Old Croton Aqueduct

Old Croton Aqueduct
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. National Historic Landmark
Ventilator No. 16, Irvington, New York (May 2005)
Location of Croton Aqueduct
Nearest city	New York City, New York
Built	1837-1842
Architect	John B. Jervis; David Douglass; James Renwick, Jr.
NRHP Reference #	74001324
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	December 2, 1974
Designated NHL	April 27, 1992

The Croton Aqueduct or Old Croton Aqueduct was a large and complex water distribution system constructed for New York City between 1837 and 1842. It was one of the first great modern aqueducts and transported water by the force of gravity alone 41 miles (66 km) from the Croton River in Westchester County into reservoirs in Manhattan, where local water resources had become polluted and inadequate for the growing population of the city. Although the aqueduct was supplemented and largely superseded by the New Croton Aqueduct, which was built in 1890, the Old Croton Aqueduct remained in service until 1955.

The island of Manhattan, surrounded by brackish rivers, had a limited supply of fresh water available, which dwindled as the city grew rapidly after the American Revolutionary War, and fresh water sources became polluted by effluent. Before the aqueduct was constructed, residents of New York obtained water from cisterns, wells, natural springs, and other bodies of water. But rapid population growth in the 19th century, and encroachment on these areas as Manhattan moved further north of Wall Street, led to the pollution of many local fresh water sources. Below Grand Street, a small number of well-off customers of the Manhattan Company had fresh water delivered to them, but that company was actually more focused on banking – it eventually became Chase Manhattan – and only paid as much attention on its water activities as it needed to not lose the state charter that allowed it to bank. The poor and the rest of the city were forced to rely on well water, often made palatable by adding alcoholic spirits, prompting temperance campaigners to call vigorously for the municipal provision of water.

The unsanitary conditions caused an increase in disease. Epidemics of yellow fever ravaged the city. A polluted aquifer, overcrowded housing, the lack of sewers, public ignorance of basic sanitary conditions, and the existence of polluting industries near wells and residential areas contributed to an unprecedented mortality rate of 2.6% (1 death per 39 inhabitants) in 1830. Then in 1832 cholera first reached New York in the deadliest epidemic to that date. The need for a new supply of fresh water was crucial.