# "1900 House" **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 16, 2000, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602 "2000-06-16T16:33:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/61 "2000-06-27T16:12:44Z")
Nah, don’t bother, St.—I could never afford it. J. Peterman’s is going to start up their catalog again this fall, so that’s where all my money is going . . . My friend David has promised to throw a “faggot party” for me when I visit him in New Orleans in October! ---
**Author:** ![brachyrhynchos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brachyrhynchos/32/376_2.png) [@brachyrhynchos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brachyrhynchos)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/62 "2000-06-27T17:46:08Z")
I caught the faggot party reference - the first time I heard it, I thought I heard wrong. Those kids were great - so imaginative and sweet. I would have liked to have seen more of their play. ---
**Author:** ![Athena](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/35a633/32.png) [@Athena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Athena)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/63 "2000-06-27T18:07:26Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\* > Ooooh—can she make me an Anna Held model, so I can stroll down Fifth Avenue humming “Why Do They Call Me a Gibson Girl?” > > And did anyone else catch that remark about “faggot parties,” or was I hallucinating? > \*\* Yes, I did. SO and I immediately resolved that we would use the word “faggot” and “fag” to mean new things in everyday conversation. Soon after the end of the show, he went upstairs to fag his teeth, while I ventured into the kitchen to give the dishes a quick fag before bed. ---
**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/64 "2000-06-27T18:15:42Z")
I missed eposide 3. I was too busy recovering from falling down in my bathroom (I fell and I couldn’t get up!). Don’t the English call cigarettes “fags”? Perhaps it was a smoking party. The coming attractions from last week showed the family “cheating”. What was it they couldn’t live without and had to buy? Please, fill me in! ---
**Author:** ![SwimmingRiddles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SwimmingRiddles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SwimmingRiddles)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/65 "2000-06-27T18:21:46Z")
Are you alright, Pink? I was just wondering this morning where the hell your smiling face was. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/66 "2000-06-27T18:25:34Z")
Oh, Pinky, are you OK? Channel 13 will rerun the show this weekend—Sunday, I think, check your TV page. From what I could gather, “faggot” in this sense meant a trick (!) or skit that would favor your guest with. The narrator said, “The first faggot was a play by the twins.” I’d always heard it meaning (in the UK) a bundle of sticks for burning, a cigarette, or a prep-school flunky. Those wacky Brits! I remember my British 8th-grade algebra teacher saying to someone who came in late to class, “I’ll bet you were out in the parking lot with a fag in your mouth!” Hysteria reigned, as you can imagine. ---
**Author:** ![Rodd\_Hill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3ab097/32.png) [@Rodd\_Hill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodd_Hill)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/67 "2000-06-27T18:32:31Z")
I’d never heard of the “faggot party,” either. I knew that a faggot was a bundle of sticks (possibly from “fascine”?); and the cigarette “fag” (my Dad said that in the 30s, he and the other kids would approach smoking men with the cry: “Got any fag-cards, mister?”). There is also the Public School “fag” system, in which the younger boys are made to perform menial (and often unpleasant) chores for the older boys, such as shining shoes, making tea and toast, cleaning toilets, etc. “I say, new bug, aren’t you Chomondeley Major’s fag?” ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/68 "2000-06-27T18:35:50Z")
Translation. Fag - in fee paying schools such as Harrow and Eton a ‘fag’ was a junior boy who ran errands and did chores for older boys.Given the almost monastical existance in such schools one might wonder what other ‘tasks’ were required. All the secret service traitors were ex-pupils of sucvh places and all were homosexual. Fag - Used widely to mean cigarette. Fagged - Tired out Fag - To fetch something for another person. Fag-end The small remainder or leftover(from cigarette butt) Faggot - A type of meatball which was very cheap and easy to make. Faggot - Bundle of kindling wood ---
**Author:** ![cher3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/da6949/32.png) [@cher3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cher3)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/69 "2000-06-27T18:35:50Z")
It says on the website that a faggot party is one where all the guests have to provide some sort of entertainment. Make of that what you will. And I know you will. ---
**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/70 "2000-06-27T18:38:57Z")
I sprained my knee and my elbow, now everybody at work is limping around holding their arms close to their bodies. I think they’re making fun of me! I can’t wait till Sunday! What did the mom get caught buying? ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/71 "2000-06-27T18:44:49Z")
She bought shampoo, after much whining about how much she HATED the home-made stuff. Even after someone suggested eggs and vinegar, she continued her whining. They also hire a maid in this episode, and Dad barks at everyone. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/72 "2000-06-27T18:57:22Z")
[quote} My friend David has promised to throw a “faggot party” for me when I visit him in New Orleans in October[/quote] It’s the right city for it. Say hey to the boys at Cafe Lafitte’s for me. I think Mum needs to cowboy up more. After all, partici- pating in this project was her idea in the first place. Paul and the kids are in it just to humor her. Elizabeth, the skivvy, is too cool. She’s handling a tough situation(emptying slops? Ewww) with great aplomb. It reminds me of staying over at my mother’s second husband’s parents’ farm. There was no electriciy or running water, so that was my first and only experience using a chamber pot. This was rural Kentucky in the 1970’s. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/73 "2000-06-27T19:08:30Z")
