THE THAMES RAN FOUL: A SUMMER OF FILTH, 1858

The city of London breathed in the heat of summer, 1858. But it was not merely the sun that parched the metropolis. An even more unpleasant force infested its very heart: the River Thames. Years of industrial discharges had transformed London's lifeblood into a nauseating odor. The stench was all-consuming, a miasma that clung to every cobblestone

On a blustery morning in that fateful year, disaster unfolded Boston. A massive tank filled with sticky, sweet molasses ruptured sending a wall of of the thick liquid flowing through the streets. The force was catastrophic, crushing buildings and entombing residents in a treacly mass. Scores of people were killed, and many more suffered. The city