Hand-Dug Well Using Primitive Tools? - Frontier Well - Townsends Wilderness Homestead
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- Опубликовано: 13 июл 2022
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For those worried about Jon's safety....hes been alive since the 1700s I dont think hes worried.
Bahahaha!!!
He may be immortal
he's Not hes 😮
@@hamburgerhamburgerv2 He's a Time Traveler.
@@opybrook7766 🤓
Unlike the Trolls out there, I am a former OSHA inspector with 25 years experience, and after viewing the video I felt the well digging operation was just fine. While watching the original video, I even commented to my wife that you were lucky the soil was mostly clay and seemed very stable. From an OSHA compliance stand point all that was needed was a Safety Observer and a ladder to use for emergency egress. If the soil had been unstable or mostly sand, you could have still dug the well, but would have needed barricades to prevent the walls from collapsing on the digger, but that was clearly not the case here. Please do not let the Trolls (who give safety inspectors a bad name) get to you!
There is the saying, saftey rules are written in blood.
Sure, sometimes its annoying but its honestly only in our best intrestest to follow them.
I'm glad somebody has some common sense. ⭐
@@foty8679 people saying things like this in the comment section unironically have never touched a shovel in their lives. 🤣
@@WildCaughtAKCards you're the type of jackass that loses your buddy an eye at the shooting range or a finger on the job
That's awesome.
You should consider making videos "Safety inspector reacts" or something along those lines. Obviously it would have the usual caveats (you can't see the entirety of what's going on, the videos aren't formal advice, etc etc) but I think a format like this could really help 1) educate people at large about safety questions to think about and 2) help break down the stigma around "unreasonable" safety standards, thus contributing to a slight shift in the way we culturally view these rules.
Hey traditional Carpenter here. You usually toast wood before you put it into the ground. So toasting the barrels from both sides would've made them last indefinitely. They're toasted from the inside anyways, but charring them from the outside would've made them last much much longer. You can also use this trick for fence posts or posts of barns etc.
Interesting, will remember this! Where'd you learn this by the way?
@@faramund9865 I learned carpentry here in Germany and we raised a few barns like this. I also built a lot of Full Scribe Log homes and post and beam log homes. So I learned a few tricks about how to conserve wood and charring it is the cheapest solution if you plan on putting it into the ground.
@@blitzkriegfritz2779 Dope!
I heard about charring wood but i dont know what it does
@@nirujirian Well basically the Charring closes the pores of the wood and destroys the stuff in the wood that attracts bugs, funghi and bacteria which would destroy the wood in the long run. So charring the outside of the wood, makes the wood last indefinitely.
When we renovated an old barn, we pulled out some of the posts stuck into earth, everything that was uncharred above the ground was eaten by termites and woodworms, but everything that was charred and stuck underground was as if it was put there yesterday.
Same reason we find charcoal pieces hundreds of thousands of years after a campsite was abolished.
I just want to say, i appreciate the extreme caution you guys must take to ensure no camera equipment shows in these videos. It really helps me feel immersed in this era
I've never really considered that. Thinking about it though, you're definitely right. The absence of modern stuff really creates an amazing setting.
I think I saw a few pairs of waders in this episode, but I can hardly blame them.
Preach!
I appreciate showing no machinery behind the camera...thats a deep hole for no one to be dirty digging it except
1 guy....
Heck yeah.
Or powertools! By the state of their clothing they did NOT dig that well by hand.
You know the drought is getting bad when the townsends are digging wells.
Lmao
Drought: AKA building cities and farms in a desert then exporting water in the form of crops and fruits. *slow clap*
@@TheBelrick We had a drought here in Europe too. There is just no water and no produce.
@@Kareszkoma garbage. no drought, great produce.
You just brought the lies politicians are selling to justify their actual sabotage of your farming industry.
@@TheBelrick I farm on the land. Everything is yellow in the whole country. Yes, politicians do ruin everything and yes, they do steal water. At dams, they pump it away, and reduce the sizes of rivers. But also with streams.
This time however, there is just no water. At all. None is coming. None of the plowing lands had any product. Neither did ours. Our land is smaller, and we barely had any rain. Barely dusting the land.
I understand that safety was not much in the minds of early pioneers. Yet one safety consideration you did was not to work alone. Also you took your time keep everyone safe and alive. Many people may not realize the effort that you put into safety of the Well Digging Project. The Safety began way before the first shovel was placed into the ground.
Great demonstration for the Homestead.
They had safety concerns. Everyone wants to live. They had options *when* they had options. When you are choosing to create a new homestead, you do not always have others to stand guard.
the dangers of trench work do not care if there are people around to watch you die or not. its near impossible to uncrush someone when you look at how much dirt 1000 pounds is it will make sense. though they are in a pretty safe place to dig the action of water flowing through the sand can wash out causing a collapse
@@imchris5000 yep!
Says the well digger.....lol
@@BaptistJoshua one thing about safety concerns is that nowadays our info circle is a lot larger than then.
Of course if you have to dig a well you have to dig a well and f it hire a welldigger for the job to take the risk if you can afford it, much like most high risk jobs before 20th century and well into the 20th century. Or still in the 3rd world. Most stick welding in the world is still done without a mask..
My Father who was born in Southern Appalachia in 1926 & who hand dug several wells in his life always used an expression on the first really cold fall morning every year. He'd say "I reckon it's colder than a well digger's ass out there this morning." I have to say I don't think I had a full grasp of the saying until I watched someone hand dig a well. Thanks for posting this! Educational and entertaining as always!
