"The Well"

The ultimate source of natural potable water is rain, rarely used today as a direct source except where rain is collected into cisterns and serves as the only available water supply. When rain falls, it runs off into streams or soaks into the ground, percolating through porous strata until it reaches an impervious stratum and collects, forming groundwater. Groundwater is the source of wells and of springs that feed streams, rivers, and lakes. Surface waters contain larger quantities of bacteria than groundwaters, but groundwater has higher concentrations of dissolved chemicals.

Early peoples had no need of engineering works to supply their water. Hunters and nomads camped near natural sources of fresh water. After community life developed, supplying water became important for inhabitants of a city and the surrounding farms. The first people to consider sanitation of their water supply were the ancient Romans, who constructed a vast system of aqueducts to bring the clean waters of the Apennine Mountains into the city and built settling basins with filters along these mains to ensure the clarity of the water.

The invention of the force pump in England in the 16th century extended the possibilities of development of water-supply systems. The first municipal pumping station in the U.S. was erected about 1760 to supply water to the town of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. By 1800, 16 U.S. cities had water-supply systems, and since that time almost every city and town in the country has been provided with municipal waterworks, most of them publicly owned and operated.