from Poisoning Paradise: An Environmental History of Madison
By Maria C. Powell, PhD
Oscar Mayer polluted the neighborhood and the lakes—while becoming one of the richest families in America
Oscar Mayer grew and profited financially in the 1950s—according to one company history, the decade was “the height of success for the Oscar Mayer plant in Madison.”[1] By 1954, about one third of Madison’s industrial workforce was employed by Oscar Mayer, which amounted to about 4,000 people. In 1957, following the death of Oscar F. Mayer, company headquarters moved from Chicago to Madison.[i]
By 1960, Oscar Mayer manufacturing included producing saran packaging and “vacuum-sealed, air-tight, full-view packages” for its products. It also developed the “wiener tunnel” or “hotdog highway”—a mile-long continuous wiener-linking process in which meat pudding was placed into cellulose casings 55 feet in length that was twisted at regular intervals to form wieners, producing 36,000 wieners an hour. In the early 60s, the company had 19 distribution centers across the country. In 1964, the company reported a record $280 million in sales; by 1968, it reached $481 million.[ii],[iii]
Fish are “frightened” to death by Oscar Mayer’s cooling water
Given this incredible growth, Oscar Mayer generated increasing amounts of wastewaters that went to city storm and sanitary sewers and then waterways. In December 1957, 13,000 game and panfish were killed in the Yahara River by Oscar Mayer’s 85-degree coolant water that emptied into the river at Johnson Street. Similar fish kills had occurred periodically over the previous five years. District Attorney Joseph Bloodgood, handling a “civil action” directed at the company by the state Conservation department and water pollution commission,” said approximately 2 million gallons of over 80 degree cooling water per day went into the Yahara River at that time. The coolant water, he said, had “contained no pollutional material”—the fish were killed because they “were suddenly frightened from the cold 34 degree strata below the 85 degree water above.” Fishery biologist from the university and conservation department concurred.[iv],[v]
Negotiations between the state and Oscar Mayer ensued. In March 1958, Bloodgood said they were “still in the talking stage” and that though the company had recognized its responsibility, “perhaps they could have moved a little faster, a little sooner.” His office wanted the fish kill stopped, and technically could sue the firm for as much as $28,000 in punitive damages for the dead fish” but “he did not want to go about it in any way that would cut down the plant’s operations because of its importance to the city economy” (emphasis added).
Oscar Mayer’s engineer said experiments by the university “proved his firm was dumping no toxic materials into the river,” and outlined six methods for cooling the water in a way that wouldn’t kill fish. One of them was to divert the water to the Burke plant (and then into Starkweather and Lake Monona), but he admitted that this would “probably only change the location of the problem.” Another was to divert the water directly into Starkweather, which would cost $60,000. Members of the Yahara Fisherman’s Club noted that “the company had been aware of the problem for several years without taking action” and demanded that the problem be fixed by the next fishing season.
Oscar Mayer faces increasing waste challenges, tries more “experiments”
In the early sixties, while MMSD began selling bonds to fund expansion, Oscar Mayer continued to experiment—as it had since the 1930s—with various strategies to better manage its offal and effluvia onsite and at Burke, which was at this point bordered on three sides by growing neighborhoods (the Truax landfill, airport and military base were to the northeast).[vi]
In late summer 1962, A. Stanford Johnson, the company’s sanitary engineer, announced that it had launched a $500,000 program to reduce waste in the plant and also expand its industrial waste treatment facilities, including the creation of “a new rotary distributor at the Burke plant” and pilot plant for studying industrial waste treatment “under the same conditions as full-scale operations.” City and national officials were very interested in the pilot plant project “as a means of studying methods for increasing the efficiency of existing facilities here and in other cities.”[2]
Johnson touted the company’s proactive approach to handling its wastes. “Our waste treatment program is more than adequate for our current needs,” he said, “but we always plan ahead up to 20 years to make sure that our disposal capacity keeps pace with the growth of the Oscar Mayer plant.” The “rotary distributor” at Burke, he explained, “sprays previously treated sewage over a bed of rock to facilitate biological action” and “the capacity can be increased as the need arises.” After this treatment at Burke, the waste was sent to Nine Springs before discharge to Badfish Creek. “No sewage is pumped into any of the lakes at any time,” he assured.[vii]
Starkweather Creek is a stinking drainage ditch, Board of Health directs Oscar Mayer to stop discharging wastes to it by 1968
Oscar Mayer’s promises and assurances were more than a little disingenuous, given that Burke plant effluents, and wastes from Oscar Mayer’s experiments continued to slosh into Starkweather Creek and then Lake Monona.
