This is a picture of a water irrigation pump, powered by a lawn mower engine. It came to mind while reading “Private Property and the Ecological: Commons in the American West.” This particular pump has been a part of the landscape in my parents’ home since I was young. This fixture in my backyard was a social “norm” in my area of town. The whole section of town I grew up in either had a ditch running through the backyard or water hole where the irrigated water would show up once or twice a week. The pump related to the chapters for this week in varying ways. The most obvious was the water laws in southern Idaho. Most people had lawn mower water pumps to move the water from the backyard to water their entire lawns. Every year on the corner of Hawthorne and Quinn streets a sign popped up in the spring announcing the “mandatory” water meeting that decided where and when the water would be available for people to use on their property. The term “mandatory” was used loosely. It meant if you had an opinion of when you should receive water each week and what time of day you should attend. Mainly people who had horse pastures or large vegetable garden would attend the meeting. The rest like my parents would receive a letter advising when to expect water each week and bill for the summer dues. It mirrors Mark Fiege’s analysis on a smaller level; a community of neighbors sharing water in the summer for use on their private property. This service was provided at a small fee compared to city water prices. Just like the private property signs of the west, these water pumps demonstrate the history of water use in Idaho within the city.
The water pump would remain an unimportant fixture in my memory, like Californian bungalows, had I not previously read Peirce Lewis’ chapter on how to read cultural landscapes. If you were to ask me if I “liked” the water pump, I would have answered no. I think it is hideous and reminds me what a chore moving the water was. Ask the questions the Lewis suggestions on page 93, “What is that? Why does it look that way it does? How does it work? Why is it there?” These questions make the pump much more interesting. It is a water pump sitting on an old lawn mower stand because it is using the lawn mower engine. It is still a mystery to me how the thing works, because it breaks every summer. To answer the question why it is there can range from a simple answer of; to water our lawn or, as in depth, to explain private property laws bending to the communal water use. The vocabulary about its history was explained by Fiege and what little I knew of water meetings.
A last connection is to the “The Enacted Environment.” (I did not make a connection to Medicine in the (Mini) Mall. I found the article fascinating, but it did not peak my interest like the other articles.) David C. Sloanes explanation of front yard evolution is similar to the evolution of the landscape in the neighborhood I grew up in. The land on the west side of Pocatello was all farm land bought in the 1940’s and turned into a housing development. In is a couple blocks of little rectangle houses on a fourth of an acre lots. They used the same water irrigation that farms used for the houses now. Therefore, irrigation used to water crops now waters lawns for a whole neighborhood.