I've got to go! Words we now use as sort of an announcement to up and head toward the toilet in home, workplace, restaurant, sporting event, school and other common places where a toilet room is typically present.
History credits John Harrington with what we consider the birth of the toilet in 1596, costing "John" only 6 shillings and 8 pence (about $9.15). However the toilet for its purpose was created centuries earlier and was not adopted on a large scale until almost 200 years later.
History also reports that Mr. Thomas Crapper made a significant contribution to the history of plumbing the toilet. He patented a U-bend siphoning system for flushing the toilet pan in the late 19th century and is also credited with installing toilets for Queen Victoria. He actually holds nine patents for improvements to drains, water closets, manhole covers and pipe joints. Crapper has racked up quite a few achievements.
It is a reasonable thought that the word "crap" to which many crude references relate today to the toilet, was derived from American World War I soldiers seeing the words "T. Crapper" printed on tanks and themselves coined the slang "crapper" meaning toilet.
Before the crapper, early populace would just enter a stream or river and dispose of the waste directly. [Public swimming pool anyone?]
About 300 years later, 1880 and forward, emphasis was placed on aesthetics to make cisterns and bowls decorative, and in some cases resembling fruit bowls. Toilet curtains were introduced for privacy and eventually the institution of the bathroom or washroom came in vogue.
However, the challenge for toilet improvements continued and a solution that dealt with smell caused a growing need to have a toilet which could intake human waste and immediately dispose of it out of the house to maintain a standard of fresh air and cleanliness.
Perhaps 4,000 years of inventing isn't done. [True] The toilet remains an object of consistent tinkering. Most of us are just happy to have one handy when we need one. Perhaps we'll live to see the next evolution of the humble toilet in the coming years.
With the embrace of the toilet comes the second challenge. Toilet paper.
It's a fact that toilet paper has not been at our fingertips very long. For senior great and grandparents living before the late 19th Century, the convenience to stop by the local quickie mart to pick up a package of Charmin triple-ply or Cottonelle flushable moist wipes was not thought of. Rather, the innovation of the roll of toilet paper is a very modern product and convenience, in which today, has arguably become a household commodity.
So then, how did we go from nature’s fruitful leaves to the multiple choices that we are bombarded with every time we enter the tissue section at the grocery store today? What did we use before that?
It is believed that although the earliest form of toilet paper on a roll wasn’t introduced until 1880, people made do with many various items that stemmed from their environments. Evidence suggests that original material used in place of toilet paper ranged anywhere from leaves and sticks, to cobs of corn, or linen. [Ouch, that's scratchy!]
There's little doubt that this invention, the toilet, has had a heavy impact on human civilization (when related to waste treatment technologies) because it has made possible the high density human populations which could not be done by any other modern invention.
Consider what life in a large city would be like if everyone in a multi-story building had to use the same outhouse; or even worse, if they emptied their chamberpots off the balcony as was commonplace less than one-hundred-fifty years ago in the most advanced cities of the world.
That's all for today.
