We had a shallow well in the basement of the house I grew up in. We used a bucket to draw water, when the power was out.
As a kid, I worked at a place where the demand for water was higher than the system was designed to supply...thanks, lowest bidder...the pump ran often enough to stir up the sand at the bottom of the well. We raised the footvalve a few feet and got SOME relief from the problem of sand entering the system.