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The Crappy, Commodious History of Toilets · Ridiculous History

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  Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: the show, Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: for tuning in. Can we get some like prestigious, cinematic,
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: like Oppenheimer level music? Because I'm Ben your Noel Desih
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: we have come full circle. We have a very special
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: returning guest. Folks, clap, cheer, raised, rackous applause and awe
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: for our returning super producer, the one, the only mister
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: Casey Pegro.
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  Speaker 2: Oh man.
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  Speaker 3: It's great to be back with you, guys. It's great
• 1:03
  Speaker 3: to be back talking to everybody.
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  Speaker 4: It's good to have you back, Casey. And what a
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  Speaker 4: for poetous occasion.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, I'm honored to be asked back. But at
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  Speaker 3: the same time, the choice of topics here today, is
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  Speaker 3: there some kind of secret message you're trying to send
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: me a great no? Oh, okay, we're sub tweeting you.
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: I think you're just adding me directly.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and now we're just tasking you directly. Oh twitter
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  Speaker 1: h So Casey, before we begin, of course, we picked
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  Speaker 1: the classiest possible topic to explore with you today and
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  Speaker 1: explore over this week. But before we begin, we've had
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  Speaker 1: so many of our fellow ridiculous historians asking about you,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: inquiring about your adventures. Even no, I don't know if
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  Speaker 1: you saw it, but even a few people constructing conspiracy theories.
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  Speaker 3: I love that love. I need to hear these theories.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll get to them, but first, just give us
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  Speaker 1: the straight poop here. Let us know how it's been going.
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: What's up man? Life changes?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, so big, big life changes. So to go
• 2:09
  Speaker 3: back to the long, long ago days of February twenty
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  Speaker 3: twenty one, my wife Joelle and I welcomed our son, Tarik,
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  Speaker 3: and his birth was a little chaotic, a little unexpected,
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: a little early, quite a bit early, two days shy
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  Speaker 3: of six months, so not quite six months of gestation,
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  Speaker 3: which obviously meant a long stay in the nick you
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  Speaker 3: you know it was. It was a very uncertain time,
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  Speaker 3: very stressful time. So and it happened, of course, right
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  Speaker 3: in the middle of our production schedule, so like very
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  Speaker 3: quickly we had to have other people come on and
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  Speaker 3: start assisting, and super producer Max was a huge part
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  Speaker 3: of that, but the whole team there just like pitched in.
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  Speaker 3: It was incredibly heartwarming the way everybody just jumped in
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  Speaker 3: action and made that happen on zero notice, Well, it
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  Speaker 3: was so.
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  Speaker 4: Crazy on your end that we didn't even fully know
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  Speaker 4: what was going on, because I think there was just
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  Speaker 4: like it was such an uncertain time that you know,
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  Speaker 4: we weren't you weren't even really able to communicate with us.
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  Speaker 4: So we were just kind of worried and had your back,
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  Speaker 4: of course, But then we were so happy to hear
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  Speaker 4: that everything ultimately turned out great and that you have
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  Speaker 4: a beautiful son who is.
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  Speaker 2: Now a giant.
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  Speaker 3: Is a giant for his age, you know, and being premature.
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  Speaker 3: He's he's he's breaking the curve so pretty regular, you
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  Speaker 3: know what. He has like the perfect poop schedule because
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  Speaker 3: in the regular German compliments, he's he's regular. It's in
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  Speaker 3: the morning and it is after we drop him off
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  Speaker 3: at daycare. I've changed like not that many poopy diapers
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  Speaker 3: in the last you know, three to six months.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: It's amazing, don't cheeks yourself. That is so good to
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  Speaker 1: have you back case. When as our pal a super producer,
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  Speaker 1: Max Williams lit out for the territories on some adventures
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  Speaker 1: of his own. Uh, he and Noel and I all
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  Speaker 1: agreed and we're like, there's who who can fill in
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  Speaker 1: for Max. Well, there's only one guy. And it was
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: like it was like all those scenes in eighties action
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  Speaker 1: films where they're like we have to called in the
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  Speaker 1: badger or something.
