outhouses or privy plans

[mstook]

Is there anyone out there who could direct me to simple out house plans
or maybe know of a good website thanks I would like one for nostalgic
purposes. in my yard





thanks karen

[Windy in Kansas]

http://www.waltonfeed.com/old/index.html

[Ken Scharabok]

I have wanted one for a yard ornament as well. About a month ago I went to Dickson to pick up a bull and there was an outhouse out in front of a small store with a for sale sign on it. On the way back I stopped and was told it was $200 plus $35 delivery fee. Really well built out of salvaged barn lumber and intended as a shed, not as a functional outhouse. When it was delivered I asked the guy if he had considered advertising locally. He said he had all the business he could handle just in the Dickson area.

To test if there is a market locally I bought sawmill lumber and am letting it dry before making one up. Really just a 4' x 4' shed with a half-moon in the door. Nothing special about its construction.

Ken S. in WC TN

[pumpkinlady]

I have always wondered why most outhouses have doors that open outward. I always felt that the door should open in. That way when the weather is nice you can leave the door open and if company surprises you while your enjoying the view, you can kick the door closed. :haha: Think about it....

[cloverfarm]

When I was a kid, we had to live in a house trailer with no running water for awhile. Because of a family emergency our other housing options fell through. Anyway, I well remember my dad building an outhouse ... he used 4x4 treated lumber for the base, then made a little shed with a door, and tin and sky-light material for the roof. And my mom got a bright pink plastic seat from Montgomery Ward's saying if she had to use an outhouse it was goign to be stylish!

DAd installed it over an appropriate pit and we were in business!

The outhouse was actually more sanitary than our next chapter in teh plumbing saga -- we got a well drilled and ran a hose to the trailer, so my dad dug a cesspool behind the trailer and put some boards across it. Bad idea. My brother fell in and my mom was almost in a panic that he'd fallen in the cesspool. I think we'd have been better off not to have connected the indoor toilet until better arrangements could have been made.

This all took place when I was 5 and to me, it was all high adventure. I don't know how my mom handled it! If you've ever seen the TV show "Green Acres," well, that's a lot like my folks!

Ann

[mstook]

I finally got my dear hubby to agree you see we live in the city and I was born in W.VA and can recall ours! for the holes we had hearts
my mother was a fanatic about keeping it clean washed it out everyday with the hose! when my mother recalls it my fathers reply was Well it was a new house they just didnt put a toilet in it .There was more stories about that outhouse that it kept the family laughing for years and thanks for your stories and helpfull hints .keepum coming!!




karen

[moopups]

There are a lot of out houses around here, most are really just comical versions of pump sheds.

[almostthere]

2 of my aunts didn't have an indoor toilet until I was out of high school (early '90's). One just lived with the outhouse, until she was widowed and remarried and moved into his house, he had an indoor bathroom. The other, my aunt says he "dug a hole" and put the toilet in the bedroom. i would imagine he did something like a home made septic, but they lived with it just fine. Buts also why I would never stay with them. Spoiled by "modern" lifestyle, LOL.

[cloverfarm]

My Dad found a poem by James Whitcomb Riley, somethign about "the little house out back," lettered it all, and sketched outhouse scenes all around it. When I was young I was like "Oh, Dad, how COULD you!" Now I think it's funny. Especially after potty training my kids :haha:

Of course there's some James Whitcomb Riley poems I can't read without tearing up, especially one about an ornery little boy that died, and his mom is holding his jacket and going through the little pockets one more time :waa:

But the outhouse poem is pretty funny.

Ann

[Shrek]

Simple plans huh? How about " little house, some ground, matching holes in each. Simple.

[Doug in Wa]

Check your local library. Buy or borrow "The Vanishing Americn Outhouse" by Ronald S Barlow. It has nearly anything you could ask for, Privy Plans, Photographs, Poems and Folklore. Also be sure to read "The Specialist" by Charles Sale. Great stuff. Doug

[Doug in Wa]

Here's a link to read "The Specialist" on line.
http://journeytoforever.org/farm_lib...pecialist.html

Doug

[Cyngbaeld]

When Grandpa built a new 2 story house for his big family (8 kids) in Mississippi (family lived upstairs and they had a grocery store downstairs,) he decided to have indoor plumbing. Well he had the toilet fastened to the floor upstairs but hadn't yet connected it up to the septic. Guess he had the inline hooked up tho. My aunts were too embarrased to tell their boyfriends to go down the hill to the 'little house' so they let the fellows use the toilet. Then aunt Pie would fly down the stairs and try to catch it in a bucket when the current beau flushed. :haha:

[almostthere]

This isn't what you asked for but I thought it was a nice read.

http://www.jldr.com/ohindex.shtml