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In the United States, a water boy or water girl (sometimes spelled waterboy or watergirl) was someone who worked in the field, providing water to
farmworkers A farmworker, farmhand or agricultural worker is someone employed for labor in agriculture. In labor law, the term "farmworker" is sometimes used more narrowly, applying only to a hired worker involved in agricultural production, including har ...
in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Today, the name is given to those who work on the sidelines at sports events to provide water for athletes. The phrase has also been used to describe diminutive figures who serve another team or person in the business and political worlds, in a slightly derogatory manner (ex. "Bill is the
CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization. CEOs find roles in variou ...
's water boy"). The position has a long history in athletics. In the 1869 Princeton vs. Rutgers football game, one of the earliest
American football American football, referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada and also known as gridiron football, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular American football field, field with goalposts at e ...
games, an unnamed water boy was documented giving aid to a
Rutgers Rutgers University ( ), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of three campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College and was aff ...
player. Several notable people served as water boys, among which being
President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Film and television *'' Præsident ...
Herbert Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was the 31st president of the United States, serving from 1929 to 1933. A wealthy mining engineer before his presidency, Hoover led the wartime Commission for Relief in Belgium and ...
, who was the
Stanford Cardinal football The Stanford Cardinal football program represents Stanford University in college football at the NCAA Division I FBS level and is a member of the Atlantic Coast Conference. The program was previously in the Pac-12 Conference. The team is known as ...
's first water boy.


History

Although the term in modern American usage is now associated with sports, traditionally a water boy was a boy employed in farming or industry to provide water for farmworkers or machinery. On
cotton plantation Plantations are farms specializing in cash crops, usually mainly planting a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. Plantations, centered on a plantation house, grow crops including cotton, cannabis, tobacco ...
s, just as in modern manual harvesting or picking, the water carrier was in constant demand. This is documented in the
folk song Folk music is a music genre that includes #Traditional folk music, traditional folk music and the Contemporary folk music, contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be ca ...
" Waterboy", "Water boy, where are you hidin'?", which is only the best known of many folk and plantation water-call songs. Early agricultural machinery also needed a water boy to supply water for cooling. The introduction of steam threshing engines required large amounts of water to produce steam, and steam threshing engine teams would employ water boys to go from farm to farm with the engine team. This probably was behind the name "boy" on
Waterloo Boy The Waterloo Gasoline Engine Company was the first company to manufacture and sell gasoline powered farm tractors. Based in Waterloo, Iowa, the company was created by John Froelich and a group of Iowa businessmen in 1893, and was originally named ...
tractors from 1896, later products of Deere and Company, as Waterloo Gasoline engines had recently introduced water pumps to replace the traditional farm water boy. The railroads also employed water boys. In India, the water boy, ''pani-wallah'' or ''bhisti'', was an occupation. The title character in
Gunga Din "Gunga Din" () is an 1890 poem by Rudyard Kipling set in British India. The poem was published alongside "Mandalay" and " Danny Deever" in the collection " Barrack-Room Ballads". The poem is much remembered for its final line "You're a better ...
(poem 1892, film 1939) is a water boy.Ken Dancyger ''The Director's Idea: The Path to Great Directing'' 2012 "The waterboy, Gunga Din (Sam Jaffe), wants to be a soldier. His transformation from waterboy to posthumous military hero gives the film its emotional arc. "


See also

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Batboy In baseball, a bat boy or bat girl is an individual who carries baseball bats to the players on a baseball team. Duties of a batboy may also include handling and preparing players’ equipment and bringing Baseball (ball), baseballs to the umpi ...
in baseball


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Water Boy Agricultural occupations Railway occupations Sports occupations and roles Water