On March 31, 1898, the London village council voted six hundred dollars to pay Frank Snyder for the work of preparing plans and specifications for a sewer system. What these plans consisted of or what detail was carried out according to instructions is not revealed by the records. The mayor's report for April 12, 1896, says that former councils had spent seven hundred dollars on sewerage, and that the board of health had resolved to sewer the town. Evidently very little was accomplished.
An ordinance declaring it necessary to provide for the construction of a sanitary sewer and a sanitary-sewer system and a sanitary sewage-disposal works and to acquire a sanitary sewage farm for the village of London, was introduced to the village council on November 10, 1904, the sewage-disposal farm to be located on the land of Jane T. Butler. Eighty per cent. of the whole cost of the improvement was to be borne by the property holders and was to be assessed per front foot on all lots or lands abutting, assessments to be levied in five equal annual installments, with interest on deferred payments at five per cent., the remaining cost, including appropriations, proceedings, damages, etc., to be paidby the village. The council appropriated four and forty-three hundredths acres of land belonging to Jane T. Butler in surveys Nos 8446 and 9500, on March 31, 1905.
At the same meeting the council passed an ordinance "to improve by constructing a sanitary sewer and sanitary-sewer system and sanitary-sewer disposal works and acquire a right-of-way for said sewer and acquire a sanitary-sewer farm for the village of London, Madison county, Ohio." The plans and specification accepted called for two main sewers—the first main to have three lateral and five sub-lateral mains; the second main to have five lateral and four sub-lateral mains.
The building of the sewer system was supervised by City Engineer Herschel McCafferty. The disposal plant was constructed by D. E. Sullivan & Son, of Columbus. The system was accepted by the council, on the recommendation of the city engineer, in April, 1907. Few changes, with the exception of a few lateral mains have been made in the system since that time.
The council provided, April 1, 1905, for an issue of thirty-five bonds for sixteen hundred dollars each, totaling fifty-six thousand dollars, at five per cent. interest. According to the report of the city engineer the sanitary-sewer system.,outside of the disposal plant, cost forty-six thousand, four hundred and sixty dollars and thirty-one cents. With the disposal plant the system cost about seventy thousand dollars.