A FERTILE GROUND FOR NEW THINKING

EMERGING ISSUES

1880-1920

William Pitt Mason

Pioneer in Sanitation Engineering

William Pitt Mason(1853-1938)

• C.E. degree, RPI (1874)• M.D., Albany Medical College (1881)• Assistant Professor of Chemistry, RPI (1882)• Professor of Analytical Chemistry, RPI (1885)• Head of Chemistry Department, RPI (1895)• LL.D., Lafayette College (1908)• Head of *newly formed* Chemical Engineering

Department, RPI (1912)• Doctor of Science, Union University (1917)• Member, APHA, 28th president of AWWA

W.P. MasonPioneer in Sanitation Chemistry?

• Notes on Qualitative Analysis for Students of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 1st ed. (1883, Nims) – Chemical analysis of water

• Studied bacteriology with Pasteur at Pasteur Institute (1889 and 1893)

• Examination of Potable Water (1890, Nims & Knight)– Commentary on importance of standardized water

examination methods (chemical analyses)– Based on 1889 report of the “water committee” of the

American Association for Advancement of Science (AAAS), of which Mason was a member

– This committee influenced the first publication of Standard Methods in 1905 by the APHA

• “Notes on some cases of drinking water and disease” (speech, 1891)– Typhoid outbreaks in the Albany area, due to

contamination of Mohawk-Hudson water

• Report on An Additional Water Supply for the City of Troy Made to the Water Commissioners (1893, 1897)– Investigated alternative water sources for Troy, NY– Ranked “desirability” of water sources on bacterial counts

• “Chemical and bacteriological examination of potable water” included in 4th year chemistry class description for Natural Science majors (1896)

W.P. MasonPioneer in Sanitation Chemistry?

• Water Supply (Considered Principally from a Sanitary Standpoint), 1st ed. (1896, J. Wiley & Sons)

• Examination of Water (Chemical and Bacteriological), 1st ed. (1899, J. Wiley & Sons)– Preface: “Knowledge of ordinary quantitative analysis is here

necessarily assumed…while the items properly lying within the scope of a sanitary examination are dealt with more at length”

• “Special Course in Water Analysis” offered at RPI (1902)

• Standard Methods of Water Analysis, 1st ed. (APHA, 1905)

W.P. MasonPioneer in Sanitation Chemistry?