DON'T READ BEFORE DINNER

Jan 6, 2026

I’ve been thinking about the Great Victorian Manure Crisis, first introduced to me years ago on the Stuff You Missed in History Class podcast. That sent me on a binge of related shows — and here they are.

In the 19th century, cities depended on horses for transportation and freight. That meant huge amounts of manure, urine, and flies, along with dead animals in the streets and real public-health concerns. Some modern retellings exaggerate parts of the story — especially the famous “1894 conference” — but the basic problem was very real: horses created massive sanitation issues in crowded industrial cities.

The arrival of electric streetcars and then gasoline automobiles dramatically reduced the urban horse population, which also meant a big reduction in manure. So in that sense, motor vehicles helped solve one public-health problem while creating new ones of their own.