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Description
This circa 1930 photograph shows the fountain in front of the Sacramento Filtration Plant. Built in 1923/24 under the design of Henry D. Dewell, the structure was the first water filtration complex west of the Rocky Mountains. Its design called for purification through rapid sand filtration. The structure, however, was not without issues. The city switched contractors early on, then, after the plant's completion in March of 1924, the taste of the water was an issue of considerable public frustration. Perhaps the most vexing of the issues was a wall collapse on one side of the plant and several pipe leaks that prevented full production for months. By the mid-1930s, however, the plant was operating at an annual profit of 50,000 dollars while pumping and purifying nearly 13,000,000 gallons of water a day.
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