#TBT: Yes, THAT James Earl Jones narrated this 1978 documentary about the Cuyahoga River

The melodious tones of James Earl Jones' golden pipes grace the narration track of this Cuyahoga River documentary from 1978.

This clip features JEJ reading text from an infamous Time Magazine article that followed the 1969 river fire.

Cuyahoga (1978)
#TBT: "Some river! Chocolate brown, bubbling with subsurface gases. It oozes rather than flows." Hear the one and only James Earl Jones read from the 1969 Time magazine article that followed the Cuyahoga River fire.
Posted by Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District on Thursday, October 29, 2015

Learn more about the 1969 blaze, or the 12 or more other times the river burned.

GATOR: February 9 was Alligators in the Sewers Day. We did not know this.

Chickasaw, formerly known as Jenni, rescued from Big Creek by our crews in 2012. Photo by George Uhl.

Blogosphere, we have let you down.

Apparently, February 9 was Alligators in the Sewers Day and we had no idea. For this, we're sorry.

The declaration was made five years ago to commemorate the 1935 sighting of an alligator in the sewers of Harlem, New York.

In 2012, one of our crews had a similar experience as they rescued an 18-inch alligator from the chilly waters of Big Creek in Cleveland. It was no urban legend, no unconfirmed reports, but an actual alligator. The gator, now named Chickasaw, has been in the care of Cleveland Metroparks Zoo ever since where she has been an important part of their outreach and education efforts.

Largely, alligators in sewers survives only as urban legend. Should we see any creatures of such zoological significance in our tunnels underground, we'll be quick to let you know.

Consider this date marked on our calendars moving forward.

Here's Newschannel 5's story from the day:

HISTORY: Barrels of alcohol down the sewers? Looking back at 1919 #Prohibition and environmental effects

Image courtesy Library of Congress

Happy anniversary! On this date in 1919, America officially became a "dry" country as prohibition became the law of the land.

Following the ratification of the 18th amendment, there was a whole lotta alcohol that needed to be disposed of around the country, and photo archives show that authorities forced many breweries to drain their inventories. Literally.

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Seeing these, we asked our Environmental Services staff: What impact—environmental or otherwise—would this much alcohol have if it entered our sewers all at the same time?

GAMES: "You have died of cholera," and other health lessons #OregonTrail teaches us

You have died of cholera. Ah, the memories.

Adults who grew up with Apple IIs in the classroom in the 1990s are having a nostalgia field day now that the Internet Archive has made more than 2,000 MS DOS games available online, including the memorable Oregon Trail.

What makes it relevant to a Sewer District blog (and you, fine reader) is a look at the diseases that plagued the pioneers: Cholera, dysentery, and typhoid fever, among others. You might not have realized it as a child, but the first three are caused by a lack of proper sanitation and still relevant today.

VIDEO: "Police of the underworld," Vienna's sewer brigade of 1934

The city of Vienna once had a police squad specifically trained for sewer patrols.

This 1934 British newsreel showcases the "canal brigade" of Vienna, Austria, braving the bowels of the city, a common hiding place for criminals at the time.



Most interesting to us was the squad's frequency of finding "tramps," men who would walk the murky tunnels in search of coins and trinkets citizens would lose down the drain. But rather than arresting them or escorting them out, they were merely searched and regularly permitted to carry on.

...All being well, they are allowed to proceed with their very exclusive occupation.

#TBT: They don't make garden hose advertisements like this anymore.

In 1914, Australians apparently took their yard work very seriously.

This ad for Dunlop Garden Hoses as seen on Wikipedia takes us back to a different time in fashion. But it also reminds us of two points relevant today.

First, if you have a lawn or garden and water them regularly, consider rain barrels for water reuse.

Also, if you are a NEORSD customer and homeowner consuming more water in the summer for pools, washing cars, or other uses, you can sign up for our Summer Sprinkling program that may help you lower your bills.

And now, back to 1914:

You're welcome.

