It happened in San Luis Obispo County in the mid-80s. The guy was down the privy at a state park and he was ready for a leisurely day – even had his lunch with him (a detail I will never forget). He was caught because a little girl – who knew to check, because nasty things are always down the outhouse hole – spotted him. I don’t remember the red light on the video camera being mentioned, but maybe that was what she was first.
The rangers were flummoxed over what charge to attach to the feller’s behavior, but they finally thought of something that would… errr… stick.
I worked at the Public Defenders’ Office then. The lawyers quarreled over who would get to take the case and practiced their mock closing arguments to staff until we were holding our sides.
The song Under the Boardwalk enjoyed a resurgence around town… with modified lyrics, of course.
The case made Paul Harvey’s “The Rest of the Story” show.
I’ve always had indoor plumbing, but I’ve used plenty of outhouses as well. At many state parks and highway rest stops, an outhouse is your only option.
Back in the day when outhouses were still common, those catalogs were like newspapers, which were also used for that purpose. That could still be uncomfortable, but nothing like glossy paper would have been.
I’ve also heard of corncobs being used as TP too. I once saw a corncob kit that was packaged as a novelty gift, which had 2 plain cobs and a single dyed one; you were supposed to use the dyed one first and then the first plain one to see if you also needed to use the second plain one. :dubious:
The revival of this thread caused me to remember working on a Heifer Project build (church mission trip) where they had a sawdust toilet, which was a privy into which you tossed a scoop of freshly fragrant sawdust to cover your “business”. It had very little odor.
Sorry, been away for a few days! Girl Scout camp was in NE Indiana. I don’t remember the name of the camp, I googled it but neither of the camps close by sounded familiar. Of course it was about 35 years ago. All I remember was the greenie and that a tornado touched down less than a mile away the night we were there. No wonder I never went back!
I vacation every year at a place with outhouses. It’s on an island, and there’d be too much run-off into the lake with a septic tank and flush toilet, so they can’t upgrade.
They have upgraded a couple of the most-used outhouses to the composting type. Those barely smell.
There are multi-hole outhouses on the island. There’s walls around each hole, so socially it’s pretty much the same as a public toilet with more than one stall.
That’s the basic idea behind a composting toilet. Add lots of “brown” (carbon) matter so the “green” (pee and poop) don’t smell so much when they decompose.
Nope. I got one, but not at my main home. I have one at my camp in Maine. It’s too big to move, so I clean it each spring when the nightsoil has turned to regular soil. The camp is not insulated, so from deer season until ice-out it doesn’t get used.
When I was in middle school, I hung out with a girl (I graduated from high school in 1984 - so this would have been the late 1970s) who still had no indoor plumbing or electricity in the house - it was a farmhouse - it was put in some time in middle school or early high school. And while we weren’t exactly urban, this was within a 30 minute drive of the Twin Cities.
Plenty of Northern Minnesota cabins had them when I was growing up - stayed at more than a few “Lake Cabins” with just outhouses. My daughter still gets to use them at Girl Scout Camp (though they also have flush toilets, and some of the girls who stay out where there are just the latrines learn to hold things for a LONG time.)
Back in 1999, the Mayor of Alma Colorado was murdered by a man that lived in town. The scuttlebutt was because he was going to be forced to remove his outhouse and go on town water and sewer. The murderer also stole a loader and did his best to destroy the new water department. Did a pretty good job of it too.
Oh, and Klondike and TubaDiva, I also know about short summers. My Wife and I live at 11,200 feet in central Colorado. 16"s of snow last weekend, and it’s been an easy year. 21 feet So far…
Our family cottage in northern Quebec still has an outhouse in use. When I was a kid, I used to hate it, because it was a natural hang out for gigantic Dock spiders.
Now, I find watching them kinda fascinating.
The same cottage still has kerosene lanterns for light. It was built in the late 1950s and very little has changed since.
I remember listening to that as a kid.