And now we're all enlightened. :)
Amen
What does that mean?
@@xploration1437 While digging, your butt is constantly pressed into chilly damp soil
It's a big saying around the West Virginia area.
My New England cape was built in 1770. The house still pulls water (modern plumbing) from its original hand dug well. 8ft wide x 20ft deep! Pubic records from the time note this well being used as a cistern for the town in times of drought. It’s lined with granite field stone. I don’t think this wells ever run dry in over 250 years of service!
Being that shallow makes me wonder what sort of contaminants might be in it. I hope it gets tested routinely.
@@MmmmJuicy We had it tested when we first moved in but it’s always the same. From the well it contains bacteria as well as a lot of minerals. We have filtration for it. The only direct source is our garden hose. Everything in the house runs through a series of filters. This includes osmosis. The filtration system is rather simple to use, upkeep and was a lot less expensive then drilling a new well. Which probably would have needed filtering as well for arsenic and who knows what else.
Your safety warning at the object highlights the danger our ancestors faced while just going about their day to day lives. Everyone had a well back in the day and every well was dug by people. It was normal but like most of their lives, their was risk. That's why their life expectancy was was much lower. Great video!
This is a common misconception. Their life expectancy was much lower because of infant mortality. Once you control for infant mortality, their life expectancy wasn't too far off from ours.
@@dewisselaar8418 Exactly. They lived well into their 60s, but when someone dies at birth and another at 60, the average becomes 30 which is where the myth comes from.
@@dewisselaar8418 Infant mortality, lack of antibiotics, lack of clean water sources/ hygiene, and just about everyone had to be a murderer back in those days to survive, as everyone was a bandit, or at least ran across bandits or someone willing to hurt you or your family, or steal your land. There were no police forces back then and it was survival of the fittest for most of wild wild east/west, even before the wild wild west was a thing. Even the bunny rabbits would try to kill you. Everyone had an outside toilet, only scholars put their privy away from their drinking water, and only the smartest of men put their privy upstream of their enemies.
@@dewisselaar8418 it wasn't just infant mortality but maternal mortality at Birth. And death of children from diseases that we can now protect them from. So isn't just infant mortality but child mortality and maternal mortality that drives the numbers down. Then again there are all the men who died in wars and doing dangerous stuff. I continue to be amazed that Humanity survived the plague Etc
@@dewisselaar8418 50+% of my great grandparents as well as others I know lived into their 50's/60's our life expectancy is at least 10 years longer. I do agree with you that birth rate plays into it but what bout hygiene, diet, and lifestyle? I don't mean this as a challenge but I do believe those thing played into it.
A few ideas for the future of this project (from a water treatment operator):
1: You might consider building a bucket with some sort of flapper valve at the bottom so you don't have to worry about trying to tip it over. It would make collecting the water a bit easier.
2: Concerning water quality, given your proximity to the nearby creek and the shallow depth of your well, it's very possible that you're still dealing with "groundwater under the influence of surface water". Sand is an effective filter for particulate contaminants, but you'll still want a means of disinfection if you're going to drink this. Normally, I recommend household bleach, but given that you're very much doing this the old-fashioned way, boiling is your best bet.
3: Again concerning contamination, you might want to put some form of seal over the well when you're not using it, to keep animals (namely, birds) from either dying or... relieving themselves... in your water source. Also, if you build an outhouse, make sure it's at least 100 ft away and preferably downhill from your well.
My state's regulations say 150 feet from the nearest pollution source. Otherwise I agree!
5:57 Your fate if you dont obey this advice
I don't know about other countries, but in Sweden, we used to put eels in our wells who would eat anything that fell down. I actually read an article some years back about a well eel they found who was 150 years old.
Tops were built to keep rain wash out too.
I never saw a flapper bucket for a well. Sounds a bit complicated with era technology. The stick cranes already kinda fancy
I mean, they made it from barrels. repurposing the barrellid wouldn't be that hard. Put a handle on it and boom.
Every time I watch these videos, it makes me appreciate modern technology and just how hard our ancestors had to work just to stay alive.
But they did do it on their own terms, freely and for free, no 14k dollar job here, and no taxes paid , now to get a well you'd have to pay on it as you worked for a few years for a business, and pay taxes to the government on the price of the well, and pay taxes on each of those checks your making to pay for it, as did the well driller pay taxes on your money as well, income tax for him, also tax on all his employees checks, tax on the fuel he used in his rig, tax on the payments of his truck and equipment, sales tax on all of it, and yearly property tax every year on all of it, see whos winning here and who is "not very smart" every bucket from this well is actual free water, being drank by a free man, for the price of 3 days labor of a small community helping each other, the way god intended us to live, god bless him and his family
Honestly, for me it's the opposite. This kind of life just seems to me soo much more appealing than modern, meaningless, existence. Yes, it's *much* more physically strenuous, but anyone who has made anything with their hands knows just how satisfying working with physical objects, which you can see the gradual process of change that your actions bring about, is.
I love that you guys dont just tell us what life was like back in 18th century but that you actually do those things and in the same way as if you were living in the 18th century.
Yeah. That's the bit I like too. I reckon it takes big brass ovaries take on the task of making the shovel to dig the well.
Well done!
😁
About 30 years ago while working on a large cattle ranch in the west. While checking on cattle in a big pasture I would often go to an old well I knew of and water my horse and get a drink myself. It was fed from a mountain spring and the water tasted good, especially on a hot day.
