1987 Drum Tower Village - Water Well, Chengyang, Guizhou Province

This photograph was made in 1987 in a small Dong minority village near Chengyang, Guizhou Province. Water sources like this one were essential parts of village infrastructure — serving not only as drinking water but also as places to wash vegetables, fill cooking pots, rinse tools, and exchange daily news.

The stone steps descending toward the well follow a route worn smooth by generations of footsteps, connecting the terraced rice fields to this sheltered water point. The simple stone structure with its sloped protective roof reflects the practical engineering of rural China during this era: durable, efficient, and built entirely from local materials.

As modernization began to reshape the countryside in the late 1980s, many wells like this were replaced by pipes and pumps. This photograph preserves a quiet moment from a way of life that has largely disappeared — a visual record of tradition, agricultural rhythm, and community interdependence in rural southwestern China.