central tower, and the superintendent’s mansion, displayed off in the distance (Figure 1).14 Significantly, the extraordinary design of the treatment plant was a key factor in compelling the populace to care about the ownership of the facility. Initially, the Florence Water Works and Minne Lusa Pumping Station catalyzed Omaha’s urban transition as a result of the lower utility costs. Developer CW Martin and architect Everett S. Dodds surveyed the plot in 1915, initially attracted by the presence of the Florence Water Works facility.15 In fact, the development was strategically named the Minne Lusa development to capitalize on the positive associations people had with the waterworks.16 An advertisement in the Omaha Daily Bee in 1915 used the water station as the primary selling point, chronicling how the water station brought with it the economic redevelopment of roads, easy accessibility to utilities, and proximity to working-class jobs.17 The construction of a cable car route (Figure 2) that passed right by the plant, and the urban design of the city, which runs perpendicular to the treatment site as if branching out from it, illustrated how the Minne Lusa facility was the focal point of the redevelopment of Florence, Nebraska.18 Furthermore, plant operators knew that the unique design of the plant would attract public attention and began offering tours of the facility, thus drawing in new residents and tourists to the town of Florence, catalyzing its economic and population growth.19 Despite its initial positive benefits, the privately owned and operated plant could not keep up with Omaha’s rapidly growing population, much of which it catalyzed itself. Historians Larsen and Cottrell noted that immediately after its opening, “serious problems plagued the new works.”20 For one, the American Water Works Company did not have the resources to appropriately and sufficiently maintain the plant’s infrastructure. Customers often found dead fish in their water mains and frequent raw sewage leakage in their taps.21 Furthermore, the plant was constructed without water meters resulting in enormous wastes of water.22 In other words, the company did not track individual household consumption, charging a flat rate to all customers regardless of usage. The lack of financial incentive for water conservation led to over-excessive water use and undetected leakages, putting a further strain on the plant’s ability to operate while maintaining financial viability.23 These problems contributed to both rising water rates and the installation and maintenance of new water mains only in areas where consumers were willing and able to pay these rising fees.24 Ultimately, the residents of Omaha, embittered about the American Water Works Company’s inadequate service and rising costs, began to fight for public ownership of water. At the turn of the 20th century, the Minne Lusa Pumping Station’s inadequate operations generated considerable civil unrest in Omaha. Historians Larsen and Cottrell noted that “it was no longer possible or fashionable to blame inaction on rapid growth.”25 The citizens of Omaha demanded a solution to the emerging and expensive water crisis. Therefore, in March 1897, at an Omaha City Council settlement to postpone municipalization until 1917, hundreds of Omaha residents flooded the meeting hall.26 In an over three hour discussion, the public strongly opposed the council’s proposal citing the exorbitant water rates and the impediment of future municipal ownership as the primary reasons.27 This meeting, and the city’s subsequent acquisition of the plant in 1912, reflected the Omaha citizen’s belief that public ownership would be more economically feasible and just. The improved management of the Florence Water Works and Minne Lusa pumping station after 1912 demonstrated the benefits of public ownership of natural resources. First, public utility ownership eliminated the American Water Company’s profit obligations to shareholders, and therefore led to substantial decreases in water rates. For example, between 1912 and 1916, “water rates were reduced by 50%.”28 Moreover, by eliminating the profit generation goal and gaining access to municipal funds, grants, and bonds, the newly created Metropolitan Utilities District’s management could comparatively invest more into maintenance and facility upkeep. These improvements also cut service costs for small consumers by 50%.29 Ultimately, public control of water in Omaha contributed to enhanced operationally