The well wasn’t producing as much water as it should so the cow boss decided we should clean it out.
While digging it we removed the skeleton of an entire steer out of the mud.
I had wished I hadn’t drank so often from that well!
🤢
Meh, protein.
Now u know why it tasted so good
Diversifying those gut cultures of yours. Take that Activia!
Oh no 👀
Maybe it was a really old one? Did your boss mention, when the well had last been cleaned before?
Trust me, you've consumed worse.
Townsends is the best channel. Historical content and accountability. Yes!
Accountability is such a cool buzzword!
@@gzuskreist1021 And perfectly applicable to the video, assuming you watched it
I've seen these old wells in tours in St.Augustine. In Ga. because of the abundance of clay and brick making most were brick lined.
@@gzuskreist1021 Don't forget equity and sustainability!
In my part of America, nobody seems to know what any of those words mean, but they sure do like to say them a lot.
Back when i was growing up, the elders said we needed to dig a new well, as the community well had all but run dry. I was 15, and by that point, was one of the few members of the tribe older than 12, but younger than 40.
We used old cobble stones to lay a wall as we dug down.
We dug about 10 feet down at first, then cobbled it up. Let the mortar sit for a day or two to properly cure. Dug another 5 feet, and then oh so carefully, widened the hole so we could cobble up again. We got about 25 feet down before we hit water, and when hit water, Sweet mother of the mountains did we hit water. I dont think i had ever scaled a ladder faster in my life! It took less than 20 minutes to completely fill the well. We actually ended up building a a small aquaduct type system because we accidentally dug into a spring under pressure.
All dug with cheap tools barely any better than 'primitive' tools. A few years later, we had proper concrete tubing installed to keep it safer.
The smaller tribes, like mine, dont get all those benefits that the bigger tribes get. We didnt get to upgrade from tin and tar shacks and converted wood sheds until the mid 90s. We upgraded to 3rd and 4th hand mobile homes that needed major work just to be able to safely move them.
When I was very young, I lived with my grandparents in the back hills of West Virginia. They had a hand dug well on their property, stone lined, that was dug in the 18th century. It still gave good water, and they used it for drawing water for the garden, and to keep things cool in the summer, like milk, etc. There was a very cold spring nearby that fed a small creek all year round. I am pretty certain the well was fed by the spring water filtering through the soil, and water drawn from the well was pretty cold. To my knowledge, the well is still working and in use, or at least usable, today. I do not know the depth, but given the depth to bedrock in that area, I don't think it was exceptionally deep, and quite likely went down to the bedrock, maybe 20-30 feet. I consider it a blessing that I got to live with them, and learn first-hand a lot of the old ways of doing things and living off the land as needed.
On the property where I grew up in Oklahoma there was the most fabulous old well. It was not the one we used, it was very close to the highway, and the house had been built as far away from the road as possible. Anyway it was fully brick lined and had walls that came up I guess 36-40 inches high above the ground. Daddy put a pipe down into it and using siphoning set up a water source for the cattle. It ran slowly for years without stopping.
Massive respect for this. Acknowledging that what’s being shown is extremely dangerous given that it appears without safety measures, and then reuploading the video to talk about that and rectify it deserves all my support. You guys are the real ones. Take care.
Edited: removed ambiguous language (“a potential false narrative is being presented”)
What false narrative?
No false narrative. Just a bunch of Karens.
@@SR-iy4gg No, it's actually extremely dangerous if you do it wrong. Jon and co. did the right thing, don't try to make it anything other than that.
@@Zelmel this guy OSHA's
@@JP-zu8ij A month or so ago, a 19 year old and his sister got buried on the beach in a hole they dug. The guy died. It was very sad - he seemed like a good kid. I appreciate the consideration.
You might find it interesting to read about the well that conservationist John Muir dug by hand as a teenager. It was 80 feet deep and took him several months to dig because he had to use a hammer and chisel to cut through sandstone. It almost killed him when toxic gas accumulated at the bottom, and his father had to winch him out before he passed out completely. An insane amount of work went into creating that well.
Always let a lantern down first every day.
He needed a Canary. Poor Canaries.
Thank you. I have been explaining to people that our ancestors dug *far* deeper wells than this. I once dug a 6 foot long, 1 to 2 feet wide, 5 feet deep hole to find a gas pipe. Took me about 1 hr. I am dumbfounded when I see guys taking all day or days. I used a common shovel.
@@paulgee4336 they used birds up until recently. When my Dad was an electrician, other guys lowered birds into sewers or tunnels to test before the guys went down.
@@BaptistJoshua the digging speed does depend a lot on the kind of ground you're digging through.
0:12 - Phew what a relief - because I heard a stories on how somebody was digging a well and it colapsed on him even though he was surrounded with concrete rings - and you don't have even that in here.
I have read some very old books explaining the original way that wells where dug ! You must dig a well with a verticle line up and a slope going down to it ! Digging like this prevents cave-ins and allows easy access and extraction, and allows you of course to dig very deep. When you reach the water you can start to build up your circular well with stone or brick and fill in around it as you go adding gravel or broken stone allowing for infiltration and filtering ! Having a slope for access means you can get in and out with wheelbarrows taking in materials and taking out dirt !
It's over 400 ft to the water table where I'm at. I don't think I'll be digging it by hand anytime soon! We gather water off our roof. Nice job you guys
Oh that's cool!
Hope you don't have an asphalt roof.
@@essaboselin5252 I'm not an idiot.