Starkweather deteriorated further, and city officials began discussing what to do about stormwater pollution into it and other city waters.[3] In 1961, as the city was considering covering “open stormwater ditches” in the city with concrete, an alder proposed covering Starkweather Creek as well.[viii]In 1963 the city biochemist Thayer Burnham announced a “twin education and inspection program…to prevent pollution of Madison’s lakes through its storm sewer system.” According to the State Journal, the city health department was “concerned with keeping substances such as oil, grease, and cleaning solvents out of the storm sewer system. When “problems of this sort” were encountered, they were turned over to building inspection “which attempts to trace the substances back to their source.”[ix],[4]
The next year, alders “decided to do battle with the ‘stinking green water’ of Starkweather Creek.” Adopting similar tactics used by lake activists decades before, one alder brought a “jar of green brackish water” from the creek to a council meeting. Another alder commented that “[t]he stench from this creek is something terrific.” The alders urged the city health department to do a study of the creek’s pollution problems.[x],[xi]
A few days later, a citizen wrote in to the Capital Times about the state of the creek. “The filth and rubbish of all kinds that stays right in one place,” he wrote, “is something terrible to behold.” He noted that while Madison was rated as the third or fourth most beautiful place to live in the United States, “evidently they [those rating the cities] did not drive near Starkweather Creek.”[xii]
The Common Council recommended that the plan commission survey the creek to facilitate cleaning it out, and a study aided by the State Committee on Water Pollution was initiated on sources of nutrients entering the creek.[xiii] With building pressure from citizens and alders, in 1964, the State Board of Health charged Oscar Mayer to “eliminate the discharge of organic wastes to Starkweather creek by July 1, 1968.”[xiv],[5]
Serious and silly solutions proposed
More proposals to fix the Starkweather Creek problems were put forward. In early 1965 an alder suggested that Starkweather should be flushed out with cooling water from Oscar Mayer. Oscar Mayer studied the possibility and concluded it would cost $60,000 and would not work because “the volume of water in the creek is not large enough to cool the water returned from the Mayer plant before it would enter Lake Monona.”[xv]
In 1967, the city removed 90 tons of debris from the creek. Boy Scouts did a cleanup day.[xvi] Countless creek cleanups had been done for decades already—the newspapers were full of stories and photos of various groups dragging garbage and debris from the creek.
Some observant residents, having watched this sad saga play out for a long time, resorted to irony. In 1966, a Madison resident wrote this tongue-in-cheek op-ed with a solution—just create fish that thrive in pollution: “Sirs–Perhaps your readers would like to know about one of the latest research projects being carried out here at the University of Wisconsin. Unlike most state-financed plans, this one is designed to save the taxpayer money. For an estimated $500,000 we can do away with all of these anti-water pollution programs which will obviously cost millions. The idea is to produce a fish that will live and multiply in our polluted waters, rather than clean up our lakes and streams. By crossing a bullhead with a garfish, we already have a fish (called a bullfish, or is it a garhead) that will thrive in Badfish and Starkweather creeks. This is fine for the present, but we’ll need a fish, tougher yet, to adapt as pollution gets worse. We have borrowed a little corner of the Nine Springs treatment plant where we hope to develop a strain that will be able to utilize paper mill wastes, sewage effluent, cheese plant overflow and all the other nutrients that are increasing in our lakes and rivers. This fish will be able to point his head upstream, open and close his mouth and grow fat. Other plans are in the offing, but this should satisfy the next generation of fishermen.”[xvii]
Madison officials blame Lake Monona, wind, and neighborhood lawns for “less than perfumy” Starkweather stench—and an alderman proposes “closing” the creek
As the city debated solutions, the Starkweather Creek stench grew even worse. A 1967 Capital Times story, “Creek Stench Irks Area Residents” began with a comment from a “housewife” who lived along the creek. “You’ll need a gas mask to go near it,” she warned. “Other housewives” chimed in with their complaints. “Clothes hung out on the line pick up such a smell, you have to wash them over again,” one said. “You have to breathe through your mouth around here. Some of us had a picnic last week, and we could hardly eat. The food even tasted bad.” One said her kids rarely go outside, and another added, “What’s the use of complaining. It’s been this way for years. Nobody’s going to do anything about it.”
