Pathway 3, Subject 4

Pump Crawl

Solution: ENTERIC PAIN

At first there isn't really all that much to go off, apart from that it's unusual for this to be a "pump" crawl. However it's obvious we need to locate where this is supposed to be; it sounds like a city of some sort with many fashion outlets listed. The most obvious clue probably comes from the tailor being located on a street with many tailors, suggesting Savile Row in London.

From here, googling "London" "pump" points us towards John Snow's famous work on the spread of cholera through central London during the 1854 Broad Street outbreak. His work is a founding event of epidemiology, and is immortalised through a map of disease cases in relation to water pumps, which he correctly hypothesised were the cause of disease transmission.

In fact this is exactly the map we use for this puzzle. Following the pump crawl instructions, we go from pump to pump, taking note of the modern landmarks that now stand at those locations. We use the "travel time" to index.

The letters spell ENTERIC PAIN, which can be a symptom after profuse diarrhoea and electrolyte disturbance caused by cholera, although it isn't really a typical symptom.

Author's notes

Author: Allen

Given this is Pathway 3, this puzzle certainly was designed to be slightly harder than the rest. It goes to show how important it is to look into every detail if stuck, as my intention here is for Savile Row to be the main "in" into this puzzle.

This puzzle originally was meant to have INFECTION as the solution, which naturally lent itself to a puzzle about epidemiology. I also didn't know until writing this puzzle that at the site of the original contaminated Broad Street pump, there is a pub dedicated to John Snow's memory; how apt! Naturally we need to end the pump crawl there. In fact, they do host a "pump crawl" of sorts themselves:

The pub serves as a meeting place for the John Snow Society, which encourages its members to visit the pub, introduced a walk following the footsteps of Snow through Soho and ending at the pub, and performs a ceremonial removal of the pump handle and visit to the pub following its annual Pumphandle Lecture.

I'm definitely paying a visit next time I'm in London.

Feedback

Guess log