Watch out for the micrometeorites
@@CRJines I never said you were. Lots of people, including readers here, have no idea the issues with that.
When I stayed on a Tudor/Stewart farm in Wales, all our water came from the well.
When no one was on site it had a large wooden cover placed over, with a substantial rock on top after coming home one night and finding something stopping the bucket from reaching the water. When a torch was found, the culprit was a sheep that had committed suicide by not using the bucket, choosing to drink directly from the well...!
...and a tip if you use a modern lightweight plastic bucket to collect water from the well, drop it down the well upside down and it will fill up as it turns over - it won’t collect any water if you send it down the usual way, it just floats on top of the water :-)
Billie.
No one has ever accused sheep of being overly intelligent except in finding new and more creative ways to hurt or kill themselves. Not bright, those sheep.
About bucket... people just add weight on one of sides of bucket (anything compact and heavy would work, like padlock), so bucket will definitely sink on one side and get water. Also, usually bucket may be outlined with metal exoskeleton, for the same purpose, plus extra effect in protection from being outright destroyed by hit of water surface.
@@bunnyslippers191 I personally cannot determine which is a dumber species. Sheep, cows or cnn etc viewers.
@@TheBelrick Given that the third are unique to Memerica, I'd say that option is disqualified.
@@MyVanir BBC are direct equivalents. Imagine watching hostile, blatant liars for your source of news. Idiotic, cow level stupid
I showed my parents your homesteading playlist and they love it! Even though they don't understand English that well, they enjoy watching you work and learn a bit by context. They are very impressed with you guys' handiwork!
Best way to learn :)
I agree with water treatment comments in this discussion, as an environmental geologist who has spent a good portion of his career dealing with ground water quality. They should get the water checked. That’s an extremely shallow well, and the sand does help filter it, but there’s not a lot of residence time. It may turn out to be fine, but given the proximity to the creek and all, it would be well worth having it tested for biological and chemical contaminants. It’s easy peasy to do and doesn’t cost much. Even if all they’re doing is washing things with it, you never know what creepy crawlies might end up visiting your gastrointestinal system.
Yea my biggest issue was... Wait that well is under 30'?
We run houses out in TN off river water through sand and clay filter pits because nobody is gonna run city water up the mountain.
Our substrate tanks start at about a 3' diameter equivalent of 50' of substrate.
When I lived up in the Northwoods we had to feed cabins with legit hand dug wells and those fuckers were like 50-70', brick lined. Only way to get fresh water in -50 weather.
But it would be as good as the creek right?
I also doubt they are drinking it
@@stich1960 Bet they will, after boiling it just for safety reasons.
Organic critters and compounds aren't the only problem they could have when using the unconfined aquifer that flows along the first aquitard. There could be heavy metals. Always get new well water tested before using it.
You guys keeping this knowledge alive will end being far more important than anyone realizes right now.
Dear Mr. Townsend,
I only just saw your dear father's obituary on the NWTA website. I want to send my deepest sympathies to you and your family. I think I met your father once in the 1990s when I started reenacting. Having lost my father last year, I know what you must be going through. I am so sorry for your loss. May the Lord bless you and your family.
With admiration and respect,
Ken Ruley
I worked on a ranch in the Big Bend area of Texas back 40 + years ago, and when it was established back just after the turn of the century they hand dug 40 to 60 ft deep wells in that volcanic soil and rock. ALL with hand tools . I had a hated enough time prying enough rocks out of the ground to put in fence posts and was inspired by that type of work and tenacity ! People today have no concept of that kind of work that built this country. Heck we have electric screwdrivers, we mix food with electric mixers.
Your videos are great showing how the simplest things taken for granted today were major chores back then.
There is absolutley no danger of cave ins with the density of that clay. I have spent 36 years digging wells and underpinning homes. Keep up the good work!
You had pretty good digging conditions here. In my hometown was a French and Indian War fort, and they had to dig the fort well 70' deep through limestone to get to water.
Reuploading is a huge decision and I really respect your dedication to the safety of your viewers. I’ll keep this video on repeat all day. Hopefully it helps with the algorithm 🙂
what did they do the first time? something unsafe?
@@xeterexixxeterexix3157 I think they just added the remark to the beginning
I hand dug my own well.
I used the cages from water totes as casing. As I got deeper the cage would drop and I would add another, using the cage frame for my ladder wood.
After I got deeper, I would fill up five gallon buckets with 550 cord, then climb out and pull them up.
It took years, but now I have fresh water at 7.6 coming fresh of the wet mountains in Colorado. It don’t get much better.
Always be aware people that wells and deep holes can fill with gases that can kill. Never idle machinery near a hole you are in either. Exhaust can also settle in the deep area and make you pass out. Nice well! I have a drilled and dug well on my property. I also drill wells for a living. Great video.
Exhaust gasses , carbon monoxide will actually sink down ?? How does that happen exactly ??
@@waylonmccrae3546 not really sure. Just know a guy in town died working in a trench while his machine was idling next to it.
This episode is experimental archaeology. Brilliant! It illuminates so much about our early settlers.
You are such a class act. I mean truly, this is one of the best channels out there with an amazing community, and you are so engaged and transparent. It is such a breath of fresh air these days. I love letting a few of your videos collect and just sitting down and losing myself for a bit. :) Thank you for all the work you do!
As someone who has re-stumped a lot of old houses I can honestly say there is not many more frustrating jobs than digging hard ground in a tight space.
Come to the Columbia Basin. You will hate digging.