Mayor Fesge and Dr. Charles Kincaid, Director of Public Health, explained that that the stench is caused by scum and algae that float up from Lake Monona. “If the Lake Monona shoreline could be cleaned up,” he said, “it would help the situation. Otherwise, it may be necessary to eventually close up the creek.” [xviii] Madison Public Health Department’s Thayer Burnham explained further to the Wisconsin State Journal. “There’s not enough force in the stream to push the stuff back out” into the lake, he said. Kincaid attributed the “less than ‘perfumy’ situation to the swampy nature of the creek, runoff from neighborhood lawns, and of course the pesky algae…I don’t know if anything can be done effectively to solve this,” he opined. “I wish the wind was in another direction, if it came from the northeast we might not have this.”
Mayor Fesge ordered the Fire Department to flush out the “offending material” into the lake, and if that didn’t work, the city would resort to chemicals.[xix] Health officials said they were hopeful that “someday people will not have to hold their noses while enjoying parts of Madison’s lakes, but in the meantime a clothes pin will be required gear.”[xx]
Citizen accuses Alderman of “haphazard thinking”—and asks him to stop polluters
In newspaper stories, Madison leaders and public health officials didn’t mention pollution from Oscar Mayer or other industries along the creek as potential pollution sources.
Citizens were not duped. Following these stories, a resident wrote an angry letter to the Capital Times, ridiculing the “haphazard thinking” of the alderman who proposed closing the creek. “Doesn’t Alderman Crary realize that Starkweather Creek itself is one of the biggest contributors to the present pollution of Lake Monona?” Why did Crary even report the Starkweather stench to public health officials “who have heard the same story for years,” he asked, adding that “both, if pressed, will admit that Starkweather carries a terrific load of industrial waste into the lake.”
He went on, ridiculing the proposed solutions. “To shut off such convenient arteries of waste disposal by closing up Starkweather Creek to Lake Monona is wishful thinking and Crary knows it,” he wrote. “He suggests the possibility of calling in the Fire Dept. to flush out the present mess in hopes the problem will disappear like a dream into Lake Monona. Such an act of shoving something you don’t want into the laps of someone else has been the main reason for the present day near destruction of much of our once beautiful waterways.”
Crary should look to the Yahara Fisherman’s Club, he proposed, which “has diligently fought the condition” of Starkweather for years, documenting “proof of deliberate dumping of industrial waste” into the creek. “So let’s get at it Alderman. You can’t close Starkweather Creek, thus half drowning your constituents each spring, but you can do a big job by fighting to put a stop to the polluters who are slowly but surely destroying not only the creek but the waters of Lake Monona as well.”[xxi]
First Earth Day at Oscar Mayer: Spray chemical perfumes on the stench!