PHOTO: Safety first, top hats are a priority.

Quite dapper for a sewer tunnel tour, no?

These gents were friends of English civil engineer Joseph Bazalgette attending a tour of the main drainage works of his new London Sewage System in 1862.

Tours of anything similar today are accompanied by hard hats rather than top hats, but historical images like this do convey the significance of these infrastructural achievements.

Huzzah, ol' boy!

VIDEO: 1928 school film shares how to treat sewage, how to set rat traps, and how not to catch malaria, typhoid, or the bubonic plague

Throwback Thursday is an opportunity to harken back to a time when we used the words "hence" and "typhoid" in daily American conversation.

The 4-minute clip above is from a 20-minute 1928 educational silent film called "Health and Hygiene" which focused on the causes of common diseases and their remedies.

HISTORY: Next time you tap an address into your GPS, thank a pigeon. #GISday

Image courtesy Wikipedia

Before there was Google Maps, there were pigeons.

Every November, GIS Day showcases geographic information system (GIS) technology that many of us use every day without even thinking about it. It's a large part of our work, and our own GIS team has routinely used the unofficial holiday as a soapbox for sharing little-known facts about the technology and its amazing potential.

GIS Analyst Eric Baker recently reflected on the history of remote and satellite imaging dating back to the 1800s. That history included references to the year 1906 when professional photographers would harness one-shot cameras to the breast of carrier pigeons.

HISTORY: No power was no problem our plants couldn't handle

"We had people showing up at the plants asking how they could help."

That's how our then Director of Operations Tim Tigue described employees' response to the great blackout of 2003 as staff was dedicated to maintaining service for customers.

During the event, we sampled water on local beaches and streams to ensure proper water quality was maintained, and emergency generator power was redirected at each facility to ensure critical processes were maintained.

Our Westerly plant shown here was without power for 15 hours, but wastewater flow was stored until it could be treated fully.

ARCHIVES: Her name is Peggy.

Who was she?

We posted this image on our Facebook page in 2011 but had no other information on her at the time. No one in our sewer maintenance department could identify her, and little was known about the equipment it appeared she was using.

It became a favorite photo of mine because it conveyed an employee working with both confidence and purpose, perhaps answering a question from a co-worker or member of our communications team. But was she an employee? When was the photo taken? What was she doing? The interest remained, and the questions remained unanswered.

Until yesterday.

ARCHIVES: A photograph that changed everything

Like rummaging through family photos from a dusty hatbox in the attic, finding a photo in our Sewer District archives can have amazing emotional impacts.

We found this one today.

VIDEO: "OK, class, we have a film for you today."

Ah, the new school year is upon us. And it brings back memories of science-class filmstrips and the clickety-clack of the projector.

Here's a classic from 1967 called "Journey through a day," in which a young boy spends his day in the great outdoors, interacting with his environment and the many creatures around him. Did you ever spend days like this? Do your kids have days like this today?



Sewer District crews spend days along streamsides, too, mostly monitoring fish and aquatic life for water-quality tests, not diving in after frogs or putting turtles in their pockets like the lad in the video. But the level of enjoyment spending a day in the great outdoors may be comparable.

HISTORY: 40-year anniversary, 100+ years of history?

Expansion of our Easterly Wastewater Treatment Plant. April 5, 1932.

Our history predates our creation. Make sense?

This year marks the 40th anniversary of the creation of the Cleveland Regional Sewer District, which would later be renamed the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District. But that doesn't mean the area's wastewater treatment efforts began in 1972. They began decades before.

Our three wastewater treatment plants—Easterly and Westerly in Cleveland, and Southerly in Cuyahoga Heights—were originally built by the City of Cleveland, and all date back to the early 1900s: Easterly began screening wastewater in 1908, Westerly in 1919, and Southerly in 1928.

ARCHIVES: "Detailed plan, 1902"

Scanned from a series of glass-plate slides from the early 1900s, this 1902 blueprint shows a schematic for a primary filter.