Not sure what "re-stumped" means in this context, but parts of my property require a literal pickax to break the soil. The last time I did any digging out there in those areas, I used a sturdy spading fork and a huge amount of weight and leverage to get the tines in the dirt, then used my entire body weight just to wiggle it a little, then went at it with a shovel and spading fork just to break it up enough to hit it with a tiller lol. Luckily, once worked and amended, it's ok consistency for gardening. Pretty much hard clay.
Jim's red pants and Jon's muddy shoes!
15:55 Does anyone get the same feeling as me? Getting a chit-chat thing sitting under the tree after doing fieldwork is a heavenly pleasure
Hey that young man in the white shirt looks like he needs a raise. Being able to fit down the well, and get back to filming the process is hard work, all while risking his life in that unstable well! He needs more recognition! And screen time!
I moved onto (bought)my Great Aunts farm in 2-3-2020
It has a 50ft. Hand dug well that was dug in 1924/25 and when I moved here used it as my primary source of water, still there and I love it.
Watching you dig this well was like seeing how my Great Uncle must have done it. There is no liner that I can see, amazing how that was accomplished. It also has concrete top on it where the crank and rope/bucket were attached
Great video, keep up the good work.
get your water tested
I grew up in an area of western Missouri where hand dug wells of 100 feet deep, and more, are quite common. Most of these wells are 6 to 10 foot across at the top. Generally the top several feet are lined with rocks or bricks and then the top were covered with a wooden plank top. Many were finished later with a concrete poured top, particularly if the well was at a house. They often had windmill powered pumps or hand pumps, occasionally you would see one with a bucket n a rope and windlass. My grandmother had two cisterns at her house which collected and held the rainwater from the roof of her house. She only used the cistern water for her chickens and garden because she had a well drilled sometime in the 50's.
Now a days a good solution for the liner is to use 12 to 18 inch diameter clay belled end sewer pipes. You can get them in 4 to 6 foot lengths, but because of their heavy weight you probably will need an excavator with straps or chains to lower and set them in place. You could also use clay flue tiles, or a steel or double wall plastic culvert. The culvert would be most readily available and probably the easiest to install, but not authentic for your period recreation.
I got a hand dug well right out my backdoor. It is lined with round river rock and looks quite deep. I am not sure when it was built.
You ought to take a video of it!
Well I guess I have to give this a second watch through. You guys deserve it
I am actually in the process of doing this myself and you gave me some great ideas. Thanks! We are currently down about 8 ft and we just hit water today. There is nothing more exciting than seeing that hole fill with water! 😁😁😁
Great example of all our ancestors did for us, in the good old days, to pave the way for a better life.
Well said. And a fact most today never consider!
So cool to see the water flowing into the hole!!! What hard work digging it by hand!!
I have a pavlovian reaction to digging holes that I immediately think of calling 811.
Love everything you do, Townsends. Best of wishes to you and yours. Cheers.
I'm a plumber, and we use the same method to install water pumps in basements (dig a hole, get a container and drill small holes into it, insert the container for the pump to sit in, surround it with fine stone). Doing so cleans the water out to prevent large objects from gumming up the pump.
Absolutely love these 'build' type of videos, it's what got me to join the Patreon. More of this please.
Hey! Just notice your one teammates seems to have slimmed down. Is he enjoying it? Losing weight is a lot of effort. Kudos.
(Hopefully he's okay.)
Digging big holes in clay will do that to you
Townsends is the best channel on youtube such a wholesome guy
The fact that you needed to put a disclaimer up at the start of the video confirms to me all that’s wrong with the world. As a child I learnt from my mistakes, in today’s world we attempt to learn by never making any, which means we don’t learn. We are sheltered in a house of fear built by people who are useless. This rant could go on but I’m going to shut up now… I really enjoy your videos. And I understand what you’re trying to achieve. Brilliant work.
My great-grandmother was helping my great-grandfather dig a hand dug well
someplace south of the caprock in Texas.
In the course of picking the bucket up with its load of rocks,
a rock fell out and caught him on the head.
She said that was the only time she ever heard him cuss.
This is why Townsends is the best historical channel on RUclips! You guys are amazing and such a calming channel after a hard day.
Gray clay sounds great for mid fire pottery.
i was thinking the same thing ! and that sand could make for a decent grog methinks
I love this channel. Everything down to the attire, music, and atmosphere is just a picture image of the time period. Fantastic content. I wish they made us learn history using this man in school. Keep up your second to none work!
This is awesome! Such a beautiful project that
you have started and keep improving on. History is rich and alive, you make all of us remember that!
The house I grew up in has a well very similar to yours. I believe it was dug in the early 1800's but could be as old as the 1790s. Some time in the 1970s it got a pipe added below the frost line. That allows the house to have running water. The well is about 4-5 feet in diameter and about 14 feet deep to the waterline. When it is filled it holds about 4 feet of water. The walls and the bottom are bread loaf sized rocks from a local field. I've climbed into it to do maintenance and it is very well built. You can use the rocks as hand and foot holds all the way to the bottom, no ladder needed.
My little brother still lives in the house and will likely use the well until the water table gets to low. The changes in climate and dry summers have really made it hard. Occasionally my brother has had to bring in water from a neighbors modern well; that is deeper and refills much faster.
Well, well, well, a well-built well. 😃
Have faith in Townsends, people!!!
EDIT: they know what they're doing!
They know what they are doing, and crazy enough to do it anyway.