In 1967, the state Division of Resource Development, which later that year merged with the Conservation Department to form the Department of Natural Resources, ordered Oscar Mayer to put dikes around its Burke sludge lagoons and heighten irrigations fields “to prevent overflow into Starkweather Creek. According to newspaper, Oscar Mayer did this to the Division’s satisfaction.[6]
The company continued to have problems with sewage overflowing into storm sewers. A letter from a plant engineer to Madison’s Director of Public Health said they had corrected overflow problems from the Commercial Avenue sewage pumping station and from the tank car grease loading areas—but that there were additional areas where contaminants could still reach the storm sewer system “under certain combinations of weather conditions. These areas included a “grease loading spot, a bacon grease loading area, and contaminated water flowing off the stockyards. Oscar The company, he said, was “requesting funds for corrective action” for these areas.[xxii]
The year 1970 also marked the beginning of the country’s “environmental decade,” with rising public concern about environmental pollution and ecological destruction. Increased awareness of these problems was prompted, in part, by Rachel Carson’s seminal book Silent Spring eight years earlier. Madison was at the epicenter of the environmental movement; many Earth Day (E-Day) presentations, marches, rallies, and much more happened all over the city in spring 1970. United States Senator Gaylord Nelson (D-Wis) was among the key political leaders who inspired this organizing.
In early April, next to an article announcing that Senator Nelson would be the headliner at the upcoming Madison E-Day rally, the Capital Times reported that Oscar Mayer would install a mile-long “deodorizing spray system” around the Burke treatment plant “in a major step aimed at reducing objectionable odors” in the neighborhood. The system would include “a network of 170 individual, atomizer-like sprayheads” that would cover the entire lagoon and filter areas with “a chemically-treated mist…designed to neutralize odors common to treatment plants.” The system, still in its development phase, would cost about $50 a day to operate.
Oscar Mayer’s sanitary engineer admitted that “we are not convinced that this system will solve the odor problem completely.” Nevertheless, he felt it would “result in improvements” and could eventually lead to “virtual elimination of odor.” Further, he assured that “the odors are not air pollutants in the usual sense and are not harmful to health.” He didn’t provide any information about the chemical makeup of the perfume mists.[xxiii]
According to the Wisconsin State Journal, Oscar Mayer hoped “to exchange the strong for the sweet,” which would “exchange the characteristic odor wafting off its East Side sewage treatment plant for that of new mown hay” and “lilac, cinnamon, carnation, citrus, mint, and bouquet.” One odor at a time would be misted over the area, alternating each day.[xxiv]
Perfume doesn’t work and Oscar Mayer stench battles continue. What to do? More studies!
A few months after the perfume treatment began, the State Journal reported that Oscar Mayer was negotiating with the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District to send its wastewater directly to the Nine Springs plant, which a company official said “would eliminate the odors which are now a problem at the Burke treatment plant…” The sewerage district said it had hired an engineering firm to study the plan, but it would take at least two or three years before the switch could be made.
Around this time, an alder called a meeting about Oscar Mayer and Burke stench and air pollution problems, and about forty residents attended. The community had also been complaining about smoke emissions from Oscar Mayer’s several coal burning boilers, and the Capital Community Citizens charged that the emissions were violating city ordinances. In May 1971, Oscar Mayer announced that it would convert one of its remaining coal burning boilers to natural gas (leaving two coal burners on the site).[xxv] When a young man at the meeting suggested that the company should “use more expensive fuel to reduce air pollution,” an Oscar Mayer official said this would force the company out of business and advised the man to “go back to the University and take an economics class.” The man accused the company of being “too concerned about making profits.”[xxvi],[7]
As for the effectiveness of the perfume experiments, the City Health Director Dr. C. K. Kincaid said the smell at the treatment lagoons had been “fierce” in the past, but after installation of new equipment–presumably referring to the perfume sprayers–“the fierce odor has not recurred.” But he then added that “[t]his doesn’t mean it smells good. Far from it. But I don’t think any sewage treatment can be completely odor-free.” Nevertheless, Oscar Mayer hired a consulting firm “to see if an odor-free treatment process can be found.”
Oscar Mayer thrives, odor abatement efforts fail (again)
By 1970, Oscar Mayer was the seventh-largest meat processing company in the country in terms of sales, and was considered “a leading innovator” in the meat packing and processing industry.[8] In 1971, Oscar Mayer’s Madison plant was the company’s headquarters and also its largest facility. It went public that year.[9] Clearly the company was doing very well.
