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Janet

In article >, says...
>
> sf wrote:
> >
> > There were still people in the Appalachians who didn't have indoor
> > plumbing in the '60s.
>
> That would be my grandparents on my mother's side. I visited them and
> stayed for longer in the summers when I was really young. Back in the
> beginning, they had an outhouse in the back yard. At night, they put
> a porcelin pot in the upstairs hallway. If you had to "go" at night,
> you opened your bedroom door, took in the pot and did your business,
> then put the lid on and set it back out for others to use.

We all had one under our bed.
>
> Back then too...no running water. The kitchen sink had a hand pump to
> pump in water from the well.

Our (hand) pump was out at the front of the house, shared with the
neighbours. We filled a bucket and carried it to the kitchen.
The kitchen sink plug hole was over another bucket.
>
> Each morning, some poor soul had the job of emptying in into the
> outhouse pit and cleaning it out.

me :-(
>
> When they finally got their first bathroom inside with a flushing
> toilet, they would show you the new bathroom first thing when you came
> to visit.

After I'd moved out, the council installed mains water and a bathroom
in my grandfather's house (against his wishes) in what had previously
been the cold pantry. He was furious and refused to use it, except for
storing coal in the bath. He carried on using a bucket in the outhouse
which he then used to fertilise his (tremendous) vegetable garden; and
drinking water from the pump (which is still there today, now a trendy
garden feature).

A couple of years later he got frail and came to live with us . He
STILL refused point blank to either bath or use a flush toilet and
insisted on having a bucket "like at home".

Emptying that was my job too :-(

Janet.