Former Fukumoto Family Residence Well and Water Tower

What Is the Former Fukumoto Family Residence Well and Water Tower?

The Former Fukumoto Family Residence Well and Water Tower (旧福元家住宅井戸及び給水塔, Kyū Fukumoto-ke Jūtaku Ido oyobi Kyūsuitō) is a stone-lined well topped by a small brick water tower, built around 1926 in Nishiyashiro, Suo-Oshima Town, Yamaguchi Prefecture, to supply running water to the house, and it was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on February 17, 2022.

It stands southeast of the main house. The well shaft is lined with fitted granite; on top of it sits a tower of brick finished in mortar, roughly 1 meter square in plan (0.9 m² in area) and 2.8 meters high.

Plumbing for an Island House

Fukumoto Chōemon had lived in the United States, and when he came home he wanted taps that worked. The Former Fukumoto Family Residence Well and Water Tower was how he got them. Yamaguchi Prefecture describes it as the installation that carried water from the well to each faucet in the building.

The water went to the bath and to the kitchen of the main house, where Fukumoto had set up an American oven and sink on a board floor. Piping took over the job of hauling buckets from the well.

On the tower you can still find traces of the system: marks left by a gauge that showed how much water was held in the tank, and by the pipes that carried it away. These scars are now the main evidence of how the equipment once worked.

Why It Was Registered

The Former Fukumoto Family Residence Well and Water Tower was registered for its contribution to the historic landscape. The prefecture values it as a window onto daily life in the years before public water mains reached the area.

Granite below, brick and mortar above: the two materials stacked one on the other show, in plain physical form, a conventional well with a new delivery system grafted onto it. Stand in the main house's kitchen or bath and you cannot tell where the water came from. This tower is the answer.

Visiting the Well and Water Tower

The Former Fukumoto Family Residence Well and Water Tower stands in the open, southeast of the main house, and is easiest to reach by walking round from the south side before or after your tour of the interior. Look closely at the surface of the tower for the gauge and pipe marks.

There is no access to the inside of the tower; it is a structure to be seen from outside. Photography is prohibited inside the museum building, and the tower is outdoors, so follow any signs or staff instructions about taking pictures in the grounds.