Collect Pond, Manhattan
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anachronism - drainage connections predated collect's pollution era - loss of outlets prob contributed to pollution
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New York City's Collect Pond was a body of fresh water north of the original city on the southern tip of Manhattan, covering approximately 48 acres (194,000 m²) and running as deep as 50 feet (15 m). It was located just north of today's Foley Square and just west of modern Chinatown.
On a modern map, "the Collect" (as it was at the beginning of the 19th century) would be bisected between east and west by Centre Street, its northern edge almost touching Bayard Street (extended) and its southern edge clipped by Worth Street (former Anthony Street). Modern Baxter Street (former Orange Street) almost bordered the eastern edge of the pond at its bend.
As the city grew northward in the colonial era the Collect became an important source of fresh water. As municipal growth continued into the late 18th century, the pond (really a small lake) became polluted by seepage from privies and run-off from small industries, including tanneries, slaughterhouses and breweries.
Due to the extreme pollution, which had been implicated in small scale outbreaks of cholera and typhus, the Collect was condemned, and drained and filled in stages. A drainage canal was dug to both the Hudson and East rivers and was later filled in (present day Canal Street was built over it). Several decades would go by before New York City obtained a new, plentiful supply of fresh water from the Croton Aqueduct. The Five Points neighborhood, a notorious but vibrant slum, developed just off the former eastern bank of the Collect and owed its existence in some measure to the poor landfill job (completed in 1811) which created swampy, mosquito ridden conditions on land that had originally attracted more well-to-do residents.
New York's Tombs Prison, built on Centre Street in 1838, also stood over the site of the pond and was constructed on a huge platform of hemlock logs in an attempt to give it secure foundations. The prison building began to subside almost as soon as it was completed and was notorious for leaks on its lowest tier and for its general dampness throughout its life. When the original Tombs building was condemned and pulled down at the end of the century, builders sunk enormous concrete caissons to bedrock, up to 140 feet below street level, in order to give its replacement more secure foundations.