Cast Iron Drinking Fountain on a Cobbled Square

Clean water was hard to come by in Victorian cities. Plenty of people drank beer because it was safer. In 1859 a London charity opened the first of its free public drinking fountains. Towns all over Britain followed with cast-iron ones like this, often with metal cups hung on chains so nobody walked off with them. This green and gold one still runs from a lion's mouth on a cobbled square, with a plane tree and stone storefronts around it. Fallen plane leaves on the wet cobbles give the drinking fountain jigsaw puzzle its fall colors.