Philadelphia’s early-1800s wooden water pipes

Steve Hendrix Feature writer without portfolio based on Local Enterprise but filing for National, Foreign, Magazine and other sections

May 6, 2017
A Water Department crew working May 3 on the 900 block of Spruce Street unearthed this 200-year-old wooden water pipe. (Jon Snyder/Philadelphia Inquirer)
Philadelphia was little more than a decade removed from serving as the nation’s capital when a work gang on Spruce Street began installing the latest in 1812 sanitation technology: a water main made of hollow tree trunks. [The fake news that haunted George Washington]
Designed in 1801 by Benjamin Latrobe, the architect of the U.S. Capitol Building, the Philly system used two steam engines to pump water from the Schuylkill River up to the domed, neoclassical Centre Square Water Works, where the wooden tanks could hold about 25 minutes worth of water at a time.

Source: www.washingtonpost.com