In this chapter of the virtual exhibition “Drought, Mud, Filth, and Flood: Water Crises in Australian Cities, 1880s–2010s,” the authors describe the ways in which infrastructure failed to keep pace with population growth in Melbourne, Victoria, and how residents developed their own means to overcome deficiencies. Residents of the postwar suburban frontier installed septic tanks and pan toilets, joined together to lay stormwater drains to improve the health and amenity of their local streets.

In “Another Silent Spring,” historian Donald Worster explains how human relations with other animals, wild and domestic, is at the core of a majority of epidemics.