Windmills!

[Phil C]

If you are ever in Lubbock be sure to go to their great windmill museum. They have windmills from all over the world there and great demonstrations. A windmill basically uses the energy of the wind. In West Texas and other parts they are mainly used to pump water and fill up water troughs for cattle and are especially used when rain is scarce. They are operated today by electricity but at one time it was completely wind regularted. The wind would blow vanes (also called sales) that would movie a long iron bar up and down and it would go deep into the ground connected to a pump that would pump water up through a pipe into a water trough. I don't know the mechanics but I was told that there was something in the trough that would stop the windmill when it reached near the top to keep from wasting water. Also the ranchers could manually adjust it to not work when they were satisfied with the level. This was essentially for cattle in dry regions.

Interesting indeed.