It was also producing more wastes than ever. The odors from the Burke plant apparently continued largely unabated despite the chemical spraying and other odor control efforts. In March 1971, the State Justice Department recommended that the DNR order Oscar Mayer “to take immediate steps toward odor abatement on Madison’s East Side”—to eliminating odors by the fall of the year. The public intervener from the Department suggested that a dome be placed over the wastewater filter beds, but Oscar Mayer “balked” at the expense. DNR also recommended that Oscar Mayer submit a report within six months on whether it would be feasible to send its wastes directly to the Nine Springs plant.[xxvii]
Neighbors complained to city officials about how stench from Burke affected their property values.[xxviii] Early the following year, Oscar Mayer announced that it would spend $440,000 on a new wastewater filtering treatment system on factory grounds that would dewater sludge, producing a dry, compressed cake that would go to landfills or to “a compost manufacturing company.” The company would also install a new trickle bed filtering system at Burke that it claimed would “eliminate practically all odors.” The “expanded spray system for neutralizing odors” (the perfume misting system), company officials said, had already reduced odors over the past year.[xxix]
Four years after the Department of Justice’s order to abate odors—and over fifty years since neighbors began complaining about horrific odors from the Burke plant– it was clear that none of the many odor abatement strategies attempted at the Burke plant worked very well. A 1975 article in the Wisconsin State Journal reported that “attempts by the company to control odors…have failed or have been only partially successful.” The dewatering system reduced odors by 50 per cent, Oscar Mayer’s public relations person said, “but how does someone know when they’re smelling only half the bad odors they smelled before?”
So Oscar Mayer was considering investing a million dollars in yet another wastewater treatment system “that will be odorless to its neighbors on the city’s northeast side” and was undergoing an eight month, $25,000 pilot study of the system, called “Bio-Surf,” at the factory. If the system was effective, it would replace the Burke plant.[xxx]
Oscar Mayer’s wastes pollute the whole Rock River watershed, not just Starkweather
Many decades after heated public debates began about the effects of Madison’s sewage on downstream lakes, and over a decade since most of the city’s sewage was diverted to the Nine Springs sewage plant, Oscar Mayer’s sewage and other wastes were still having a significant impact on all the Yahara lakes and further downstream into the Rock River watershed.
In 1970, The Capital Times published a piece by a UW group called Engineers and Scientists for Social Responsibility titled “City, Area Sewage Exacts Heavy Toll on Rock River Drainage Basin. It included a large photo of Starkweather Creek with caption: “Starkweather Creek, which flows into Lake Monona on the East Side near Olbrich Park, shows signs of being unbalanced. The probable polluter is Oscar Mayer and Company, which has received a federal grant for a study of the problem.”[xxxi],[10],[11] In 1971 a front page story appeared in the Cap Times—“Oscar Mayer Blamed for Sewage in Lakes.”[xxxii]
Residents of the lower lakes, as they had for decades, blamed Madison for pollution discharged from the Nine Springs plant into Badfish Creek and then the Rock River. “There is evidence of physical, chemical, and biological deterioration of the creek in our county since Madison started discharging effluent from its plant into it,” the Rock County environmental protection administrator said.[xxxiii] Badfish Creek, downstream residents said, was “once a trout stream” but now “is badly polluted as a result” of the sewerage district’s pollution. DNR asked the sewerage district to remove nitrogen and phosphorus from effluents, but the district would be allowed to continue to discharge effluent into Badfish Creek.[xxxiv],[xxxv]
“Bureaucratic buckpassing” as Oscar Mayer’s sewage poses “potential ecological disaster”
While downstream neighbors complained about the Nine Springs plant’s discharges into Badfish Creek and the Rock River, Oscar Mayer wanted to send all of its sewage to Nine Springs. Its sewage was clearly overwhelming city sewage systems.[xxxvi] Raw and partially-treated sewage from the company was overflowing from a manhole in front of Oscar Mayer, then flowing into storm drains leading to the Yahara River. Waste water, the Cap Times reported, also “squeezes out of another manhole, south of the Burke Treatment Plant…and if the pressure is great enough, it blows the manhole right off” and then flows to a storm sewer to Starkweather Creek.[xxxvii]
