ABSTRACT
In the post-World War II consumer boom, the widespread availability of all kinds of new consumer goods—including household wonder products—was one indicator of the end of the austerity of the Great Depression and the war. This chapter explores the controversy surrounding the dumping of detergent phosphates into the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes have long been a major source of fresh water for Canada and the United States. They also suffered from inexorable pollution from numerous sources. The synthetic detergents, however, posed new kinds of pollution problems and addressing them created tension among companies producing the detergents, various levels of government, and women consumers and activists. The Great Lakes have long been a sink for a variety of pollutants.
