Wacław Wojewódzki could not count on the kindness of his friends. Nobody greeted him anymore saying "good morning" or "good evening". Everyone asked right away, "When will there be water ?!" It is not surprising for them. The director had been managing the Sewage and Waterworks company for years, which was unable to put into use ... not a single pipe.
The anecdote about the offensive greetings was presented by the interested person himself. On November 2, 1938, he gave a radio talk, explaining to the citizens of Łódź why they still live in conditions that seem to be the darkest of ages. "Undoubtedly, the inhabitants of a city with a population of nearly 700,000 have the right to ask this question and be interested in the question of when Łódź will finally have healthy city water," he admitted defensively. But he didn't have good news at all.
From a short talk - then published on the pages of the "Journal of the City Council in Łódź" - you can learn that the works on the Łódź water supply system started already in ... 1909! At that time, plans were drawn up with different ways of delivering water to the city. It was possible to pump it from Pilica, 50 kilometers away, or from deep wells. A quarter of a century has passed and none of the variants have been realized.
Wacław Wojewódzki. Government commissioner, and then the head of the phantom waterworks in Łódź.
The magistrate moved from discussion to action only in 1934, opting for the minimum option. It was decided to dig five wells, assuming in advance that they would only provide water to certain districts. Costs were decisive - supplying the entire city would cost 50 million pre-war zlotys. And the city only wanted to spend half that amount.
The works dragged on, and in 1938 the second bore was only completed. Hundreds of thousands of Lodz citizens were still condemned to use water tanks and public baths. Wacław Wojewódzki assured that at least the water in the planned wells is "healthy, adequately soft, but has a greater than acceptable percentage of iron".
There was a need to build new installations, and work on the next wells was still delayed. The provincial governor emphasized that they seem to be moving forward, but it should be taken into account that Łódź is making pioneering deeds. And with such a calendar cannot be treated too restrictively.
In its residual form, the water supply network was not to be put into use until the second half of 1940. At that time, however, the "Aryan" Litzmannstadt was already lying in the place of Łódź ...
Source:
Trivia is the essence of our website. Short materials devoted to interesting anecdotes, surprising details from the past, strange news from the old press. Reading that will take you no more than 3 minutes, based on single sources. This particular material is based on:
- W. Wojewódzki, When will there be water in Łódź? , "Journal of the City Council in Łódź", No. 11 (1938), pp. 1099-1102.