ABSTRACT
A soft–clam depuration plant was established in Maine in 1962 and was utilized for many years to depurate on a commercial scale as well as to develop physiological and microbiological parameters related to the depuration of soft-shell clams. The first attempt at depuration on a commercial scale was initiated about 1921 at Inwood. Starting in the early 1960s, with the aid of both federal and State funding, several groups attacked some of the basic questions of molluscan physiology, microbiology and epidemiology as they pertain to shellfish sanitation and depuration. The problems of typhoid fever associated with consumption of raw shellfish were widely recognized by health authorities in North America. The universal use of depuration seemed to be deeply entrenched in the philosophy of some members of the public health community, as was expressed by R. A. Prindle in a keynote address before a National Shellfish Sanitation Program Workshop in 1968.