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  Speaker 4: Remember that scene in the Tim Burton Batman. I think
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  Speaker 4: it's Jack Palance plays like the big bad mob boss.
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  Speaker 2: He goes Jack.
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  Speaker 3: You can't remember him doing push ups on the oscars?
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  Speaker 2: Oh Jack allis Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think he Maybe he won for Best Supporting
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  Speaker 3: Actor and I could be wrong about it, but for
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  Speaker 3: whatever reason, he was on stage and he just got
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  Speaker 3: up there and he started. He dropped, and he did
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  Speaker 3: like ten or twenty, I don't know what, just to
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  Speaker 3: prove that he still had Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: At least he definitely had it.
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  Speaker 1: I feel like doing ten push ups is I don't
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  Speaker 1: want to sound rude, but I feel like doing ten
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  Speaker 1: push ups is not super.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, but he was like seventy or something.
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  Speaker 4: Okay kidding, I'll do one and be impressed. Okay, So
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  Speaker 4: so uh.
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  Speaker 1: We had an episode a while back Casey about the
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  Speaker 1: weird and somewhat disturbing history of soap, which may involve
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  Speaker 1: ritual sacrifice, and this got us thinking about another bathroom
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  Speaker 1: stand by the toilet. Where did it come from? You know,
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  Speaker 1: we know you had a great idea. A few years
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: ago we did an episode all about bidets, and we
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  Speaker 1: actually contacted a bidet company and sort of gave him
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: the hard cell. Casey, you were there. You remember this.
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  Speaker 2: Golden the golden era of ridiculous history.
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  Speaker 1: So we started to cogitate and ask ourselves, what's the
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  Speaker 1: straight poop? Where does the toilet actually come from?
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  Speaker 4: Because we also did an episode on underwear that was
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  Speaker 4: a tie in with Fruit of the Loom.
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  Speaker 2: That's right.
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  Speaker 4: So if any toilet companies want to sponsor this episode
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  Speaker 4: after the fact, we you know, we're here for it.
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  Speaker 1: We will shill.
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  Speaker 2: We will shill for your product.
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  Speaker 1: Send Japanese toilets, Toto please, I'm going to say it.
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  Speaker 1: I know not everybody wants to admit this because there's
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  Speaker 1: a little bit of anism involved, but the nation of
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  Speaker 1: Japan is pooping in the future. Those toilets are amazing.
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  Speaker 1: Have you guys ever used like the fancy Japanese toilets?
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  Speaker 4: No, but there's a really good episode of Bob's Burgers
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  Speaker 4: where Jeane falls in love essentially with a Japanese toilet
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  Speaker 4: that talks and all of this good stuff.
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  Speaker 2: It's pretty wild.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, there's things can get up there and cost you know,
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  Speaker 4: even just like a sort of bargain basement model, like
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  Speaker 4: a topper for your traditional commods. Those can run you
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  Speaker 4: in the hundreds of dollars. But then if you want
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  Speaker 4: one that's like fully flushed out, yeah, okay, those can
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  Speaker 4: be thousands and thousands of dollars. And they yeah, they
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  Speaker 4: do things like you know, rotating bedeys, like a little
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  Speaker 4: whirlwind in your butt that can be heated.
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  Speaker 1: They have like customizable features so they know who is
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  Speaker 1: sitting down in the home. Got these nice gentle burst
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  Speaker 1: of air.
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  Speaker 2: I got it.
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  Speaker 1: It's one of the every time I've been to Japan,
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  Speaker 1: I can't help it. The first and number one tourist
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  Speaker 1: attraction for me as the airport toilet. I'm just consistently amazed.
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  Speaker 1: And it took a long way to get there, because
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  Speaker 1: people have been pooping way before they figured out how
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  Speaker 1: to clean up their poop or how to safely transport
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  Speaker 1: it away from their living quarters. We know that the humans'
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  Speaker 1: closest relative, the chimpanzee, was already practicing some form of
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  Speaker 1: restroom hygiene, and that tells us that other primates likely
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  Speaker 1: did the same thing as they evolved into humans.