For real. The people leaving comments about how dangerous it is to dig an 8-ft hole have clearly never been outside or touched a shovel in their lives. 🤣
It's been so special to see all this come together, thank you so much for sharing.
What a smokehouse it will last for years to come ....awesome absolutely awesome
I respect you guys so much for this, but I wish there was a way to keep the original comments. So many folks shared their childhood memories and a tale from grandpa, etc. Now those are gone and we are here posted about the fact that you reloaded and it was a respectable thing to do.
Gave it a rewatch because I don't want you guys to lose revenue. It is still great video.
There's a lesson there everyone should take to heart. So much of our lives these days is on computers and other electronic devices, which can break or lose power or get wiped out with the click of a button. We still have letters and journals from people who lived hundreds of years ago - what are we leaving behind to document our lives that will last?
@@Raskolnikov70 we are less than a blink in the universe. To the vastness that surrounds us, we aren't even .01% of its mass. We amount to what harmless bacteria around us and within us is to ourselves: nothing. We simply are unaware of its existence... and the universe is unaware of ours. Even the bacteria is unaware of us. It is simply too small and it's lifespan too short to notice us.
All this technology? Isn't even remotely important. What is important is how we have chosen to use it.
We are the "walking books" of our generations. Many of us will simply become the teachers of our communities.
Humanity is and will be ok for a long time. We are build for this planet and will regroup and rebuild.
Well most of those comments are probably bs anyways made up by people for likes.
I don't understand how this could be dangerous someone please explain
@@cullenyoung4776 The walls on hand dug wells can collapse and kill the person inside. There's probably other dangers as well but that one I know of.
I've dug wooden telephone pole holes by hand to a depth of 6 feet. They are narrower than your well, but I had access to a long handled set of shovels that made the job easier; one was like a straight pointed shovel for loosening the dirt and the other was called a "spoon" . The spoon was at a right angle to the long handle and made pulling the dirt out much easier. I'll bet they made similar tools a long time ago.
Sharpshooter and post hole digger perhaps?
A lever and fulcrum retrieval system (as you are planning), relies on a large diameter opening to the well... But the windlass retrieval system (crack and handle), is compact and requires only a few inches of space around the bucket.
Still remember about... 12 years ago maybe, we dug one just like that my father and I. Turned out to be about 9.6m (30feet?) deep.
We did have the luxury of a pulley, very useful to pull the bucket up without tiring the back... and rubber boots to keep the feet dry!
We also "made" a well shovel by cutting the handle on a regular big shovel, it allowed us to go really fast on the digging. We did hit a good 3 meters of harder gravel that needed the help oc a pickaxe and slowed us down quite a lot, we were relieved when we found the clay layer!
The system to get in and out of the well is a traditional one used in that region of spain (and I can imagine many others in the world), we just dug little holes in the walls of the well, to make a sort of mud hole stair that you would navigate up and down by stretching your arms side to side. Still giving water today! we did have to re-dig a bit of depth during some intense droughts in order to keep a good water flow...
Toads did have a tendency to appear out of nowhere, so we had to make a beefy wall with stones and concrete and a solid concrete lid to avoid any critters falling down in search of humidity...
I'm here to watch this re-uploaded version after having enjoyed chocolate almond milk "ice cream" with homemade cherry topping while you enjoyed your coffee chocolate caramel ice cream. This well video is as cool as the first one, but with extra snazz. I mean the video and storyline are still exemplary, the camera work is still ingenious, and the editing is still artful, and the extra snazz is added with the new opening scene. Well done, Gentlemen. Well done.
Long time fan here! I love your channel so much! It is an American treasure, and I think you guys deserve some special designation, ensuring funding to continue your amazing work! This channel and all the people behind it breath life into a way of living that many people think is long gone. Sure, what you do is historically-accurate to a specific time period. That's the charm though. I can't think of something modern people need more, than to get reacquainted with the ways of life that lead to our modern society.
The best part of this video is that it has people talking about their ancestors and experiences in the past. Weve forgot so much and this a great way to start reviving ourselves as a people.
Your dedication and hard work is very impressive, I’m so excited for you !!!
Blessings
This reminded me of the little house on the prairie book where pa dug a well and his neighbor almost died. Pretty scary stuff, really made me appreciate my sink as a kid
I came here hoping to find info on what kind of gas Mr. Scott encountered. Laura either didn't know what it was called when she wrote about it or chose not to name it because she was writing as if her younger self was narrating and she definitely hadn't known what it was at the time. All the book says about the gas was that it would put out a candle but was cleared away by a small explosion.
@@dbseamz I think coal miners had to deal with it, maybe it’s methane? I can’t be sure.
@@thetillerwiller4696 I thought of that, but isn't methane flammable? And if it is, I don't think it would put out a candle.
@@dbseamz true
Maybe not enough oxygen mixed in yet
When I bought my house years ago, there was a hand dug cistern. It was HUGE! I never actually measured the depth but I would guess it was every bit of 30 feet deep and fifteen feet across. The whole thing was lined with hand stacked stones. It took tons of rock and soil to fill it up after I had pumped it empty. I would have left it but I had 3 small children and I didn't want them playing near or in it and getting killed or hurt.
My Grandfather, born in 1896, called the wheelbarrow an Irish dump truck...
lol
My dad hand dug the well we grew up drinking from. He pre-cast concrete rings about 2 ft tall and 4 ft across using forms made from Masonite and plywood. As he dug the rings would slide down, when the top one was about a foot or so below grade, they set the next one on top with a homemade tripod & chain fall. That well was about 15ft deep, 4 ft in diameter and produced the coldest, clear water no matter how dry a summer it was. It was in use right up until developers bought out the farm next door an put in houses with septic systems just across the road.... less than 75 ft away. The folks ended up getting connected to the town water system, with all the chlorine and such included.