City engineers knew about the problem as early as 1967, and had suggested steps to correct it, but action had been “forestalled by bureaucratic buckpassing.” A “City Hall source” was quoted: “Everyone has known about this for some time, and everyone expected someone else to do something about it.” The city asked Oscar Mayer to lessen the amount of wastewater it sent to the sewage system, but company officials felt the burden should be on the city, since the system served other parts of the northeast side.[12]
Following the Capital Times expose, an alderman said he would ask the Madison Rivers and Lakes Commission to conduct “a full-scale investigation” into the sewage overflow problem, which he called “a potential ecological disaster.” The investigation would aim to make sure all necessary actions are taken at once to provide relief to the Burke outfall, “to find out why the problem reached the crisis stage without remedial action on the part of city, Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District or Oscar Mayer authorities,” and implement programs to prevent it from happening again. “The Madison lakes system can ill afford abuses of this nature,” the alder said.[xxxviii]
Madison engineer, Donald Theobald, admitted that the sewage from the Burke outfall had occasionally overflowed for several years, but that the problem had become more severe recently, with overflows occurring several times a week. However, he said, the wastes were diluted by the time they reached the waterways, and “there isn’t really a great health problem being created. It’s the nutrients that are primarily my concern.” He blamed the problem on recent north side developments and “increased operations at Oscar Mayer.”[xxxix] The city and MMSD were building another sewer line to serve the area, which would be completed by the end of the year.[13]
City engineers test Oscar Mayer discharges
In 1971, City Engineering published a report, “Status Report on Sampling–Investigating the Oscar Mayer Area Sewerage System for Surface Water Pollution.” The report, according to a later document, “mainly documented the pollution problems as reported for a number of years concerning the discharge of industrial waste waters and overflow of sanitary sewerage to the Oscar Mayer area storm sewer, and “floating and suspended fatty materials.”
Following from this report, city engineers further assessed the quality of Oscar Mayer storm sewer discharges, “with the principal objective of locating the source of floating and suspended fatty materials which were being discharged periodically to the Yahara River.” The Madison Rivers and Lakes Commission also asked city engineers to test Oscar Mayer cooling waters, also called “clear” waters, to “see if they are ecologically compatible for adding to the flow of Starkweather Creek.” Engineers would assess the amount of phosphorus in these waters, as well as “identify the odor causing substance in the Packer’s and Roth storm sewer catch basin,” and “measure the extent of the plastic materials in the Packer’s and Roth storm sewer catch basin.” [14]
The results of these investigations were summarized in a report dated January 1972, by Bernard Saley of the City Engineering Department.[xl] Phosphorus, the investigation found, was “regularly discharged” at levels well above background (groundwater) levels (0.01 to 0.08 mg/L P or 0.03 to 0.25 mg/L PO4) from all the sample sites, with the highest concentrations of 7.5 mg/L PO4 (media 6.6 mg/L) at the Commercial Avenue storm sewer.[15]
“Visual observation” and “odor recognition” revealed “floating materials, suspended substances, and particular odors.” Fatty materials accumulated in a fish net at the Johnson Street outfall at the Yahara River, and “bits and pieces of colored plastics” were seen “floating from the Packers and Roth North storm line.” As for the odor at that catch basin, Saley wrote that it “still remains a mystery but the burning sensation produced on the skin upon exposure was positively documented on several occasions.”
Phosphorus and plastics in Oscar Mayer’s stormwater discharges—are they problems?
Saley’s report concluded that “the high level of phosphates” in Oscar Mayer’s cooling waters is “of major concern,” because the composite water from all cooling water “represents a substantial discharge of phosphorus to Lake Monona. He surmised that the primary source of the phosphorus was the Commercial Avenue storm discharge from the company and “undoubtedly is the waste water, in part, from water treatment processes associated with water cooling and heating equipment.”