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  Speaker 4: It's pretty wild. Apes apparently, you know, know how to
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  Speaker 4: keep themselves relatively feces free, despite their reputation. And you know,
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  Speaker 4: they do play with it. Sometimes they'll throw it at you.
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  Speaker 4: They'll they'll throw it at you, while we as humans
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  Speaker 4: may not do that on a good day.
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  Speaker 2: On a bad day, you know, I'll bets are off.
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  Speaker 4: But apparently we are filthier in terms of our ability
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  Speaker 4: to you know, track, collect and track poop particles. I
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  Speaker 4: did not even think about this until I moved in
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  Speaker 4: with my girlfriend and she was very insistent that I
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  Speaker 4: closed the toilet lid before flushing.
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  Speaker 2: I did. I did. I maybe I'm a disgusting man.
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  Speaker 2: I'm a disgusting man or just a man, but I did.
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  Speaker 4: Not realize this is a thing, especially in a small
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  Speaker 4: bathroom where the sink is right next to the toilet.
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  Speaker 4: If you flush it, it's like a poop bomb going on.
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  Speaker 2: It really is.
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  Speaker 4: You know, it's the particles you can't see. But bolt,
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  Speaker 4: it's not gonna stop, y'all. It's not gonna stop. But
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  Speaker 4: stick with us. It's worth it, we promise. So chimps
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  Speaker 4: are good at like pooping off the side of their
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  Speaker 4: sleeping areas and and doing it directly and not tracking
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  Speaker 4: it in. But apparently, you know, since we often are
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  Speaker 4: barefoot in the house or in the bathroom or whatever,
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  Speaker 4: if you don't close the lid and you flush the toilet,
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  Speaker 4: then you're getting it on the floor, then you're put
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  Speaker 4: tracking it on your feet, then it ends up in
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  Speaker 4: your bed. So apparently chimpanzees sleeping areas test much cleaner
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  Speaker 4: than human beings sleeping areas. Scott forbid of hotels. Can
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  Speaker 4: you even imagine, Well, we don't want to go there,
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  Speaker 4: We've been there on our other show.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, check out the stuff hotels don't want you
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  Speaker 1: to know.
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  Speaker 3: Uh.
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  Speaker 1: And it's up to you whether you want to bring
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: a UV light on your trip or not. But will
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: it will change the way the way you see things?
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  Speaker 1: So yeah, no, I'm glad you mentioned this. This is
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  Speaker 1: a study conducted by Adriana Hernandez Aguilar and Fiona Stewart,
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  Speaker 1: and they found.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly what you're describing.
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  Speaker 1: Chimpanzees were much much cleaner and because of the closing
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  Speaker 1: the lid thing, because a lot of us aren't stopping
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  Speaker 1: the catapult when it settles on the floor, it can
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  Speaker 1: go anywhere from there, you know what I mean. How
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  Speaker 1: far away from your bathroom is your kitchen. That's another
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  Speaker 1: huge issue, and we're not going to disparage them. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: people have always tried to be clean, even in very
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  Speaker 1: very dirty times, and people seem to have always he's
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  Speaker 1: known that feces could be dangerous. If you go way
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  Speaker 1: back to the time of the Sumerians, you'll see that
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  Speaker 1: they had something like toilets thousands and thousands of years ago.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, three thousand, five hundred and three thousand BCE to
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  Speaker 4: be precise, the Samarians in Mesopotamia, they built these ancient
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  Speaker 4: versions of toilets, which were essentially deep pits that had tubes,
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  Speaker 4: kind of ceramic tubing if you can picture maybe something
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  Speaker 4: you might see in a garden or something along the
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  Speaker 4: lines of like roofing shingles maybe, but like you know,
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  Speaker 4: tubular and that's what they sat upon. And then they
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  Speaker 4: were able to love the word excret excreta. Yeah, it
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  Speaker 4: sounds like a prog rock band or like a Mars
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  Speaker 4: Volta album.
