Threatened: Tankhouses, Windsor, CA.

Photos by Thomas Eddy

The sentries of Mendocino's skyline are the town's water towers, or tankhouses in preservation speak.  As if securing the town from an approaching fog bank, the redwood tankhouses also help us identify Mendocino as a one-of-a-kind place in coastal California.  They are a community's icons that have new found purposes; everything from wedding backdrops to hotel accommodations.

  

Tankhouses are indeed unique to the west coast, and in particular to California.  Our long, dry summers meant water needed to be stored for months until the winter rains replenished the soil.  Elevating the tanks helped to transport the water by gravity.  Noted geographer Leon Pitman has identified six different types of tankhouses with each style being unique to a particular region in California.  However, it is clear that Windsor farmers did not pay attention to this apparent "rule."

Slanted or straight walls, attached houses or windmills, all are visually top heavy due to the immensity of the redwood tanks. At least eight tankhouses can be found within and around Windsor.  Most exemplify others found throughout our state. New pumps, pressure tanks, and municipal water connections have made these tankhouses obsolete.  Today, many are turned into living spaces or storage barns, but too many others are either severely deteriorating or already lost. The skeletal remains of one is slated for demolition to make way for a modern hotel on Old Redwood Highway.  Another, with only one story remaining, is slated for a future parking lot near the new train depot.

As these iconic landmarks find their way onto wine labels and bookshelves, will others be embraced by the community as heritage resources spotted all over the vernacular landscape...or will they strictly become fodder for retail kitsch? We should be looking toward places like Mendocino to understand their value as repurposed and functional structures that can also define sense of place.