Old houseshave all kinds of quirks , from coal parachute to carpeted bathrooms to fallout shelter . Tour some pre - World War IIhouses in the northeast and you may come across one of the more curious feature film : a freestanding toilet in the cellar , minus any other typical bathroom trappings . Colloquially , it’sknownas a “ Pittsburgh potty . ” And once upon a clip , it seemed like a good mind .
The motivation behind the public stool was not , as you might surmise , any kind of excretory immodesty . alternatively , the open - construct pot was installed to serve a unlike purpose . Some experts say that this feature , which mostly appeared in Pennsylvania dwelling builtcirca1880 to 1910 , was sum up to preclude sewage backups from entering the nicer parts of a house . ( Indoor plumbing , a relatively late addition to urban areas in the late 19th and early 20th one C , did n’t quite have all the twirl worked out . )
If there was a sewage backup on your block back then , it could potentially enter your base through the lowest full stop in the plumbery system , meaning the toilette . Rather than have the contents of that fecal cauldron spill into a cardinal aliveness sphere , it was better to suffer it in the basement , where any messes could be easily strip up .
“ As the [ plumbery ] system were used more and more , backup would pass off , ” William Martin , an designer and chairman of the Historic Preservation Committee at the Pascack Historical Society , toldPittsburgh receiving set place WESA in 2017 . “ Well , in a home , what happens is the sewage backs up the pipage and into the fixtures that are connected to it . So , if you have your independent aliveness space on your first storey and you have your nice tiled beautiful john and the toilet backs up on your street — and you might not even be the cause of it — the toilet back up . It ’s go to come up through your bathing tub , it ’s going to come up through your toilet and it ’s going to spill over and it ’s become to be all over your living blank . ”
The resolution , Martin enjoin , was the lone toilet , which was less a personal commode and more of an emergency outlet . “ The idea was to put a throne fixture in the cellar , and that ’s why they ’re by themselves , because they really were n’t meant to be used . And they are at the down in the mouth point of the system . ” ( Floor drainsweren’t commonat the time . )
Once these emergency can were commonplace , homeowners took to making use of them . blade pulverisation workers return to a home could use the cellar as a sort of mud way , stripping off their soiled clothes and tending to other job before joining their family unit up the stairs . Would it be clumsy to go down there and find your don voiding his bowels in the middle of the room ? Yes , but think of that basements were rarely finished or look at occupied space at the time .
Another intellect for the lone , below - course can is the fact that for some run - socio-economic class house physician , bathroom fixtures did n’t always get in totality . Someone might instal just a sump , a bathing tub , or a toilet , but not everything at once . If someone want a commode , they might opt for the basement , which was typically the cheap way to route plumbing at the time .
Some residents may have even considered the chamberpot a alone feature of their home rather than a mutual fixture . indite forPittsburgh Magazinein 2010 , Virginia Montanezrecalledher adolescent opinion that her granny had made a purposeful decisiveness to set up a basement toilet until she began house - hunt as an grownup : “ My husband and I visited menage after family , and in every fourth basement — a can ! Out in the middle of nowhere ! can every which way strewn about cellar of every form and size of it . Potties with handles and potties with pull cords . Potties with lids and can without . Potties so pocket-sized you question if chipmunks use that potty at night . potty so tawdry and large and water - wasteful , you reverence they could soak up the space / prison term continuum into them . ”
The potties can be found in Pennsylvania , New Jersey , New York , and in other areas . Does it add to a property ’s value ? Likely not , though some originative Realtor may opt to hold it a half - bath .
