Long Journey Quenches Thirst – I heard from a relative that there is a drinking water company that plans to redesign its water gallons. Then the first question that arises is: “What’s wrong with the existing gallons? Isn’t that standard?”
Indeed, reactions like that often arise when we talk about something that has been going on for a long time. It seems the novelty has become far-fetched. We also often answer the question, “Why?” with the answer, “Because that’s how it usually is.”
The design of a product that lasts a long time does have that kind of potential. Not just a trend or commodity, design can even define an activity. For example, gallons of drinking water. We no longer care what brand of water we drink, but gallons have built a concept in our heads about drinking itself.
How do we drink? What water is good for our health? How to store water properly? The best concept that comes to the mind of a modern person is probably holding a glass under the showerhead of an electric dispenser. The water is immediately cold when we press the blue button, and immediately hot when we press the red button.
Where does the water come from? How does the water from the spring get into the gallon? We never question. We only understand that when the gallon is empty, it is time to replace it with another gallon that still contains drinking water.
Before dispensers were popular, we probably still remember where we had to store water in a jerry can or bottle and put it in the refrigerator. So the concept of drinking cold and clean water is to open the refrigerator, take out the bottle and pour it into a glass.
Now innovation is increasingly advanced and continues to develop. Various types of dispensers have emerged, not just storing and cooling or heating, but also filtering and sterilizing. The last one is a kind of drinking water sterilization device called Pureit .
Can you drink water that instant? This doubt may clearly arise in our minds, considering that our concept of “drinking” is too synonymous with bottled water of a certain brand.
Then have we ever asked who designed the water gallon? I tried searching for it on Google but couldn’t find the answer. However, if we ask, who designed the cooled dispenser machine that we commonly use, apparently there is an answer in the
The drinking water dispenser machine was invented by Halsey Willard Taylor and Luther Haws in 1906. This water faucet was then patented by Luther Haws in 1911. Since then The Halsey Taylor Company and Haws Sanitary Drinking Faucet & Co have revolutionized the drinking water process. The background to designing a dispensing device like this was the occurrence of a typhoid outbreak due to contaminated drinking water which caused Haws’ father to die. Therefore, the main aim of designing drinking water dispensers is to provide safer drinking water ( purified water ).
For similar reasons, namely preventing disease due to contaminated drinking water, Halsey Willard Taylor then made a drinking water tap (shower) for school children in Berkeley, and this became the first drinking water tap in the world.
Initially, this kind of dispenser only provided water at room temperature. However, because the demand for cold water was so high, a refrigerated dispenser was designed in 1938. Because the cooling process at that time used ice blocks, you can imagine that the refrigerated dispenser machine at that time was very large and heavy.
A certain decrease in water temperature at that time was considered to be an effort to purify and free the water from certain bacteria. However, at that time the dispenser was not designed with a water treatment method that measured its effectiveness in killing germs.
Over the following decades, along with developments in technology and design, drinking water dispensers became smaller, lighter and more affordable. Now individuals, individual households can even buy it.
In recent years, where the dispenser design has not changed much, now innovation in the field of drinking water is no longer changing the concept or way of drinking, but to continue to improve the way water is purified to improve people’s health.
Now in almost every modern home, people drink water through a dispenser like this. It’s hard to imagine not having a dispenser in a house. Because the design of the gallon and dispenser is often considered to disturb the beauty of the room, interior and furniture designers often hide it in a built-in cupboard , or design a gallon cover.
But what about the times before 1906? Before a dispenser like this was created? Before this instant era? The concept of drinking water is definitely very different. What’s interesting is that while people today don’t know for sure whether the water they drink meets health standards or not, the older people who preceded us felt that the water they drank was definitely healthy. Ancient people dared to drink water directly without a filter not because they looked at the packaging, or what kind of dispenser they used, but by choosing spring water that was considered clean and not polluted.
One product that we cannot fail to mention when it comes to water is the jug. Jugs are still used today even though they have been largely forgotten. What’s interesting about jugs is that this object can be described with just one word, namely container. The jug can be used as a storage place as well as a place for drinking water. The jug can also directly become a tool for drinking itself. Certain people have returned to using jugs as drinking utensils because they believe that water stored in unglazed clay vessels can be healthy for the body. And if design developments require a dispenser that can cool water, people actually believe that the temperature of the jug’s water, which is cool but not too cold, can cure certain diseases.
However, it must be admitted that jugs are no longer popular. There are many everyday objects that replace the function of a jug. As a means of storing drinking water, jugs can be replaced with bottles, jerry cans, teapots, dispensers, etc. As a place to store water, jugs can be replaced with buckets, jars, and so on. As a means of drinking water, jugs can be replaced with glasses.
Jugs are used throughout the archipelago as standard everyday objects and perhaps at that time no one questioned what a jug was. Apart from that, jugs are also still used in foreign countries such as India, Ethiopia, and countries where water distribution in pipes does not yet exist.
People who live in areas that still use jugs as a means of distributing water, storing water and drinking water containers like this, may not have an idea of pressing a blue or red button as a concept for drinking water. They only know that each jug has a different shape. Some are simple in shape like water jars. There are also those that have a hole like a mouth to channel water out. There are big jugs and there are small jugs.
Nowadays, when drinking water is as easy as pressing a button, coupled with all the innovations in water purifiers and purifiers, we probably can’t imagine having to do the things we did when dispensers had not yet been invented.
Then what tool do you choose to drink water? Going back to the old ways, drinking jugs of water? Or drink purified water like pureit ? Or just a standard dispenser?
However, the question that is also crucial to answering these choices is whether we can still access clean water that is suitable for drinking straight away? What have we done to preserve clean water, apart from just designing storage, distribution and equipment such as dispensers, gallons, bottles, glasses and refrigerators that can purify water that is already dangerous?
And how do we feel about current conditions, after looking at the past, or seeing areas where piped and bottled water has not been distributed? Do you feel lucky because you don’t have to carry water by propping a jug on your head and have tools that can ensure the health of your drinking water?
Or do you feel sad because you can’t drink water directly from the spring because many springs are polluted? What is certain is that we can feel grateful because there is still water on this earth, because otherwise, any designs and methods would no longer be useful for us.
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