efficiency and more equitable distribution. History of US Waterworks: More than just a hallmark of the growth, expansion, and urbanization of Omaha, the Florence Water Works and Minne Lusa Pumping Station served as a microcosm for both national and international developments in water management. Omaha’s private to public utility transition represents broader trends in the global anthropocene regarding the control of water. In the United States, water provision before 1830 was generally considered to be publicly controlled, as urban expansion had not yet necessitated the development of uniform, complex systems. Water was primarily obtained through individuals’ own devices, public wells, and occasionally private water merchants.30 As American cities struggled with fire control, poor sanitation, and the threat of disease, the need for development became apparent. Concurrently, Europe was going through a water revolution of their own. Through the early modern period (1500 - 1800) water systems and provision became increasingly viewed as a subsidiary of the industrial sector throughout Europe. Though mainly manifesting itself in Britain, European water systems transitioned from basic gravitational supply from distant sources to mechanical and eventual steam engine pumping from rivers and other freshwater sources.31 In accordance with increased globalization, these technological developments in water management were brought to North America in the mid to late 18th century. Despite the first pumping station being opened in Philadelphia in 1754, it did not become recognized as an integrated and functional waterworks until 1801. This development was seen as a relative anomaly, as it did not spark an immediate nationwide trend of cities developing waterworks.32 However, the propagation of integrated waterworks began to spread during the early to mid 19th century as the traditional methods of water collection could not keep up with communal demands for larger quantities of clean water and increased fire security.33 Concurrent to these developments, the sanitary revolution, 1830 - 1880, began to sweep through American cities, as public health was correlated with the presence of waste and decay in natural resources. Both city officials and sanitarians, then, became invested in the connection between these water systems and the new goals of environmental sanitation in order to get a handle on waterborne diseases. The overwhelming majority of these new waterworks were privately owned, 80% of all works in 1830, and relatively small compared to the systems that would later gain popularity.34 While relatively inefficient in disease mitigation, as bacteria was later identified as the cause of disease, the increasing importance of effective water provision during this time correlated to increases in the complexity and number of waterworks. In support of this emerging trend, there were only 45 unique works in 1830, but 599 in 1880.35 Municipalization: The implementation of additional systems, newly invigorated civil needs, and the requirement that systems be integrated within the entire urban area led to the skyrocketing of the costs of establishing and maintaining waterworks. Therefore, many city leaders throughout the US concluded that the continued control of sanitary water systems by private entities would be difficult to maintain. Additionally, they came to believe that the control of the public water supply could be profitable for city governments and would benefit the public, as this vital resource would no longer be controlled by for-profit businessmen.36 Mirroring the sale of the Minne Lusa Pumping Station to the city of Omaha, this transition to public ownership of water systems through city governments led to the first major shift in the history of waterworks, municipalization.37 Between 1830 and 1924, the percentage of publicly owned waterworks increased from 20% to 80%, representing the uniform nature of these changes throughout the United States.38 This transition to municipal ownership was perceived as a public good throughout areas of implementation. Low-income American households would spend 4.39% of their income on water resources in privately controlled sectors and 2.84% of their income in publicly controlled sectors as of 2007.39 Additionally, numerous studies demonstrate how municipalized systems ensure equitable access to water. One such study examined the effects of municipal water ownership on black communities from 1889 to 1921. It