history of musical fountains

History of musical fountains

You may have seen a musical fountain, and thought "isn't modern technology wonderful" but did you know that musical fountains are older than you think, MUCH older.

In 1908 (Yes over 100 years ago) saw the "birth" of "The electric fountain" made by FW Darlington. In short, this was a custom made concrete building in the Ferril lake in Denver U.S.A. It was very clever, it had nozzle formations on the roof which were built around what we would call skylights. Below each skylight was an electric arc light above each arc light was a coloured disc which could be remotely rotated to give different colours. (What we would call a colour wheel)

The whole building was submerged underwater and everything was controlled remotely from the shore, including the steam driven pumps that made the water shoot high up into the air.

The remote operator controlled the fountain by moving a series of levers in time to music played by the local band.

The first truly portable musical fountains had to wait at least another 12 years, the company was started by Otto Przystawik, the company is still running today.

This is an "old" musical fountain, it is at least 28 years old, ( We were invited to restore it back in 2001, it was at least 15 years old then) it is redundant and neglected. It is constructed from galvanised steel, its lights are mains operated which are no longer allowed in the UK, and all the lights and their fittings were either broken or seized.

It did have one "novel feature" it had moving rows of jets, but they were operated by a mains operated motor, which as you can see is seized up. (Lid removed for picture purposes)

It really was a pleasure to have seen it. Unfortunately the cost of restoring this old fountain (Which is why we were invited to see it) will cost more than a new fountain will. It is not feasible to restore it due to the fact it has been allowed to fall into such neglect, and too much of it is corroded.

We have been asked to point out by Michael Przystawik that this is NOT one of his family's creations. This fountains actual origin is unknown.

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