Marston Water Tower

Last crawled date: 2 years, 11 months ago

After a severe water shortage forced the cancellation of classes in 1895, building a water tower became the main priority of the university. Anson Marston, the first dean of engineering, was put in charge of the feat. Most water towers usually last three to four decades, but not this one. Marston wanted the water tower to serve as an object lesson, both to citizens of the state and to hundreds of young engineers. He used steel instead of wood, doubled the load requirements, and elevated the 162,000-gallon barrel more than 150-feet in the air. It became the first steel and tallest water tower west of the Mississippi River. Today, the water tower is still the tallest structure on the Iowa State campus. In 1978, the use of the water tower was discontinued when the university switched to a city water system. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1981, and restored in 1997. The model was completed by Kurtis Wolgast and modified by Benjamin Schwartz. #ISU_Water_Tower