"The well wıll be anywhere from 10-12 feet deep" Oh that explains how it could be done. I always assumed they were more like 20-30 (Hence them being so dangerous to fall into) because out in arizona our well lines are driven 100-300 feet deep depending on water tables
Yes modern wells are just steel pipes 50+ feet deep, and have a flow rating. These wider shallow wells work by accumulating the results of a slow seep, and storing it until it it used.
Shallow wells are typically not as safe to drink from because they get easily contaminated by run off. Modernly, farms are a large source of groundwater pollution due to fertilizers and especially pesticides. Historically, animal waste, industry (like tanning or butchering), and latrines were the most common source of pollutants for a homestead's or community's well.
Digging deeper means that the water you pull up has been filtered through a lot more soil, so it's much less likely to be polluted. It's also more reliable because in a drought, the more shallow sources of groundwater run out sooner. That's why modern well-drilling companies like to put in a 50'+ well (they also get paid by the foot to dig!). Of course in a place like Arizona, that's just how far down you have to go to hit an ancient aquifer that spreads out over most of the Southwest. It's the only water that's reliable (for now).
But historically, you couldn't dig very deep because once you hit groundwater, you can't keep digging. Only in a drought, when the well dried up, might someone try digging deeper to find more water.
Water tables in the south were very high especially near the eastern coastal plain. I have a little well in my backyard to water the lawn with an electric pump. With development artesian wells which you used to see just free flowing everywhere are disappearing and wells are having to be deepened below fifty feet to 100 to 200,etc.
this isnt really a well. its ground water. there is a difference. this water needs to be boiled before its consumed
Wonderful job! I grew up along side Amish who dug their well just as you have done, Congrats! That sure looks like a high loam clay, might be great to make pottery and other things like ole Dutch ovens. I wish you all the luck and happiness this new well brings! :)
I'm very happy about the result of your efforts, this well looks great! Great job, boys!
Loved this program. You fellas are amazing! Thank you for sharing your adventures.❤❤❤
Great project. Will be interesting to see how the water level rises and falls with the seasons. And in a dry / drought year how quickly it dries up. Suspect that those oak barrels under water and totally saturated would last for a very long time. A clever lining technique.
We have a similar shallow well at our place and use it for watering gardens and outdoor uses in summer. We are on sand next to dairy farm where cows are on pasture. We measured e coli levels in a winter and found it was suitable for drinking but then measured last summer and it had trace levels of E coli in it. Thus wouldn't consider it drinkable. It has high iron and manganese levels so would taste gross, so not used for drinking anyway, but interesting to test. You should have a lab that can measure potable water quality within postage distance (sample needs to be kept cold, so speed of delivery is important)
Was expecting either sandy soil or 12+ feet deep after opening statement. Clay is pretty stable when not completely saturated, and the well was pretty shallow when it comes to collapse. Guess youtube comments are pretty scathing when any risk is involved.
I know it's not strictly period-accurate, but you should chlorinate that well before use. Just use regular unscented bleach, drop 2 cups per 50 gallons of standing water in the well, then 3 cups of white vinegar to bring down the pH and let the bleach do its work. Agitate and let stand for 8 hours. After that take water out of the well until it no longer smells like chlorine, and you're good to go.
You should repeat chlorination with 1 cup of bleach and 1 1/2 cup of vinegar once a month to be safe, or if the water ever gets a weird taste.
If the water stands for too long unused in the well, repeat the full chlorination cycle.
@@klstacked Without chlorine in the drinking water you'd be long dead, friend... The idea is to poison the parasites and bacteria and algae that would otherwise kill you or make you real sick.
@@klstacked Chlorination of water is something that's done all over, and has been for over 100 years.
It's way too diluted to cause any harm.
@@hatad321 boiling and filtering:
When I was 12, my grandfather had me climb down our 30 foot well to clean it out. It was so cold down there that I was shivering. He let me come out to warm up a few times.
Thanks for being great. It's bittersweet to see great new videos since my mothers passing. She actually introduced me to this channel and she would've loved this video. We shared lots of moments with you over time. Thank you
Someone said the pioneers did not mind safety as much as today. If you read letters such as Charles Billinghurst (Albion's Greatest Hunter) and gold mining pioneers from Marshall , Michigan that traveled to California during the gold rush, you find they always, day and night, had their head on a swivel looking for danger. They were most of time far more concerned with safety than many people today. Every aspect of their life was checked and rechecked from the salt, water, and flour to body temperature of their animals.
In dangerous times you need to be more vigilant, nowadays it’s quite safe to be alive in any profession really.
Most people died before the age of 35 - from accidents as well as harsh living, infection, hypothermia, cholera from bad water etc. As you say, it was not "happy go lucky" as the romantics would have you believe.
Great vid!
The thing that strikes me about your re-enactments is the plodding persistence that pioneers needed... How long did this take?
How long would it take on ...basically subsistence rations?
Good effort!
Well done!!!!!! So wonderful to see the homestead coming along into self-sufficiency bit by bit. I'm a tenderfoot city dweller but I'm under no illusions as to the tremendous amount of hard work and team work this homestead requires in order to be successful. Kudos to every one of y'all for continuing to make this happen! If we ever suffer a CME or EMP someday, y'all are ready to ride it out!
