Subterranean pleasures

I had nearly forgotten I had this picture! Years ago I wrote featured travel articles for a section of the Wichita Eagle. Most of the monthly pieces focused on Kansas destinations. 

This photo comes from Ellinwood, Kansas, and its underground 'Main Street.' There is a lot of speculation on the origins of putting businesses beneath two city blocks of a prairie town, where space is not a problem. What is known is that  many of the establishments provided men-only services to cowboys, bringing cattle up from Texas to slaughterhouses up north. Before they headed out to a night of entertainment, cowhands need a shave and a bath. At first glance, these look like zinc coffins but they are dandy little bathtubs, a delight to the saddle weary. 

Sadly much of the district were sealed up when city fathers decided that the decaying wooden sidewalks and tunnels were hazards too costly to maintain. The bathhouse, barbershop are about all that remain, but left in the original grubby condition, much as they were (minus the floor fan) when abandoned in the 1920s.

Solitary but not private

This toilet has not been cleaned for decades. A chilling reminder of the brutality of 20th century punishment for the most hardened criminals, this is a shot of a cell in Alcatraz. Privacy is not an option.

This is the shower room. Plenty of cold water for all

Light is right

The poster, courtesy of Gatorade, was posted on various restroom doors in the gym facility of Butler Community College. Just in case, a young athlete forgot to drink enough water in the hot days of early fall, this colorful reminder provides a gauge of the quantity of liquids that have been consumed.

Traveling comforts

I don't know about you but I hate using the 'facilities' on a moving vehicle of any sort, train, bus, plane, it doesn't matter. However, I am fascinated by compactness and economy of space.

So, I was captivated by the bathroom facilities afforded on this 1931 train display in Omaha's Durham Museum. Unfortunately there were gates that kept visitors from entering the areas so it is difficult to appreciate the compact elegance of this first-class accommodation. The cars hearkened back to the days when train travel was a luxury to be savored, not a lurch from one place to another.

Not one, but two sinks, one, I believe for shaving
Note the padded bench in front of the corner one

Voila! the bench reveals the toilet

the space over the toilet become a berth

Another car featured the sink transformed into a shelf
and..

Honoring the setting

 I took these images a few years ago at the one-day conference at Park College, Parkville, Missouri just north of Kansas City.
The private college's dominant feature is a venerable limestone structure located on a bluff overlooking the Missouri River, now on the National Register of Historic Places.
What many don't realize is how much of the campus is underground. Campus developers utilized the bluffs to excavate and build learning spaces and parking underground. This restroom reflects how the designers honored their surroundings, incorporating the texture of the limestone bluffs as well as tile to the restroom's design. The limestone walls are not incorporated quite so clearly in other areas but it clearly adds an fascinating aesthetic to the environment.

Homestead reminders

This image was shot on the inside of a stall  at the Homestead National Monument in Beatrice, Nebraska. This is a historical museum and site of the first homestead claimed in the Homestead Act of 1862. It is a fascinating collection of artifacts and records from the early days of the Midwest farms. Robert and I both recognized many of the artifacts from the farms of our parents and grandparents. Robert insists that many were still in use when he was a kid. 

The door graphic is a reproduction of an outhouse door. According to many sources, the moon designated a women's privy, while a star indicated one for men. 

The text on the graphic is appropriate for an education-oriented building. It reads:

Did you know,,,

most people in rural America used outhouses until the late 1930s? It wasn't until then that indoor bathrooms with indoor plumbing were possible. Think of how many flushes they saved! These restrooms are equipped with low flow toilets to conserve water. What you are doing to save water?

Thankfully, the stall and the restroom itself were perfectly ordinary - clean, working and stocked with regular toilet paper.

No frills relief

These pictures were snapped in the public restroom in the park in Marysville, Kansas. To the uninitiated, Marysville is home of the black squirrels. These little black critters are relatively rare, and certainly in this part of the country. They are all over this park. Urban legend has it that they appeared sometime early in the 20th century as escapees from a traveling circus. 

But their story is irrelevant to this restroom. What struck me was the sheer practical economy of the place. The set up reminds me of something that my uncles might rig in the back of their machine shed. Actually there was a full bathroom in Uncle Martin's machine shed, but that is a whole other story.

The stalls do not have doors, but practical washable shower curtains. The faucet is a bit, um, unhandy. There is no handle. You have to hold the knob in to turn it on; release it and it turns off. So you can only wash one hand at a time. 

The only spendthrift feature of the restroom are the toilets. The water pressure must be unreliable so for the sake of good hygiene, the user is asked to "Please flush twice!" Note the Please and exclamation point. It should be pretty easy since they are fairly 'flush' push buttons.