Oh, you people! If you paid attwention during the episode of “1900 House” they told you that each person was supposed to provide an act, called a “faggot”, to be thrown onto the cheery fire of togetherness or some such. The analogy being worked here is using “faggot” in its sense of “a stick of firewood”. Everybody contributes to the warm and rosy feeling of being together. I imagine “fag” or “faggot” for “cigarettes” derives from this older meaning of “firewood”. I don’t know how it acquired its association with homosexuality. Seems to me that firewood could be a hetero symbol as well. But in any case, getcher minds outa the gutter. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2000, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/74 "2000-06-27T20:12:56Z")
Darn it! It seems every time I add a post to a thread it sinks straight to the bottom of the pack. Are my words too heavy or something? ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2000, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/75 "2000-06-28T06:20:53Z")
Forgive me, I’m catching up from last week. Eve, my turn to compliment you on your choice in reading material. **Wisconsin Death Trip** is a great book, indeed. Some of my family is from that neck of the Great Woods and I was so proud to see none of them listed as “nervous collapses, suicides, hop-heads and people carted off to the Laughing Academy.” But dear, you saw the ribcage drawings on the show. I assume you’ve seen photographs of corset wrecks. Would you really be willing to risk all that to look good? And would you post pictures for us lingerie fans? \ All, I’m afraid that I have more respect for Elizabeth than the whole Bowler family. She is getting into period more than they are. AND, she did her homework BEFORE starting the job. No running off to **Beeton’s** for her! And how hard she worked! You could tell fromn the efficiency of her movements that she wasn’t just showing off for the camera. She knows what she’s doing! They should be nicer to her. Their prototypes would have or she would have moved on to a household that appreciated her. Did you see how that rug went from dried-blood to a recognizable red after they hired her? She didn’t waste her time with that bellows thing. Rug + clothesline + beater + elbow grease = clean rug. The woman’s a prize. Question for our British chums: Has Elizabeth leveraged her exposure on this show into a tidy (hehehe) little cleaning business IRL? She deserves better than being a maid of all work. I was waiting for them to get a proper carpet sweeper. I still love those things! They are especially handy on cat hair. What would make the soap work as a shampoo would be to follow it with a vinegar rinse. Gets the scum out. Egg yolks and lemon juice (not vinegar), as she tried, won’t get your hair clean because it isn’t shampoo, it’s the start of Hollandaise sauce. ---
**Author:** ![\_dpr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/_/b9e5f3/32.png) [@\_dpr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/_dpr)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2000, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/76 "2000-06-28T06:35:12Z")
Anyone who watches such programs must be running on half their brains. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2000, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/77 "2000-06-28T14:01:50Z")
“But dear, you saw the ribcage drawings on the show. I assume you’ve seen photographs of corset wrecks. Would you really be willing to risk all that to look good?” —Damn right I would! I agree; I want to hire Elizabeth to clean MY apartment, too! I wouldn’t even make her take the bed apart and clean it with a toothbrush . . . ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2000, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/78 "2000-06-28T21:28:54Z")
Then I believe I am quoting the great Wally when I say, “Pictures! We want pictures!” I’ve been looking up old shampoo recipes. The more palatable use castile soap instead of that yellow crap they were using. Sure looks like Fels Naptha to me. Wretched stuff for your hair, but gets other stuff clean. I was in an antique store that was selling a bar of Fels Naptha for seven dollars American. I inquired, thinking this was preposterous for a product selling for $1.59 at the grocery store. The clerk said, “But it’s old!” I pointed to the UPC bar code. The clerk had grown up with bar codes and apparently thought that great-grandmum had a laser to read them because she still didn’t get it. ---
**Author:** ![StGermain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stgermain/32/2868_2.png) [@StGermain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StGermain)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2000, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/79 "2000-06-28T21:57:49Z")
**dropzone** - LOL! My mother used to wash our mothers out with Fels Naptha. Believe me, it worked! I don’t even _think_ cuss words! StG ---
**Author:** ![MadPoet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8c91f0/32.png) [@MadPoet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MadPoet)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2000, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602/80 "2000-06-28T22:29:41Z")
I have to back up a bit here, having come into the thread late… > [@](#): > > A shillin’ a week, and you could hire all the Irish girls you needed. I _so_ need to go back to the 1900’s… Anyways, on corsets, modern corsets are far safer than those of yesteryear… and damn, they can do some interesting things to a figure. Just do a search for corsets on yahoo… there’s lots of sites that will tell you more than you wanted to know. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1900-house/22602.md?page=5)