identified that rates of typhoid fever decreased by 9% in black individuals under public ownership without substantial impacts on white communities, highlighting the general increases in water quality and uniform implementation under municipal ownership.40 Although this transition was driven by financial and operational factors, it raised fundamental questions regarding whether profit-oriented private corporations could effectively manage vital natural resources.41 Moreover, these debates coalesced around the core issue of whether water should be treated as a commercialized commodity or a basic human right. Conclusion: The environmental history of the Florence Water Works and Minne Lusa Pumping Station demonstrated the national and global shift toward municipal ownership. However, as contemporary corporate interests seek to regain access to municipal utilities, it is important to keep in mind the benefits of Omaha’s municipal shift. On a national level, the 2014 Flint water crisis spurred many Americans to distrust municipally controlled water sources. While current understandings have placed the majority of the blame on individual government officials and not municipal control in general, the transition away from sourcing water from Lake Huron without modernized infrastructure under the Karegnondi Water Authority has raised the question of reprivatization in the face of aging infrastructure.42 On an international level, public opinion has generally aligned with municipal water resources. In regions of Latin America specifically, several instances of remunicipalisation have occurred from 2000 to 2005, as water prices spiked without increases in the availability or quality of the water provided through private ownership transitions a few years prior.43 By considering the themes of urbanization, globalization, and the consideration of natural resources as inherent human rights, the history of the Minne Lusa Pumping Station and the global municipal water transition should be taken into account. Though the immediate infrastructure boost under private ownership may be beneficial in the short term, public control of water sources will be essential in maintaining the supply of clean water to all individuals in the face of climate change, pollution, and the commodification of natural resources.   Figure 1: Robert Paskach, Missouri River Trip, 1967, Robert Paskach Collection, Durham Museum, Omaha, NE. Figure 2: Map of Florence in 1923 from: (Omaha: North Omaha History Blog, 2017), Minne Lusa Pumping Station Collection, North Omaha History Blog, Omaha. https://northomahahistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/florence-1923.jpg Figure 3: Tables recording the number of waterworks, the breakdown of ownership style, and the number of cities with waterworks (1800-1830 only) from 1800 to 1924 in the United States. From: Melosi, Martin. “Full Circle? Public Responsibility versus Privatization of Water Supplies in the United States.” In Urban Water Conflicts, edited by Bernard Barraqué, 39–56. Taylor and Francis, 2011. Endnotes 1) Donald Worster, “The Flow of Empire: Comparing Water Control in China and the United States,” RCC Perspectives, no. 5 (2011): 5. 2) Worster, “The Flow of Empire,” 15. 3) Worster, “The Flow of Empire,” 15. 4) “Omaha from the Air,” Omaha World-Herald, 1947. 5) Robert Lee Rayl, “A Study of Warrensburg Sandstone,” University of Missouri, (June 1952): 85-95. 6) Michael J. Harkins, “Public Health Nuisances in Omaha, 1870-1900.” Nebraska History 56 (1975): 478. 7) Raymond A. Mohl and Neil Betten, “The History of Urban America: An Interpretive Framework.” The History Teacher 3, no. 3 (March 1970): 30. 8) Mohl and Betten, “The History of Urban America,” 29. 9) Harkins, “Public Health Nuisances in Omaha,” 478. 10) Harkins, “Public Health Nuisances in Omaha,” 478. 11) Robert Lee Rayl, “A Study of Warrensburg Sandstone,” University of Missouri, (June 1952): pg. 85-95. 12) Federal Writers’ Project Nebraska, Omaha: A Guide to the City and Environs (Omaha: Omaha Public Library, 1939), 45. 13) Federal Writers’ Project Nebraska, Omaha: A Guide to the City and Environs, 25-27. 14) Robert Paskach, Missouri River Trip, 1967, Robert Paskach Collection, Durham Museum, Omaha, NE. 15) "Big Land Deal is Brought to Close," Omaha Daily Bee, April 3, 1915. 16) Jennifer Honebrink, National Register of Historic Places Registration Form: Minne Lusa Residential Historic District, register form, November 2013, national Reigster of Historic Places, accessed November 5, 2023, https://preservation.cityofomaha.