The Pumpman Returneth
part II
A few weeks after my original “Pumpman of Skye” item appeared in the Glengarry News, I had a visit from Mr. Peter Jack, who lives on Cumming Road, southwest of Maxville. He is part of the generation who attended high school in Maxville’s now-demolished brick school house, that was just north of the MacEwen complex on Mechanic Street West. As such, he was chums with many of his contemporaries from the Dunvegan area who also arttended.
He has fond memories of time spent with his Dunvegan friends, including skating parties at the gravel pit just east of Fiskes Corner Road and the 8th Concession. There, in the very late fall, the young folks would illuminate the frozen pond with their car headlights and while away the time doing the things young people are naturally wont to do. But Mr. Jack hadn’t dropped by to share ‘skating’ stories. To my complete surprise, he wanted to show me a piece of history that he had long stored in his back shed.
Mr. Jack had read my account in the News about John Norman MacLeod, the “Pumpman of Skye.” And lo and behold, there, in the bed of his pick-up truck, were some of the components from an actual antique wooden pump.
To begin with, there was the main body or cylinder of the pump — a four or five-foot long tamarack log about four or five inches in diameter with a hole bored straight though its length. What I never realized until seeing the actual artifact was that the pump body was sharply tapered at the bottom. It was Mr. Jack’s opinion that this was done so additional lengths of logs with bore holes could be added to act as a “pipe”, through which the well water could be drawn. And I was inclined to agree with him.
Mr. Jack also had the internal mechanism of the pump, which was fashioned almost entirely from wood. The only metal was a small swivel joint to attach the pump’s handle to the wooden shaft of the plunger.
However, the pump part that really caught my eye was the hand-carved foot valve at the end of the shaft. Much like those amazing wooden chains fashioned from a single piece of wood, the valve consisted of a wood ball in a wooden cage. On the down-stroke of the handle, the ball would be forced against a hole in the very bottom of the valve; this would seal the column of water and allow it to be drawn up and out the spout. And on the up-stroke (of the handle), the ball would float up in its cage and allow more water to enter the cylinder. Around the valve, one can even see what remains of the “leathers”, the seal that ensured that the only pathway for the water was through the foot valve. This strip of leather was fastened to the valve with two tightly packed, parallel rows of tacks.
As for the maker of Mr. Jack’s pump, no one knows for sure. It could have been a product of the Pumpman’s Skye Road factory. Or it could have come from somewhere else. These amazing wooden machines were no doubt crafted in many rural Ontario communities.
But the fact that this ingenious handmade artifact still exists is truly a two-fold miracle. First, the pump and a number of additional pipe sections were rescued many years ago by Mr. Jack from a farm where they were being used as part of a pigpen.
Second, Mr. Jack stored the pump and its wooden pipes for safekeeping in an old shed and, as a result, they escaped being consumed in the devastating fire that destroyed his family’s home over twenty years ago. PS: If you’d like to see a rig like John Norman MacLeod’s in action, Clay MacWhirter from the Cumberland Museum has a YouTube video in which he demonstrates how a log boring machine and a huge lathe are used to make wooden pipes and pumps.