Saley cited a 1966 scientific study suggesting that in waters that already had high phosphorus levels, more phosphorus wouldn’t worsen the growth of algae and nuisance aquatic weeds, and another in 1970 showing otherwise—that reducing phosphorus inputs, even partially, does improve lake water quality. Following from these contradictory findings, he opined that “the effects of nutrient discharges is extremely complicated and beyond the scope of this report and “open for further discussion and interpretation by the scientific community. This caveat aside, he offered his opinion that “[b]ased upon the generally accepted conclusion that increased amounts of the fertilizer element phosphorus in lakes and streams produces increased productivity of nuisance type organisms, then the effects would certainly be judged to be deleterious. A more rational interpretation would, however, be that unless the sources of phosphorus are shut off or reduced there is really no hope of ever reducing the phosphorus concentration below the critical optimum growth level.”
He went on with scathing comments on how this situation had been allowed with no questions. “It seems absurd that this phosphate laden water or so called “clear” water from the Oscar Mayer Co. has been allowed to discharge into the Yahara River (eventually Lake Monona) without any serious questions being asked about the water quality,” he noted. “Unless the phosphate levels are reduced to background levels (ground water) it seems inconceivable that these “clear” waters would be suitable for discharge into Starkweather Creek or any other of our lakes and streams in the Madison area.”
On the “bits and pieces” of plastics found in the Packers and Roth North storm sewer line, Saley opined that they “in themselves do not constitute any important pollutional threat.”[16] However, he noted that “[t]heir presence does indicate the potential for discharge of other wastes since such extraneous materials suggests that the cooling water system is ‘open” for the entrance of pollutants.”
[1] In 1950, the “Slice-Pak” was introduced, which is still used today and known as “Serve ‘n Seal.” This was the industry’s first vacuum-sealed package for meat products. In 1967, the company developed a rigid form of the “Serv ‘N Seal” package for luncheon meats and larger quantities of select meats for easier refrigerator storage. (Winterhalter, 2019)
[2] In 1966 (according to a 1996 Wisconsin State Journal article), Oscar G. Mayer Jr. was elected chairman of Scientific Protein Laboratories in Waunakee “to manufacture pharmaceutical and chemical products from byproducts of processing operations.” This may have been related to efforts to reduce animal wastes from the factory’s processes. Another article says SPL was created in 1976; it’s not clear which one is correct.
[3] Around this time, the city began making plans to develop the Worthington neighborhood along the creek. 1962.4.24 WSJ
[4] This article contains some amusing statements by Burnham about how oil isn’t really harmful to the creek or fish.
[5] The Truax military base also continued to cause Starkweather creek pollution. In 1967, the Madison Police traced an old slick to Truax Field that stretched all the way to Milwaukee Street and “saturated the feathers of a number of wild ducks that make their home on the creek.” Apparently about 2500 gallons of fuel oil leaked from a tank doing repair of an oil burner at the base. City biochemist Thayer Burnham with the City Health Department said “little or none of the oil got into Lake Monona…the biggest share of the oil was caught in the Truax drainage system and in vegetation along the creek to the north.” 1967.7.24. WSJ, 1967.7.25 WSJ
[6] The WDNR was created through the 1967 merger of two Wisconsin state agencies: The Conservation Department and The Department of Resource Development. This merger was designed to reduce the number of agencies and streamline operations. The governor at the time was Warren P. Knowles.See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisconsin_Department_of_Natural_Resources
[7] In 2018, some older residents we surveyed in the Truax neighborhood—who as children played near the Burke treatment plant area—shared memories of the disgusting smells, perfume experiments, and “grease balls” floating from the sewage effluent ditch.
[8] The company also employed 10,800 people nationwide and operated seven major plants and 36 distribution centers.
[9] Oscar Mayer had other plants located in Davenport, Iowa; Los Angeles; Philadelphia; Perry, Iowa; Beardstown, Illinois; and Nashville. By the end of the decade, Oscar Mayer had acquired Clausen Pickle Company, Louis Rich, Inc., and Chef’s Pantry, Inc., in an effort to diversify its product lineup (Winterhalter, 2019).