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/HD-021-N_-Minne-Lusa-Residential-HD.pdf. 17) “The Water Board Appraisal,” Omaha Daily Bee, July 15, 1906, https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn99021999/1906-07-15/ed-1/?sp=10&q=florence+water+works&r=0.266,0.048,0.151,0.165,0. 18) Florence 1923 (Omaha: North Omaha History Blog, 2017), Minne Lusa Pumping Station Collection, North Omaha History Blog, Omaha. https://northomahahistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/florence-1923.jpg 19) “Purity of the City’s Water Supply and How it is Attained for Omaha” Omaha Daily Bee, April 5, 1908, p. 4F. 20) Lawrence Harold Larsen and Barbara J. Cottrell, The Gate City: A History of Omaha (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1982), 104. 21) Larsen and Cottrell, The Gate City, 104. 22) Larsen and Cottrell, The Gate City, 104. 23) Larsen and Cottrell, The Gate City, 104. 24) Larsen and Cottrell, The Gate City, 750. 25) “Talk About Water Works,” Omaha Daily Bee, March 16, 1897. https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn99021999/1897-03-16/ed-1/?sp=8&q=florence+water+w orks&r=-0.008,0.02,0.258,0.28,0. 26) “Talk About Water Works.” 27) “Talk About Water Works.” 28) Earl Alexander Everret, “Municipal versus Private Wwnership of Public Utilities,” (Masters thesis, University of Nebraska Lincoln, 1919), 11. https://www.proquest.com/openview/158d820bbab6df2d9689a78bdca47b91/1?cbl=18750&diss=y&pq-origsite=gscholar 29) Everrett, “Municipal versus Private Ownership,” 9-10. 30) Martin Melosi, "Full Circle? Public Responsibility versus Privatization of Water Supplies in the United States," in Urban Water Conflicts, ed. Bernard Barraqué (Taylor and Francis, 2011), 40. 31) James Douet, The Water Industry as World Heritage: Thematic Study (TICCIH, 2018), 26-35. 32) Melosi, “Full Circle?”, 40-41. 33) Charles Jacobson, Ties That Bind: Economic and Political Dilemmas of Urban Utility Networks, 1800-1990 (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2000), 33-34. 34) Melosi, Martin. The Sanitary City: Environmental Services in Urban America from Colonial Times to the Present. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2008, 73-89 35) John Croes, Statistical Tables from the History and Statistics of American Water Works (New York: Engineering News, 1884), 4-69. 36) Charles Jacobson, Steven Klepper, and Joel A. Tarr, "Water, Electricity and Cable Television: A Study of Contrasting Historical Patterns of Ownership and Regulation," Cahier / Groupe Réseaux 1, no. 3 (January 1985): 9. 37) Jacboson, Klepper, and Tarr, “Water, Electricity and Cable Television,” 8. 38) Melosi, “Full Circle?”, 41-42. 39) X. Zhang, M. González Rivas, M. Grant, and M. E. Warner, "Water Pricing and Affordability in the US: Public vs. Private Ownership," Water Policy 24, no. 3 (March 2022): 500-516. 40) Werner Troesken, "Race, Disease, and the Provision of Water in American Cities, 1889-1921," The Journal of Economic History 61, no. 3 (September 2001): 750-776. 41) Debora Spar and Krzysztof Bebenek, "To the Tap: Public versus Private Water Provision at the Turn of the Twentieth Century," Business History Review 83, no. 4 (2009): 675-702. 42) Benjamin J. Pauli, "The Flint Water Crisis," WIREs Water 7, no. 3 (March 2020): 1-3. 43) Germà Bel, "Public versus Private Water Delivery, Remunicipalization and Water Tariffs," Utilities Policy 62 (February 2020): 1-2. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Ben Jackson Logan Yogi Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Bel, Germà. “Public versus Private Water Delivery, Remunicipalization and Water Tariffs.” Utilities Policy 62 (February 2020): 100982. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jup.2019.100982. "Big Land Deal is Brought to Close." Omaha Daily Bee, April 3, 1915. Croes, John. Statistical Tables from the History and Statistics of American Water Works. New York: Engineering News, 1884. Douet, James. The Water Industry as World Heritage: Thematic Study. TICCIH, 2018. Federal Writers’ Project Nebraska. Omaha: A Guide to the City and Environs. Omaha: Omaha Public Library, 1939. Florence 1923. Omaha: North Omaha History Blog, 2017. Minne Lusa Pumping Station Collection. North Omaha History Blog, Omaha. https://northomahahistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/florence-1923.jpg. Harkins, Michael J. “Public Health Nuisances in Omaha, 1870-1900,” Nebraska History 56 (1975): 471-492. http://www.nebraskahistory.org/publish/publicat/history/full-text/NHOmaHealth.pdf. Honebrink, Jennifer. National Register of Historic Places Registration Form: Minne Lusa Residential Historic District. Register form, November 2013. National Register of Historic Places. Accessed November 5, 2023, https://preservation.cityofomaha.