The Temperance Fountain – Washington, DC

The Temperance Fountain stands at the corner of Seventh Street and Indiana Avenue NW, near the National Archives in Washington, D.C.

It was donated to the city in 1882 by Henry D. Cogswell, an eccentric dentist from San Francisco, California, who had made a fortune in real estate and mining stocks. He used his personal wealth to donate somewhere between 15 and 30 statues dedicated to the temperance movement. Only two of these statues stand today – one in D.C. and one in New York City.

The statue resembles a square temple that is open on all sides. It is held up by four columns on the corners. In the middle is an "altar" with two entwined dolphins (which look more like evil fish sent by Poseidon to swallow Odysseus) that have their tails in the air. On top of the temple sits a life-size heron. What any of this has to do with temperance is anyone’s guess. However, the words "Faith," "Hope," "Charity" and "Temperance" appear on the sides of the temple, which does give some indication of the statue’s meaning. Originally, visitors were supposed to freely drink ice water flowing from the dolphins’ snouts with a brass cup attached to the fountain. The overflow was collected by a trough for horses. But the city tired of having to replenish the ice in a reservoir underneath the base and disconnected the supply pipes.

The fountain is also the source of the name for the Cogswell Society, a small group of Washington professionals who have taken it upon themselves to take care of the fountain. The society, which meets monthly at various bars around the Washington, D.C. area, is dedicated to "the study of man’s excesses and the lack of temperance in past and present cultures." Members utter the society’s oath, "To temperance; I’ll drink to that," standing on one leg, in imitation of the heron that tops the temperance advocate’s fanciful fountain.