Distinctly Montana Magazine

W W W. D I S T I N C T LY M O N TA N A . C O M 99 OUTHOUSE e lowly outhouse is seldom mentioned in tales and documents of the frontier west. Quietly tucked away behind the prairie schoolhouse, the cow camp cabin, the Main Street druggist's and the homesteader's shanty, the outhouse offered relative comfort, convenience and privacy in the pre-plumbed Great Outdoors. Attractive? Never. Practical? Always. e privy bench often accommodated two sizes of visitor: the smaller hole kept children from "falling in." Built correctly, the roofed rectan- gular structure was sturdy enough to withstand western blizzards and hailstorms, yet light enough to be picked up and moved over a new pit when the old one had reached capacity. Celestial symbols carved into outhouse doors exist mostly in caricature. Folklore explains that the "feminine" crescent moon and the "mascu- line" starburst directed the user to the appropri- ate latrine. A more practical speculation makes the carvings (when they existed) decorative portals for light and ventilation. While detailed outhouse customs aren't described in many written or oral accounts, modern-day "privy diggers" are turning aban- doned toilet pits into time machines. Artifact collectors know that waste of all kinds was deposited in the pits of frontier outhouses, so when they excavate old privy sites, they unearth coins, jewelry, clay pipes, discarded medicine bottles and broken tools. ose items, together with the undigested seeds left in the soil, speak volumes about how our predecessors lived, worked and ate. Earlier generations have also left us a roster of privy names, some euphemistic, others earthy: the Henrietta, nessy, thunder box, crapper, back house, der Scheisshaus (German), outdoor convenience, Mrs. Murphy, dunny (Australian slang). e very serviceable term privy has been used by English speakers since the 1200s. Its source is the Old French privé, "latrine"; literally "private place." Outhouse has also been a part of the English language for centuries, but it was the Americans who put it to New World use as a synonym of privy. It was first cited in this sense in the diary of Revolutionary soldier Henry Sewall (1752-1846): "Near the paddles or wheels which propel the ves- sel forward are two outhouses, which is a very great convenience."

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