But unlike other large cities such as New York, London and Paris, there were hardly any modern public sanitation facilities in Shanghai.

There were very few flush lavatories even at foreign companies, hotels and apartments, let alone ordinary residences.

However, it was this situation that enabled the "Dung Kings" and "Lords of Pouring" to make a pile out of the dung business.

Under the rule of foreign imperialist powers in the 1930s, Shanghainese faced the serious problem of dealing with sanitary waste, for there were more than 4 million people in Old Shanghai and the human waste in the city could exceed 1,200 tons per day.

On hearing the dung-cart at dawn, the first housework chore began for each family, hurrying to the back door and pouring the accumulated "night soil" into the dung-carts.

Having realized the seriousness of the waste problem, the International Concession and the French Concession first purchased dung-carts and employed labourers to clean up the human waste in March 1931.

Later on, Nanshi and Hongkou districts followed their lead. Some businessman became envious of the great profits to be made and so began to make and lease dung-carts to "dungmen".

From then on, dung-cart owners began to compete furiously for control of urban areas. Some sold the manure to farmers privately, while others contracted with the concession government for the right to collect the soil and for the facilities at the waste collection wharfs, where fortunes were to be made by the so-called "Dung Kings".

The most famous "Dung King" in Old Shanghai was Ma Hongji, who controlled the biggest army of "dungmen". Being the first contractor in the French Concession, he owned 600 dung-carts in the hey-day of his business.

The "Dung Kings" depended on leasing the night soil carts and wharfs as their source of income. In 1931, there were 1,900 carts in Shanghai, nearly half of which were owned by Ma and Wang. There was also a total of 22 dung wharfs at that time, with 10 of them located along Suzhou Creek.

"Dungmen" were nicknamed the "Lords of Pouring". Once farmers in the countryside, they had come to Shanghai to escape disasters or economic ruin in the rural areas. There were more than 4,000 of them in Shanghai in the 1930s, all of whom kept the pot boiling by pouring the stools of locals.

Living at the bottom of society, the "Lords of Pouring" were mostly illiterate gamblers who took to drinking as soon as they felt relatively well-off.

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