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In 1910 - The First Water Treatment Plant Is Planned
Our growing community demanded a secure supply of clean water! Public opinion was so high, in fact, that Fargo attorney V.R. Lovell was elected mayor on a platform that included an ambitious program of public works. Wonder of wonders, Papa voted for him! and I would have too, but women had not received the vote yet! Once in office, Lovell and his supporters laid plans to build a water treatment plant, and in July 1910, The citizens of Fargo approved a $65,000 bond issue to finance the plant. It was city engineer Frank Anders who was to play a pivotal role in bringing clean water to Fargo. After a committee had made a through study of the waterworks issue, including visits to other U.S. cities with new municipal water treatment plants, the city council approved the concept. Anders was assigned the responsibility of to preparing plans and specifications for a mechanical filter plant - a project that was to consume most of his thought and energy over the next three years. Anders was determined to design a "foolproof" system - one that softened water as well as removing bacteria, color, odor and dissolved waste particles from the Red River's muddy waters. Anders studied the Red River - often traveling upriver by canoe - and analyzed Fargo's growing water consumption. He sought the advice of other experts, too.
Controversy erupted when Anders initial plans were finally submitted to the city council. We had moved to town by then, and Papa swore the rumblings kept him awake that night! Some aldermen were afraid that the city would overextend its tax base. Others thought the waterworks would be a financial burden, that Anders' plans were too extravagant. Still others thought the plans should include more, like an electrical generating plant. Location was another issue. Anders proposed the old Island Park site for the plant, but the city wanted to build further south at a spot that, at that time was still outside the city limits. Luckily for all of us, Anders drafted a new set of plans and specifications, which were approved by the city council and let for bids in May 1911. Local builder James Kennedy received the official nod as chief contractor for the city's first pumping station and filter plant. Again, a squabble took place. Kennedy's low bid of $98,960 was challenged, but he won out when the courts finally ruled in his favor. Fargo broke ground for the first water treatment plant on June 15, 1911. By December, the walls and smokestack were up " and you had better believe it is a striking feature on our landscape" wrote Anders to Brown.
It wasn't until November 1912 that the first full-scale tests were attempted, with parts of the plant still under construction. At first, the performance was significantly below expectations. Angrily, Anders wrote: "The output of the plant is not as satisfactory as it might be and the water was not as soft as planned. However, the filters were working properly. Some people are complaining about the taste of the water, but they had no business to taste it anyway, at present."
By the end of the year, the plant was operating near its designed capacity - four million gallons per day. Filters removed nearly all the bacteria, and seldom operated below 95% efficiency. Hardness was reduced by half, but best of all, our water tasted good! Even Papa noticed it and bragged about it to his sister back east. Maybe Mr. Anders was talking about Papa when he said of Fargo's citizens: "They believe it to be the best water in the country." When Fargo's first municipal waterworks went into operation, it stood on the very edge of south Fargo. There wasn't much south of 13th Avenue, back then, but fields of waving wheat. Of course, Fargo continued to grow - and pretty soon houses, instead of wheat, were sprouting up around the waterworks. Over time, the water treatment plant became an important landmark in a largely residential neighborhood. It's "City Beautiful" green roofs and red brick graced grounds that were always park like and well-kept. More importantly, Fargo's water treatment plant proved extremely reliable over its 84 - year life span - never shutting down, even during severe floods. How did they do it? Water from the Red River came into the plant through pipelines, then was pumped - using the latest steam powered equipment - from the pump house to what was called the "head house" housing the filter gallery, sedimentation basins, water superintendent's office and laboratory. On the upper floor, chemicals were stored and then added through hoppers to the water supply. In the filter house, lime and iron were added as softening agents. Raw water made seven passes through a series of wooden baffles, allowing chemical reactions to take place before the water entered the sedimentation basins.
Next, water flowed into the filter gallery, where mechanical gravel-and sand filters removed color, taste, odors and some minerals.
But in time, Fargo outgrew even this innovative treatment.
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1910 - how Fargo
had grown! In fact, the city was now home to more than 14,000 people.
And most of them agreed with a Fargo Forum editorialist who declared
that further postponement of a new city water system would be "a little
short of criminal."
C. Arthur Brown,
a Chicago engineer, became an important collaborator with Anders advising
and approving all plans. Because Brown was still working as a water
engineer for American Wire and Steel, their discussions were often held
in secret. Meeting in a southern hotel, the two men finally settled
on the New Orleans water works as a model comparable to the situation
in Fargo. Architecturally, Anders' design proposal reflected the early-20th-century
City Beautiful movement, whose classical elements promoted progress,
science and technology.
Progress seemed slow,
with recurring problems in the cost and design of equipment, cold weather
yes, we had a lot of that back then, too! Once, the whole electrical
system failed, damaging the pump motors and further delaying the project
In June 1913, the
Fargo waterworks began pumping treated water into the city's water mains.
- "It was" - said Anders when it opened, "the most important municipal
improvement that the city has yet undertaken."
Sludge pits in the
bottom of the basin collected the impurities which were flushed into
the sewer system - and ultimately, back into the river, a safe distance
from the intake.
Normally, the treatment process took about four hours, and
the clean water left the plant through a cast iron water main under
Fifth Street, to be distributed by under pressure through the city's
water mains.