On London Fogs. Addressed to all whom they concern, and respectfully dedicated to the London County Council.

CARPENTER, Alfred.

Published by Croydon Roffey & Clarke, 1890

First edition, presentation copy inscribed by the author; 8vo; first gathering loose, some spotting to contents as well as darkening and creasing of the lower corners; original light blue-green wrappers, facsimile title label to upper wrapper, wire-stitched, recently bound into dark blue wrappers, spine and lower corner of original wrapper repaired with tape, front blank endpaper attached to upper wrapper, good condition; 46pp. First and only edition of this rare pamphlet by a doctor and reformer imploring the London County Council to legislate against coal smoke. Presentation copy inscribed, 'With the author's comp[liments]. Worldcat locates only one institutional copy, at Bristol, and it is not listed in the authoritative volume London Fog by Christine Corton. Physician Alfred Carpenter (1825-1892) was educated at St. Thomas's Hospital and the London University, then worked in general practice in Croydon from 1852 to 1882, when he became a consultant. He was a noted reformer and philanthropist with strong interests in 'sewage irrigation, infectious disease and temperance' and he sat on the Croydon Local Board of Health, as well as holding office with the British Medical Association, National Association for the Promotion of Social Science, and the Sanitary Institute of Great Britain' (Cambridge, 'The Life and Times of Dr. Alfred Carpenter, UCL Doctoral Thesis). The present pamphlet, published to present to the London County Council, is a compilation of Carpenter's public statements about air pollution over the previous ten years, including letters to the editors of the Times and Pall Mall Gazette, and a longer address read at the Society of Arts in 1880. He makes the important point that, like sewage in the Thames (and the modern problem of climate change), air pollution was too large and diverse an issue to remedy on the individual or corporate level, and that government regulations were required to end the scourge. He writes in the introduction that, 'the steady increase of carbon, and its natural companions in the atmosphere of the Metropolitan area. in consequence of the wasteful expenditure of fuel used for warming and cooking purposes, leads me to appeal again to my countrymen. to take resolute steps to remedy this evil. It is capable of removal; it will pay for it, and is now only continued because that which is everybody's business is nobody's work. The duty is manifest; the evil is gigantic; the interests affected cannot be amalgmated by private means, so to overcome the inertia imposed by custom and social life. The development of London has been followed by the development of the London County Council. It seems to me to be the duty of the new creation to deal with this evil'. His suggestions include taxes and higher prices for fuel and stoves, stricter regulation of the sale of gas, and enforcement of laws against chimneys and railway engines that don't 'consume their own smoke'. Seller Inventory # 113144

Bibliographic Details

Title: On London Fogs. Addressed to all whom they ...
Publisher: Croydon Roffey & Clarke
Publication Date: 1890
Binding: Soft cover
Signed: Signed by Author(s)