Omaha's trash story is no waste of time.

Omaha’s city engineer copied St. Louis using garbage scows to dump its refuse into the Mississippi River.

Thus in the late 1880s, Missouri River water downstream from Omaha was hardly (Andrew) Rosewater.

He was among the earliest to tackle the trash problem of a growing city that, through the years, has used dumps, boats, incinerators, compactors and, most recently, large landfills as solutions.

“While Omaha is located in one of the most healthy climates in the whole country, shall our neighbors and children continue to die by scores because it would be a little trouble to remove the filth of stables, breweries and like places beyond the city limits?” a letter to the Nebraska Republican asked in 1864.

City ordinances banned dumping in streets and alleys, but those often were ignored. The city marshal in 1877 was told to stop the dumping from 14th to 16th, Webster to Burt Streets.

Poor sanitation came to a head in 1880. Mortality rates from diphtheria, malaria and typhoid fever were the highest in U.S. cities in July. The Rev. A.F. Sherrill of the Congregational Church, in a sermon, said, “You can hardly go around a square without coming upon some drains or piles of decaying garbage.”

Charles Splitt was appointed as the first city scavenger. He had been a trash man since his arrival in Omaha in 1873. Families were urged to have a garbage barrel for Splitt to dump in his cart.

Splitt’s request for a city dump was granted in 1885. On the Missouri River at the foot of Jones Street, the dump was prone to smoldering fires and poor families living in shanties in the bottom land picked through it for discarded food.

The same day as another dump fire, Rosewater went to the City Council with his garbage boat proposal. He had been to St. Louis to study their waste solution.

Two scows were built, their launch coming July 23, 1886. One was anchored at the foot of Davenport Street, where a dump was added, and the other at the original dump. They would sail past the south city limits before releasing their “cargo.”

Splitt soon was part of a six-man collection force. He eventually split for a similar role in new South Omaha.

As the city’s first garbage inspector in 1888, L.A. Goldsmith kept the boats in the water. They went into drydock by 1890, but the practice of dumping garbage into the river continued from shore.

The city board of health in 1894 established two new dumps, at the foot of Poppleton Avenue and in the Gibson district east of what is now First and Spring Streets. The Gibson dump closed after two weeks because it was farther from the river than had been stated.

Upset that both dumps were south of Dodge Street, Northsiders made their own, on swampy land from 11th and Izard Streets to 13th and Grace Streets.

It was just the start of dumps, mostly unauthorized, across the city in all directions. By city ordinance, dumps could not be within three miles of the city limits and the city dump had to be along the river between Mason Street and the alley between Farnam and Harney Streets.

That ban was largely ignored, even by officials.

In 1902, the city dump again was at the foot of Jones Street. Other dumping grounds that the city tolerated were at 10th and Nicholas Streets, 11th and Grace, the foot of Davenport Street, 21st and Paul Streets, 17th and Pierce Streets, 45th and Dodge Streets, 36th Street and Poppleton Avenue and 13th and Locust Streets.

The river bottoms, including Carter Lake, northeast of downtown, were used for the next 50 days as city dumps. Among the locations were 11th and Ohio Streets, Sixth and Grace Streets, Willow Creek east of Carter Lake, north of Carter Lake (which closed once Carter Boulevard was built) and East Locust Street.

George Green ran the Locust Street dump until sent to the state penitentiary on a motor vehicle homicide conviction. Once out, he operated a private dump next door.

Some of Omaha’s finest neighborhoods, including Prettiest Mile, Field Club and Bemis Park, dealt with dumping at times

Prettiest Mile’s eyesore was at 21st and Browne Streets, to the south of today’s Florence Tower.

Health Department inspector C.C. Hall, who could be unsympathetic to complaints, said in 1926, “If the people in that neighborhood will just sit still and keep their mouths shut we’ll have the dump filled in another year.”

Field Club’s was at 35th and Hickory Streets, where Field Club Elementary has been rebuilt.

