The Coconino sun., 1920-04-02
UNCLE JASPER'S PUMPS
 by ALBERT B. REAGAN

When attending high school work ed for my board for an aged man we all called Uncle Jasper. He was very good and kind man, but from busi- ness point of view he possessed one bad fault. Any old, discarded ma chinery of his neighbors he could beg or buy cheaply he brought to his farm. He would then spend great deal of valuable time tinkering with it and doing poor work with same when he could get it patched up so he could use it. Old binders, mowers, rakes and other worthless machinery litter ed the place. His poor crops and high weeds also became by-word in the community.
 When l went to the place to board the most conspicuous, worthless thing l had to use was an old, leaky, worn- out pump in the only we'll on the place. Every time one had to get pail of water or come to the we'll to water the horses or other stock, the pesky old pump had to be primed. Also of ten the pail of priming water was empty and one had to gd to the house for water to prime the pump. Furth- ermore, in winter, on account of the freezing weather the water for prim- ing purposes was kept in the house all the time, the pump being 300 feet dis tant. Consequently this getting wat CT from the residence to start the pump consumed considerable valuable time and necessitated one's doing con siderable extra walking each day.
 This nuisance finally got on my my nerves and I said to Uncle Jas per: "How long have you been prim- ing pumps as you do this one?"
 "Well. Jean," he replied in his droll way of speaking, q am seventy-six years old and recken I've been doing it over forty years of those three-score and sixteen. Why ask?"
 'I was just wondering how much time you have lost in your life just fooling with such old things"
 'T recken haven't lost much"
 You have lost more time than one could convince you, you have. have been keeping tab on that pump for month. sIt has to be primed on an av- craze of twenty times a day. When the water to prime it has to be ob- tained from the house one must walk 300 feet to get and then 300 feet back to the well, or total distance of 600 feet. And the priming it twenty times a day necessitates one walking 1900 feet or over two and third miles. It usually takes at least fifteen minutes for one to walk mile. So in just go- ing for the priming water one loses thirty-five minutes per day in the freezing months, which in this climate average four months, but let's con- slider it four months of thirty days each, or total of one hundred twen- ty days. A loss of thirty-fve minutes per day for one hundred twenty days each year amounts to seventy hours or eight and three-fourths working days lost each winter, and the loss in forty years would amount to three hundred fifty days work or forty-eight days over a working year."
 You're making that too big"
 Just wait. l haven't figured what you lost after you got the water. l have been keeping tab on that also. It takes from twenty to forty extra strokes to prime that pump by actual count and by exact time by my watch it averages two minutes extra work to get the water and pour it down the pumps throat and then get it to flow ing out the spout. As this has to be done twenty times a day, forty min utes are therefore lost. As there are three hundred and sixty-five and one fourth days in year, years loss is 30.4375 eight-hour days and in forty years it amounts to 1217.5 days lost"
 "Oh, boy" said the aged man as he held up his large hands in horror.
 q am not done yet, Uncle," I con- tinued. Your whole loss on pump prim- l ing and in getting water to prime it amounts to $50 days plus 1217.5 days or total of 1567.5 working days. Now in your time days work on farm has been valued at $1.0O. You have, therefore, lost $1 ,567.50. A pump such as you use costs, say, $30.00 (the fact | is, not one of them cost half that), $1 ,567.50 would buy you more than fifty-two such pumps. A team of horses to this time has been worth not over $300.00. With that money you could have purchased five teams and