Over here more comon version were log-lined wells.
You would chop logs into 2 lenghs, one being about thickness of said log shorter. Afterwards you would split them into halves and clean up split side a bit. You would make square shape, placing long logs on opposit sides, and shot ones on remaining sides. You would place split side towards inside to make smoother wall. You can also make a notch in long logs to prevent short ones from being pushed inside. You would alternate sides on wich long logs are. Another optional step is placing long lasting wood sticks (like oak that was chared on outside) into notches every few rows as kind of lader to have access if well needs to be cleaned or repaired.
I'd love to see water quality tests performed on the well water. It would be nice too see how similar or different it is to our modern supply.
Would depend on (a) where the water flow from and (b) what land it flows over. Sometimes water underground flows different to what we would expect. Our shallow well just a bit deeper the water flows into the well from parallel to the river nearby. Which is totally unexpected we expected it to flow across to the river. Secondly if the land is forest or natural cover / use then highly likely to be excellent quality. However if the water flows through intensive farmland, urban, or septic / sewerage systems then highly likely to have e coli or other bacteria that wouldn't make it potable.
The other water standard that has intrigued me is turbidity. This is how clear the water is. The current drinking standards (down here in New Zealand) the turbidity required is way below (low is good) what one can detect with the eye. I sent a water sample off last summer to lab, thought it would be fine and pass turbidity as it was 100% clear to my eyeball. It just failed the standard, and when I looked it up, if you can see anything in the water it is a massive fail.
So the trace levels of slit in the bottom that are stirred up when you drop in the bucket are likely to cause a fail.
Having grown up with a deep and productive (made lots of water year round) hand dug well just steps away from our summer kitchen I can tell you even the best "looking" water from a hand dug well should never be trusted. If you have no choice but to use one for cooking or drinking water...boiling before consumption is a must.
@@glamdring0007 Having also grown up with a large productive hand dug well I'd say just test your water. It's not too expensive and you get a definitive answer. As David said it's all about your ground water and you don't know the quality until you test. You might need a filter, you might not.
The water from our well was tested regularly was just as good as the municipal water from a natural spring a little ways over.
I've been following all of the projects associated with the homestead. EXCELLENT work in designing, building and videography. Very happy disabled youtuber!! Thanks to you and all of your helpers.
Wow this is amazing! I never really understood how wells worked. Showing us how your were look for sand and gravel as a flow point for water going the creek is so cool!
Gotta love these guys, always wanting the best for us
I wonder if an extra 6-12 inches depth would have been worth the effort to be able to draw that much more water before having to wait for it to refill. And also so you wouldn't have had to cut off part of the barrel.
Another great and mesmerizing video! I can watch Towndends channel all day and still find videos I've missed. Love it!
Love your series... you do a fantastic job of bringing history to the present. Thanks!
I've dug a couple wells with my dad and my uncle. We had one collapse on itself after about a year; we lined it with brick, no mortar (cut corners, I guess we were tired after all the digging)
The second well we dug was a... replacement of sorts. My grandpa dug a well, and lined it with a 55 gallon drum. It lasted a good 50 years, maybe more, but the drum rusted out and the ground around that old well sunk on. Dad and I dug the whole thing out and re-built the well with two plastic 55 gallon drums, surrounded with gravel and sand, and a little overflow pvc piping. We weren't going for.... historical accuracy, obviously.
Yes, digging a well with hand tools is very possible..it's tiresome, tedious work, but with all work of that sorts, the end result is endlessly gratifying..
This may be a tad ambitious, but I'd love to see you grow barley or apples and brew your own beer or cider from it.
Considering the goal of this prefect is to recreate a period acurate home stead with period acurate tools. I do hope this will be the goal!
That would be awesome!
This is the most interesting video I’ve seen of yours. My great grandparents had a well on their farm. Great job and great teamwork!
this is awesome - I did this as part of an aid mission when I was in the (British) army around 15years ago. from memory we were 8ft diameter, and didnt hit the water level until 20' deep. Our engineer had calculated the need for a further 8ft to enable a refill rate equal to the pump rate of the manual pump that was being installed, double brick lined for the bottom 10ft or so and single brick lined to the top.
That was hard graft when I was young - really impressed by your work on these projects
As I said on the original upload, I had every belief that you'd succeed in digging this well, considering that there are many hand-dug wells that go well over 500 feet down out there. The work you all did on this was great.
You guys rock! 👍❤
I love the videos from this channel and Townsend always looks so happy doing his thing.
This was truly amazing guys! I love your channel and all the amazing recipes you cook but to see you guys go the whole way and do stuff like this is really awesome! I am right there with you with being so happy it turned out so well (haha.. is there a pun there?). I don't know anything about the 'controversy' of safety that may have surrounded this video but I know you guys know what you are doing and I don't doubt that the well being of everyone involved is your first priority. Your enthusiasm and passion is entirely inspiring and I love that you are bringing history to life and educating us in such a fun way in how people lived and survived before us. Thank You and keep it up! Much Love to You All!
Glad to hear, that you had been taking care of 'safety issues' behind the scenes.
And thanks for posting an updated video, making that clear. You never know, who might decide to go on their own digging expedition after seeing a cool project like that. Without doing proper research on the issue. Better safe then sorry 👍
I think people that have never left the city limits and never touched a shovel probably shouldn't be giving opinions about how to dig an 8-ft hole. 🏆