Bob Hansen
for The Hawk Eye
History books try to ignore it and no where in Burlington is there a suitable plaque raised to those that dealt with it. But before the start of the 20th century, our forebears were fighting an often disgusting battle to keep the problem in check.
Simply put, the problem was poop. Human waste, excrement, night soil. And it was for good reason that early Burlington was cursed with the nickname “Turd Town.”
The city’s natural drainage lines, a lack of laws and horrible hygiene habits converted the streets and alleys of the “Lower Town” into a quagmire of waste animal and otherwise. Hawkeye Creek was an open sewer, raw sewage floated in the river and the levee was considered a public lavatory.