[10] The article referred to a 1962-1963 Rock River Drainage Basin Report that led to pollution abatement orders to Oscar Mayer in 1964, that it said it had complied with. Another survey had been done in 1969, but had not been published yet
[11] 1970.8.25—water pollution laws
[12] Another problem was that the city had encouraged industrial and commercial development at Truax Field, which a 1967 engineering report warned would “increase the problem now existing on the Burke outfall.” A city insider said “There is a big bombshell here. It is the implicit suggestion that building should be held up until we get some relief in the sewer situation. But I doubt that you’ll get anyone willing to recommend publicly that development of the Truax Air Park be delayed.”
[13] Opponents of the new sewer line argued that it would attract development and urban sprawl. Theobald said “You have to weigh the increase in urban sprawl against the benefits of keeping effluent out of the Yahara River and the lakes.” 1971.2.15 CT
[14] At that time, the report said, the Federal Water Pollution Control Agency suggested “a desirable guideline for phosphorus (total) of 0.1 mg/L for rivers and 0.05 mg/L where streams enter lakes or reservoirs. Laboratory tests show that algae blooms may be expected when other conditions are favorable at between 0.01 and 0,05 mg/L of available (soluble) phosphorus. It is generally accepted that total phosphorus is the governing parameter since the insoluble or unavailable forms of phosphorus ultimately supply the soluble or available phosphorus required for the growth of aquatic plants.”
[15] This background level was from “Report on the Nutrient Sources of Lake Mentoa”, 1966, by the Technical Committee of the Lake Mendota Problems Committee. The value 0.01 mg/L was from a City of Middleton well. The City of Madison considered 0.08 mg/L (0.25 mg/L PO4) as an average value for City tap water.
[16] Though knowledge about the toxicity of plastics and plastics compounds/byproducts was less in the 1970s than it is now, there was already some scientific awareness that these compounds were harmful to humans and the environment.
[i] “Madison’s First 50 Years.”; Levitan, 201; “Timeline…”; “A Constant Search for Innovation.”
[ii] Winterhalter, 2019
[iii] 1981.2.1 WSJ
[iv] 1958.2.27. CT
[v] 1958.3.5 WSJ
[vi] 1961.6.1 CT
[vii] 1962.8.2 CT
[viii] 1961.2.24 CT
[ix] 1963.6.1 WSJ
[x] 1964.8.19 WSJ
[xi] 1964.9.25 WSJ
[xii] 1964.9.28 CT
[xiii] 1965.1.13. CT
[xiv] 1964.10.31 WSJ
[xv] 1965.1.13 CT
[xvi] 1967.2.14 WSJ, 1967.4.9 WSJ
[xvii] 1966.2.21 WSJ
[xviii] 1967.9.25 CT
[xix] 1967.9.25 CT
[xx] 1967.9.26 WSJ
[xxi] 1967.9.28 CT
[xxii] 1967.5.3. OM to city on storm sewer probs (in Truax count files).
[xxiii] 1970.4.6 CT
[xxiv] 1970.4.7 WSJ
[xxv] 1971.5.12 CT.
[xxvi] 1970.6.26 WSJ
[xxvii] 1971.3.26 WSJ, 1971.3.26 CT
[xxviii] 1971.10.3. CT
[xxix] 1972.1.22 WSJ
[xxx] 1975.4.13 WSJ
[xxxi] 1970.4.1 CT
[xxxii] 1971.2.12 CT
[xxxiii] 1971.3.26 WSJ
[xxxiv] 1971.4.8 CT, 1971.4.8 WSJ
[xxxv] 1971.4.8 CT, 1971.4.8 WSJ
[xxxvi] 1970.8.2 WSJ
[xxxvii] 1971.2.12 CT
[xxxviii] 1971.2.13 CT
[xxxix] 1971.2.13 WSJ
[xl] 1972.1 Saley stormwater report
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