Our modern model of garbage collection—put the bags or bins on the curb and city employees or contractors will collect it—seems to become widespread only after World War II.

By our standards, the premodern city produced relatively little refuse. Kitchen refuse fed nearby animals, kept either by the family or allowed to roam the streets. Charles Dickens noted the pigs roaming New York streets in 1842, even Broadway. The occasional crate or carton could be reused or easily burned on site much of the year. Other garbage was discarded in the street, where scavengers would pick through it for anything that could be sold or salvaged; or was thrown down the privy pit.

But even modest amounts of putrescent garbage became problematic as cities grew. A 1795 ordinance prohibited storage of refuse and dumping in the streets of Georgetown (now part of Washington, DC). With no municipal refuse collection, this meant homeowners had to hire private carters to carry it to a remote dump. Cities typically hired private contractors to periodically clean the streets, and in 1858 Washington seems to have extended this service to encompass household refuse collection.

The wastes collected was mostly just put “out of sight” somewhere in the adjacent countryside or taken out to sea and dumped. As the germ theory of disease began to be understood, cities began spraying dumps with chemicals and (beginning in 1885 in Allegheny, Penn.) began to burn refuse in incinerators. Incineration seemed like the magic solution as the waste stream grew with a national consumer economy in the 20th century: waste per capita was about 3 lbs in the 1920s, but had grown to about 6 lbs. per day in the 1970s. By 1940, cities had large central incinerators, apartment buildings commonly had ones for their residents, and even suburban homes often were built with one in the back yard or garage. Exurban and rural residents typically built garbage fires once a week, or burned waste in a metal drum.

Large cities began to collect household refuse and ashes in the early 20th century, and this became more efficient with motorized trucks. By the 1970s, most places discouraged backyard incineration and were even shutting down municipal incinerators as they became aware of the heavy metals released into the air. Mechanized collection made garbage truck routes more efficient, and sanitary landfills reduced the stench of dumps (largely, though, by limiting the decomposition of material). In-sink garbage disposals reduced the volume of putrescibles, shifting them to the sewer system. In-house trash compactors came to the consumer market in the late 1960s, reducing somewhat the volume that had to be collected.

In the 1990s, a temporary crisis in landfill space prompted a number of cities to take a new look at high-temperature incineration as part of a “waste-to-energy” scheme. Few of these projects have fulfilled the promises of promoters, as they have continued to have problems with residual heavy metals and are uneconomic compared to ever-cheaper natural gas for electricity generation.

Chapter 13, “Solid Wastes,” of History of Public Works in the United States, 1776-1976 gives greater detail about history and practices of waste collection, as well as the related problem of street cleaning.