Responding to a resident’s concerns about that dumping ground, Hall said: “Let him put up with the rats. We’re trying to get that hole filled. Although he doesn’t know it, (his) house is on ground filled in with tin cans.”

The dump near Bemis Park was at 31st and Cuming Streets, across from Technical High School (now the Omaha Public Schools offices).

What the city considered legal dumping sites in 1926 were Fifth and Seward Streets, 37th and Lake Streets, 31st and Wright Streets, 22nd and Leavenworth Streets, 30th and Hunt Streets, 42nd and Leavenworth Streets, 49th and Pacific Streets, 22nd and O Streets, 25th Street north of Reed Street, the north side of Blondo between 51st and 52nd Streets, Sixth and Martha Streets, 23rd and Valley Streets, M Street between 22nd and 23rd Streets, 49th Street between Lafayette Avenue and Hamilton Street and Sixth and Cedar Streets.

South Omaha’s ravines were an area favored for city dumps and unwanted dumps, including 13th and Frederick Streets, 27th and Center Streets, 16th and Spring Streets, Fourth and Bancroft Streets, 21st and Missouri Avenue, 14th and I Streets, 16th and Q Streets, 20th and H Streets, 21st and O Streets and in Spring Lake Park.

Benson’s dumps through the years included 64th and Grant Streets (when Benson was still a town),75th and Maple Streets, 58th and Burdette Streets and 48th Street and Bedford Avenue. Ralston’s was near the closed Seymour Lake Country Club. Florence’s were north of the town and at the foot of Craig Street.

Neighborhood dumps came and went, often covered with fill and repurposed, including those at 49th and Decatur Streets, Saddle Creek Road and Poppleton Avenue, 36th and Oak Streets, 51st and Lake Streets, 47th and Military Avenues, 64th and Grover Streets, 45th and Center Streets, 50th and G Streets and near the Florence boat yard.

After World War II, there had been 200 unofficial and illegal dumps, rat-infested and often with smoldering fires. By 1960, the number was about a dozen. Neighborhoods during that era also were asking the city to fill ravines and waste areas from landfill.

City garbage and trash collection began in 1954, the year an incinerator opened at Sixth and Seward Streets. The primary city landfill was at 20th and M Streets, where a 60-foot hole would be covered in the early 1960s with fill from a steep hill three blocks away.

After that landfill closed, Omaha took its trash to a landfill on the Iowa side of the Mormon Bridge.

Douglas County opened its first landfill at 110th Street and West Maple Road — today’s Hefflinger Park — and ordered the closing of 13 private dumps in 1967.

Ralph Hefflinger was a county commissioner who led the search for a landfill site. His first choice had been 186th and Pacific Streets. Hefflinger Park once had ballfields. But its soil isn’t compacted enough for them, so a dogpark and BMX track have replaced them.

In only six years, the West Maple landfill was full. Its replacement could have been 160 acres at 144th Street on West Maple, but it went to 126th and State Streets.

Some of the city’s first bales from its new compaction plant in 1976, which replaced the incinerator, went to the landfill before a ravine at Fifth and Cedar Streets was ready. Those 56 acres — today’s Lauritzen Gardens — were used until 1981, when the city contracted to have its waste taken to landfills outside the county.

After the State Street landfill was filled, 16 years after opening and in part because the city began using it, in 1989 Waste Management of Nebraska opened the 82-acre Douglas County RDF (Recycling and Disposal Facility) northwest of 216th Street and Nebraska Highway 36.

Its lifespan was 14 years. Its successor has a much longer life expectancy.

Pheasant Point, on 152 acres across 216th Street to the east, is expected to handle our waste – and the next several generations – before reaching capacity in the 2100s.

Coming this year is a renewable gas facility, collecting biogas from decomposition in the landfill, that will power 850 trucks and 20,000 homes.

One person’s trash is a small city’s energy. And it doesn’t float downstream.