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/HD-021-N_-Minne-Lusa-Residential-HD.pdf. Jacobson, Charles. Ties That Bind: Economic and Political Dilemmas of Urban Utility Networks, 1800-1990. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2000. Jacobson, Charles, Steven Klepper, and Joel A Tarr. “Water, Electricity and Cable Television: A Study of Contrasting Historical Patterns of Ownership and Regulation.” Cahier / Groupe Réseaux 1, no. 3 (January 1, 1985): 2–31. https://doi.org/10.3406/flux.1985.1615. Larsen, Lawrence Harold, and Cottrell, Barabara J. The Gate City: A History of Omaha. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1982. Melosi, Martin. “Full Circle? Public Responsibility versus Privatization of Water Supplies in the United States.” In Urban Water Conflicts, edited by Bernard Barraqué, 39–56. Taylor and Francis, 2011. Melosi, Martin. The Sanitary City: Environmental Services in Urban America from Colonial Times to the Present. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2008. Mohl, Raymond A., and Neil Betten. “The History of Urban America: An Interpretive Framework.” The History Teacher 3, no. 3 (March 1970): 23-34. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3054423. “Omaha from the Air.” Omaha World-Herald. 1947. https://www.historicomaha.com/aerial5.jpg. Pauli, Benjamin J. “The Flint Water Crisis.” WIREs Water 7, no. 3 (March 12, 2020). https://doi.org/10.1002/wat2.1420. “Purity of the City’s Water Supply and How it is Attained for Omaha.” Omaha Daily Bee. April 5, 1908. p. 4F. Rayl, Robert Lee. “A Study of Warrensburg Sandstone.” University of Missouri (June 1952): 1-108. https://mospace.umsystem.edu/xmlui/handle/10355/87444. Robert Paskach. Missouri River Trip. 1967. Robert Paskach Collection. Durham Museum, Omaha, NE. Spar, Debora, and Krzysztof Bebenek. “To the Tap: Public versus Private Water Provision at the Turn of the Twentieth Century.” Business History Review 83, no. 4 (2009): 675–702. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0007680500000878. “Talk About Water Works.” Omaha Daily Bee, March 16, 1897. https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn99021999/1897-03-16/ed-1/?sp=8&q=florence+water+works&r=-0.008,0.02,0.258,0.28,0. Accessed October 9, 2024. “The Water Board Appraisal.” Omaha Daily Bee, July 15,1906. https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn99021999/1906-07-15/ed-1/?sp=10&q=florence+water+works&r=0.266,0.048,0.151,0.165,0. Accessed October 9, 2024. Troesken, Werner. “RACE, DISEASE, and the PROVISION of WATER in AMERICAN CITIES, 1889–1921.” The Journal of Economic History 61, no. 03 (September 1, 2001): 750–76. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0022050701030066. Worster, Donald. “The Flow of Empire: Comparing Water Control in China and the United States.” RCC Perspectives, no. 5 (2011): 1-23. https://www.jstor.org/stable/26240326. Zhang, X., M. González Rivas, M. Grant, and M. E. Warner. “Water Pricing and Affordability in the US: Public vs. Private Ownership.” Water Policy 24, no. 3 (March 17, 2022): 500–516. https://doi.org/10.2166/wp.2022.283. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource Fall 2024 Subject The topic of the resource Should water be publicly or privately owned? For centuries, cities across the world have asked this question, and Omaha is no different. In the 1800s, Omaha’s waste flowed into the river, leading to dirty drinking water and disease spread. To fix this, Omaha took inspiration from other US cities. In 1889, they built the Florence Water Works and Minne Lusa Pumping Station. The privately owned plant could provide 28 million gallons of clean water to the growing Omaha city. The private company, however, could not keep up with the growing population. This led to sewage leaks and rising costs. In 1912, the people of Omaha finally took control of the plant’s operation, and with it came better management and lower costs. The history of the Minne Lusa Pumping Station shows that when people around the world control water, it's cheaper, easier to get, and better for the entire public. pumping station Water treatment