N&W in 1909--New filter

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Bluefield Daily Telegraph
September 1, 1909

THE GRAHAM DAILY NEWS
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New Filter a Blessing
    Communities that are interested in cleaning their supply of drinking water from impurities might profit by investigating a new process in the way of a filter which has just been installed by the Norfolk and Western railroad at Williamson.  The new filter differs very materially from anything of the kind heretofore in use, and railroad men who have inspected it, are of the opinion that it will prove a blessing to humanity so unfortunate as to be deprived of access to pure spring water.  The new filter at Williamson is the result of the ingenuity of a Mr. Smith of Charleston, and he secured a patent on his invention.  The filter is constructed of a sort of net work of brass pipes, having slots so delicate that ordinary writing paper will not pass through them.  The whole arrangement is imbedded several feet under the creek bed and the mud and gravel in the bottom of the creek act in conjunction with the filter in catching the germs from the water.  The railroad company installed the filter for the use of their employes at Williamson who are forced to get their water for domestic purposes from Tug River.  The arrangement is right expensive, it would seem, as it cost nearly $15,000, but if the waters of Tug River at Williamson can be made pure by passing through it, it is cheap at most any cost.
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[Modern complex and expensive water purification plants must be superfluous if such a simple device turned the black water that flowed in Tug River in those days into pure, germ-free drinking water.]

Gordon Hamilton
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