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[p. 31] has not the trite saying, ‘Truth is stranger than fiction,’ been proven over and over again?

If the people of this town a century or seventy-five years ago had then been told what their descendants would be enjoying and using today in way of water supply would it not have seemed an incredible tale even though they knew of the aqueducts and luxurious baths of old Rome? Would they not have marveled at the immense reservoirs, at the great mains that thread our streets, the smaller pipes that run through streets and lofty houses; at the ponderous hydraulic machinery that is the great moving power of the Metropolitan Water System?

This elaborate service of the State supplies nineteen cities and towns with water, the main source being located in Clinton, Mass., in the middle of the Commonwealth, nearly fifty miles away. Several cities and towns within the prescribed circle, the radius of which is ten miles from the State House, are furnishing their own water, but at any time, any within this circle are privileged to become a part of the Metropolitan service. Swampscott, outside of this district, is supplied by a special arrangement.

The Metropolitan Water District comprises three water sheds, the Nashua, Sudbury and Cochituate, drawing from an area of 212.30 square miles. The number of people supplied is close to the million mark, the latest estimate given at the office of the board being 980,900. Through open channels, and by aqueducts, water is conveyed from one reservoir to another, so the water you draw today from your faucet is a composite, a mingling of many distant springs and sources. The area of the district supplied is 171.7 square miles.

The system has five great pumping stations besides smaller ones, ten distributing reservoirs and ten storage reservoirs.

Medford, within the district, with a population of nearly 21,000, supplies every house with drinking water, furnishes each family enough for household needs, every

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