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  Speaker 1: It sounds like what Maynard from Tool would call his
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  Speaker 1: home poop.
• 10:50
  Speaker 4: It probably does call it something like that. He probably
• 10:53
  Speaker 4: gives it a cute little pet name. That's an odd cat,
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  Speaker 4: right there. A big fan of wine. He's a big
• 10:58
  Speaker 4: fan of wine winery guy. Yeah yeah, So this again,
• 11:03
  Speaker 4: according to the research, the solid excreta excreta would would
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  Speaker 4: keep it in there. This the lining would keep it
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  Speaker 4: in there, and the liquid would seep out through holes.
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  Speaker 4: There was of course, you know, they hadn't quite figured
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  Speaker 4: out moving running water yet, so there wasn't like a
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  Speaker 4: way to flush fast. Forward a bit to the ancient
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  Speaker 4: Babylonians and Assyrians, who also had toilets.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, so what we've already established, toilets are older than
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  Speaker 1: Jesus Christ. This is very ancient technology. The Assyrians did
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  Speaker 1: something similar. They would take two small walls and they
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  Speaker 1: would put the very close together with a narrow gap
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  Speaker 1: for the feces to fall through, and then it went
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  Speaker 1: directly into the canals. So you're just sort of pooping
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  Speaker 1: in the water system. God be with you. People didn't
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  Speaker 1: really evolve past that until the ancient Greeks and Romans
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  Speaker 1: started bringing toilets to the masses. If you are looking
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  Speaker 1: at the toilet timeline, you'll see the innovations were pretty
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  Speaker 1: clogged until about one thousand years after the Sumerians.
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  Speaker 4: Unfortunately, though, as is often the case, this is typically
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  Speaker 4: for the well to do. I'm not going to even
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  Speaker 4: say it, I already said it. Let it sink in
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  Speaker 4: poorer members of society. Unfortunately, we're kind of just doing
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  Speaker 4: the like solitary confinement treatment, you know, a bucket more
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  Speaker 4: or less a barrel that was I think the larger
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  Speaker 4: vessel that they would dump their chamber pots into. And
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  Speaker 4: we of course know that this went on into you know,
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  Speaker 4: the Middle.
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  Speaker 2: Ages, you know, medieval times.
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  Speaker 4: The idea of a chamber pot is even something you
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  Speaker 4: hear about in like you know, Dickens occasionally, I believe,
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  Speaker 4: you know. And when we talked, we're gonna talk about
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  Speaker 4: the Great Stink of London. I believe at some point
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  Speaker 4: this is all very much tied together. As long is
• 13:00
  Speaker 4: there have been humans pooping, there have been humans trying
• 13:03
  Speaker 4: to figure out how to get as far away from
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  Speaker 4: that stuff as possible.
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  Speaker 1: And who has to do the dirty job of cleaning
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  Speaker 1: it at this point. In an ancient manu in civilization
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  Speaker 1: over on the island of Crete, the people who had
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  Speaker 1: private toilets in their homes were very much the elite.
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  Speaker 1: They were the top one percent. It was like having
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: an indoor pool. In the cities. A lot of people
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  Speaker 1: used publicly trains. These things were open for fifty to
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  Speaker 1: sixty people at a time and they were just continually
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  Speaker 1: flushing out the crap. This was a meeting spot for people. So, okay,
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: two things. One thing that always confuses me. We go
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: to so many hotels when we're on the road and
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: you've seen this. Two case, I'm sure the phone by
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  Speaker 1: the toilet. Why why is there the phone by the toilet?
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean. The first time I saw
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: it was at our old office and Buckhead from Babyface Records, Right.
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: I was thinking of that that was the status thing, right,
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: that was that was kind of a phone by they.
