MANSFIELD — David and Jane Vasbinder would have been proud Monday morning.
The historic fountain that bears their name — a donation to the city that was dedicated on July 4, 1881 — came home to Central Park in downtown Mansfield.
The mammoth, cast-iron fountain was disassembled last fall and shipped to Robinson Iron, a foundry in Alabama that fully restored the iconic structure to its original glory. The plan was to return it in time for the country’s 250th birthday party.
Mission accomplished.
Workers from the company delivered the parts on a flat-bed truck Monday morning and began the process of re-assembling it, assisted by a crane from Shelly Smith & Sons of Mansfield.
Once the work is completed, probably by the end of Monday, the fountain will still stand around 18 feet tall.
City deputy engineer Blair McClenathan’s research on the fountain led to a $250,000 grant from the Richland County Foundation to pay for the restoration.
McClenathan watched the process on Monday morning.
“It’s great to see,” he said. “It’s been here for the better part of 145 years, so it’s great to see it back.”
(Below are photos by Carl Hunnell of the Vasbinder Fountain being re-assembled in Mansfield’s Central Park on Monday morning.)
McClenathan said the difference in the fountain’s appearance was “night and day.”
” You can actually see the detail in the casting now. It had so many coats of paint on it that you couldn’t see it, so it looks just about like it would (when new),” McClenathan said.
How did it feel to see his research report come to life?
“It’s unreal. To go from an idea on paper to it actually being back, it’s fantastic,”
McClenathan said.
As the workers from the company from Alexander City, Ala., continued their painstaking work, McClenathan praised Robinson Iron’s work.
“They specialize in this type of work … the restoration of Victorian fountains.
“The company that originally cast it was J.L. Mott out of New York. When it went defunct, Robinson Iron actually bought the original castings. So they’ve got the molds, they can recast, they could rebuild the whole fountain if they wanted to,” McClenathan said.
The fountain will be re-dedicated during American 250 festivities on July 4, though McClenathan said the city will test what should be improved water flow before then. The city re-plumbed the lines to the fountain while it was gone.
“It’s a direct feed to city water now. When you recirculate, as that evaporates and you refill, the calcium in that water gets so concentrated, it’ll start to drop out and you get hard water staining.
“In an effort to mitigate that, and reduce the amount of labor for the parks department, if we just straight plumb it, there’s much less maintenance,” McClenathan said.
MORE COVERAGE OF THE VASBINDER FOUNTAIN RESTORIATION
The restoration effort included recasting parts as needed and sandblasting layers of paint that have been applied over the years. The original price tag for the fountain was around $2,500.
It also included cleaning and conserving sections of cast iron, repairing corrosion, applying fresh paint and protective coating and updating the mechanical and plumbing systems.
“We are going to recreate that (1881) dedication as part of the 250th birthday celebration,” Mansfield Public Works Director Louis Andres said in January.
“It’s going to look new. It’s going to be great. And we are going to add some additional features so it will be kind of a center landmark in Central Park,” he said.
When the fountain was taken away for repairs last year, it wasn’t the first time it had left the park. In fact, the fountain was gone for two decades at one point.
The city “sold it for scrap” in 1958 to James Pugh, who owned land that is now part of Malabar Farm State Park near Lucas, including the famous “Pugh Cabin.”
The city made the decision to get rid of the fountain when it paved the road through Central Park, breaking it into two halves, south and north of Park Avenue.
Pugh, fortunately, never scrapped it, Andres said in 2024.
“James Pugh today would be considered a hoarder. He never threw anything away,” said Andres, who had been the manager at Malabar Farm for 22 years.
Instead, Pugh gave it to his friend, Louis Bromfield, who placed the fountain in a lower terrace garden near the pond before donating it back to the city when it requested it in 1979.
The city, led by then-Councilman Dan Stevens, had the fountain restored and placed back in the park. It was re-dedicated on July 4, 1979.
(Below are photos taken Monday morning by deputy city engineer Blair McClenathan as the historic Vasbinder Fountain was re-assembled in Central Park in downtown Mansfield.)
