Originally Posted by
Designer
Not many are actually being used as they were originally intended. The early ones were a very simple crank attached to the spinner, which worked a regular reciprocating water pump. Typically, there was a water tank near the base that the rancher would fill with water periodically by activating the windmill.
In later years, those same mills were sometimes converted to generate electricity, which of course often would power a water pump.
They are usually considered antiques now, and very few of them are in working order.