Read time: 3 min.

I loved to draw as a kid and even won some art contests. I was also endlessly fascinated by water towers. Somewhere around age seven or eight, those two interests collided when I proudly assembled a handmade book cataloging every water tower I’d ever seen! Nearly thirty years later, I still can’t help but notice old or unusual water towers. One of my favorites looms over Gaston. It’s known as a “witch’s hat¹.” 

Gaston sits in northwestern Delaware County. Originally known as Snag Town but platted as New Corner in 1855, the community took its present name when the railroad came through during the East Central Indiana gas boom². Today, about eight hundred people call the place home. 

Gaston is home to several landmarks, like its old schoolhouse-turned-Odd Fellows Lodge-turned home. The town’s water tower appears to date to 1930³– earlier than the bulbous spheroids we most often see today, but newer than a simple standpipe. As time passed, improvements in steelwork allowed communities to trade those plain pipes for sturdier metal tanks⁴. 

Gaston’s pointy-roof witch’s hat design⁵ was a common sight in the early twentieth century. In the 1960s, though, a new wave of round towers took over the skyline as the shape became the modern standard⁶. Indeed, Gaston’s also home to a spheroid tower on West Elm Street said to be built in 1960⁷. I haven’t bothered to take a picture of it. 

Today, Gaston’s old witch’s hat stands as a reminder of a time when even utilitarian structures featured a little personality. Even though it’s long been outpaced by newer technology and modern shapes, the tower still dominates the skyline and remains near the top of my mental list of memorable water towers.

I may no longer be sketching them out with colored pencils and stapled paper, but my impulse remains the same: to notice, to remember, and to appreciate the everyday landmarks that give small towns like Gaston a little texture. 

Sources Cited
1 Montgomery, G. (2025, September 24). Indiana town’s residents to gather for photo with soon-to-be-gone water tower. WISHTV [Indianapolis]. Web. Retrieved October 4, 2025. 
2 Kemper, G. W. H. (1908). Education in Delaware County. In A Twentieth Century History of Delaware County, Indiana, Volume 1. book, Lewis Publishing Company.
3 Parcel 0234301004000 (2025). Office of the Assessor. Delaware County [Muncie]. Web. Retrieved December 28, 2025.
4 Schmitt, E. (2018, July 23). The Shape of Water Towers: An Engineering History. Treatment Plant Operator. Web. Retrieved October 4, 2025.
5 (See footnote 1). 
6 Kempe, M. (2006, September 3). New England Water Supplies – A Brief History of. Journal of the New England Water Works Association 120, no. 3. Web. Retrieved October 4, 2025. 
7 Parcel 0233252012000 (2025). Office of the Assessor. Delaware County [Muncie]. Web. Retrieved December 28, 2025.