The water pump stood on the corner like a sentinel. Cast iron. A handle on top. A spout at the bottom. You pumped the handle and the water came up from underground and poured into your bucket. The water pump was the well of the city. The water pump was the place where the neighborhood gathered.

Before the pipes came the water pump was the only source of clean water on the block. Every family sent somebody to the pump. The line at the pump was the social hour of the tenement. You waited with your bucket and you talked to the woman in front of you and the man behind you and by the time you got your water you knew the news of the block. The water pump was the original social network. The water pump ran on gravity and gossip.

The cholera came through the water pump. John Snow in London figured it out in 1854. He took the handle off the Broad Street pump and the cholera stopped. The water pump that gave life could also take it. The city learned that the thing that feeds you can also poison you. That lesson applies to more than water.

They replaced the pump with the hydrant and the hydrant with the pipe and the pipe with the faucet. Each step moved the water further from the street and closer to the wall. The water pump was public. The faucet is private. The water pump required you to leave the house. The faucet keeps you inside. The water did not change. The journey changed.

There is a water pump still standing on the corner of Grove Street in the Village. Cast iron. Green paint. It does not work. It is a decoration now. A historical artifact that stands on the sidewalk and pretends to be useful. The tourists take pictures of it. The tourists do not know what it was for. The pump stands there like a retired firefighter at a parade. Still in uniform. No fire to fight.

See also: Hydrant, Horse Trough