Fountain

History

Numerous European treatises stressed the fountain as a principal ornament of the garden. Its popularity was attested to by its frequent use in both European and American gardens.1 Hydraulics (the branch of engineering concerned with moving water), however, did not play a major role in American garden design until the late eighteenth century, despite the frequent mention of still-water features such as canals, ponds, and pools in garden descriptions. In spite of the rarity of early examples that were executed, the term “fountain” was utilized and was understood to describe a variety of devices that issued water under pressure. This pressure was generated by gravity from an elevated water source—by a pump, or, later, by municipal pressurized water systems. Water, conveyed in pipes, was forced through an aperture that determined the trajectory of the spray. As George William Johnson (1847) and Jane Loudon (1845) described the process, different orifices could project water horizontally, vertically, or in an arc, enabling the designer to create effects simulating the form of a sheaf, fan, dome, or basket. A fountain with a single spout of water was sometimes called by its French synonym, jet d’eau, but larger waterworks, such as those in public squares and parks, were generally referred to as fountains (see Jet).

Although the research presented here has not revealed any work originating in the colonies, fountain technology was published in eighteenth-century European sources available in America, such as Stephen Switzer’s An Introduction to a General System of Hydrostaticks and Hydraulicks, Philosophical and Practical (1729). More widely available treatises discussed the role of fountains in garden design, but they do not include the level of detail and technical information found in Switzer. A. J. Downing’s A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening (1849) was the first American source to present an illustrated typology of fountains (such as weeping, or “Tazza” fountains, rockwork, and candelabra jets), but for further terminology and instruction, Downing directed the reader to “numerous French works devoted to this branch of Rural Embellishment.”2

The chronology of fountain construction in American gardens contrasts markedly with that of European and British practice. The only two known references to fountains from the eighteenth century are William Byrd II’s 1732 account of the fountain at Col. Alexander Spotswood’s estate, near Ger- manna, Va., and James Thacher’s 1830 recollections of a visit some 42 years earlier to Col. Thaddeus Kosciusko’s garden at West Point, N.Y. Even in the early nineteenth century, fountains in private gardens like the one built in 1814 at Belfield, Charles Willson Peale’s estate in Germantown, Pa., were rare. Public fountains appeared in descriptions near the turn of the nineteenth century, with the earliest examples in public pleasure grounds, such as Columbia and Mount Vernon Gardens in New York.3 Plans made in 1792 for Washington, D.C., by Pierre-Charles L’Enfant included fountains at the intersections of prominent avenues, but these were not executed until the second half of the nineteenth century, following the installation of a city water system. It was only after the introduction of city water systems in the 1820s through the 1840s that such public fountains became common, like the one in Springfield, Mass. [Fig. 1].4 In New York, numerous paintings and prints, such as a print depicting City Hall Park [Fig. 2], captured the enthusiasm reported by Philip Hone (c. 1828–51) when he said, “Nothing is talked of or thought of in New York . . . but Croton water.” Not only did pressurized water make more elaborate hydraulics possible, but the celebration of civic pride, the advancement of “modern” technology, and the health and sanitation improvements associated with these water displays helped to justify the increased tax burden on citizens.

American fountains varied in scale from a single spout of water, such as the jet rising from a still-water basin at Belfield, to the large civic sponsored displays of City Hall Park and Union Square in New York, and the Cochituate Fountain on Boston Common [Fig. 3]. Following European design tradition, the apertures of fountains were sometimes incorporated into sculpture, often in the form of figures associated with water, such as the mythical form of a Naiad, which was praised by Mark Twain (1853) for spouting water at the Fairmount Waterworks in Philadelphia. Frederick Graff’s design of a “Boy and Dolphin” fountain, which was installed there in 1832, employed an ancient symbol of navigation safety [Fig. 4].5 One of the best-known examples of American fountain sculpture is William Rush’s statue “Water Nymph with Bittern,” which issued multiple jets in front of Philadelphia’s first pumping station at Centre Square [Fig. 5].6 In less elaborate examples, water came forth from urns, multi-tiered basins, and, as at W. H. Corcoran’s garden in Washington, D.C., described in 1846, the rockery (see Statue).

The aesthetic appeal of garden fountains is evident in treatise literature, and this quality was often echoed and appreciated in descriptions of American fountains, such as in Lewis Miller’s poem and illustration of a fountain, both from his Orbis Pictus (c. 1850). Depending upon its design, a fountain could add stateliness to a flower garden or a rustic naturalness to a rockery. Fountains of a “highly artificial” character, to quote Downing, lent themselves to marking the intersection of paths or the end of walks in much the same way as did obelisks, statues, or other architectural elements. William Rush’s 1824 design for Franklin Public Square in Philadelphia [Fig. 6] called for a central fountain in which the single jet of water cascaded down a pile of rocks similar to the base of his “Water Nymph and Bittern.”7 Robert Mills’s proposal for the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. (1841) [Fig. 7], shows two aligned fountains anchoring the central axis of the building and garden in the midst of the curvilinear walks and planting beds. As Charles Marshall (1799) noted, fountains cooled and refreshed through evaporation, and enhanced the aesthetic experience with the pleasant sounds and the animation of moving water. George William Johnson’s A Dictionary of Modern Gardening (1847) pointed out the visual interest of the height of the water stream as the “surprise” and “novelty” of fountains. Like other water features, fountains also combined the garden’s essential material of nature and art. Fountains joined the “natural” element of water with the artifice of plumbing, statuary, and the design of patterned streams.

In addition to their aesthetic appeal, fountains also conveyed the owner’s investment in an expensive water system and the specialized knowledge required to execute such a project. As obvious markers of wealth and status, fountains were often placed in prominent parts of a garden or in the center of the formal approach to a house or building, as in the painting Leaving the Manor House (c. 1850) [Fig. 8]. More symbolically, fountains were connected to the religious rites of baptism and renewal. A Shaker manuscript provided information to construct a fountain at New Lebanon, Ohio, as part of the community feast ground and to represent a “holy Fountain of waters of everlasting life” for the refreshment and purification of community members and for their reflection about heaven’s order on earth.8 Finally, fountains also served two vital practical functions. City fountains, such as the one depicted in a view of the Great Conflagration (1845) at New York [Fig. 9], provided a water source for fighting urban fires; others, such as Robert Mills’s design for the national Mall in Washington, D.C., provided water for irrigation.

-- Elizabeth Kryder-Reid