• 14:06
  Speaker 3: I mean, not like it's super expensive, but it's sort
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: of like I'm so important that I can't even take
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: five minutes away from main contactable because it's all pre
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: cell phone.
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that's true.
• 14:17
  Speaker 4: Did did you notice spend that when we were in
• 14:18
  Speaker 4: Vegas recently? Did your hotel room have a phone by
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  Speaker 4: the toilet as well?
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: Yes?
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: Yes, which just seemed very very vegasy.
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess right.
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: You need a like you.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: You have a you have a light bulb moment on
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: the toilet and you call downstairs and put two hundred
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: on you know, the the braves or something. Anyway, it
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: turns out this idea of discussing business matters on the
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: toilet dates back to Roman civilization, Greco Roman civilization, because
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: there would be this massive people like at a It
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: reminds me of those giant restrooms at stadiums. You guys,
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: remember where they used to have the troth, the trough.
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: I hated the but they've got this big thing. And
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: when you would go to the bathroom here in this
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: time in ancient Greece, you weren't going to just do
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: your business and leave people hung out. And they talked
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: about you know, work stuff. That feels like, I don't know,
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: I'm glad modern boundaries exist now.
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: I came up with a fun rhyme.
• 15:24
  Speaker 4: Yeah, the elite of crete sure didn't know how to
• 15:26
  Speaker 4: excrete perfect, and that's I apropos of nothing. At this
• 15:30
  Speaker 4: point we've moved on, but I couldn't let that one
• 15:33
  Speaker 4: languish on the vine.
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: I have to say this, this is reminding me of
• 15:37
  Speaker 3: this kind of an obscure reference. But There's an old
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: Louis Benwell film called The Phantom of Liberty, And there's
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: a sequence in that movie which is just a sequence
• 15:44
  Speaker 3: of dreams and weird things. But it's a kind of
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: a high society dinner, except the bathroom and the dinner
• 15:52
  Speaker 3: area are reversed, So everybody sits at the toilet together
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  Speaker 3: in a group and poops.
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  Speaker 4: And.
• 16:02
  Speaker 3: Then and then they all they all get up to
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  Speaker 3: leave and go off into these closed, tiny chambers and
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: eat their food.
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: Alone without anybody. I get.
• 16:09
  Speaker 4: He just knew how to flip the script on on
• 16:12
  Speaker 4: polite society, did he didn't He also do the what
• 16:15
  Speaker 4: was it the unique charms of the speech, that's the
• 16:19
  Speaker 4: one with the iconic poster with like the giant pair
• 16:21
  Speaker 4: of lips with yes lady legs exactly image.
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: Do you guys are what's your policy on speaking in
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: the bathroom.
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: Like to others? Yeah? Or to myself?
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: Well, I don't like it.
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: I don't like it. It feels invasive.
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  Speaker 4: You mean, well, if if it's up to you, maybe
• 16:44
  Speaker 4: it's invasive to the other person too, because they're like, dude,
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  Speaker 4: I don't want to talk to you while you're doing that,
• 16:48
  Speaker 4: or so it.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: Just starts talking to you. You know, that's one thing
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: that I think Atlanta takes a little too far sometimes.
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, a public bath wait, no, why somebody else in
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  Speaker 2: my personal bathroom?
• 16:58
  Speaker 4: No, no, no, I just I just don't em as somebody
• 17:00
  Speaker 4: you maybe you cohabitate with, like shouting at you across
• 17:03
  Speaker 4: the house.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: Okay, in the bathroom. Oh, you're right.
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: This idea of the public latrine being like a meat market,
• 17:09
  Speaker 4: that sounds gross, but we.
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: All know what we mean by that. Really. Yeah, it's
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: a little weird.
• 17:15
  Speaker 4: That does seem you know, like yeah, but you know what,
• 17:17
  Speaker 4: it's also kind of like an old timey thing, the
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: idea of making conversation with someone at the urinals that that,
• 17:24
  Speaker 4: you know, old school folks maybe would do that, But
• 17:26
  Speaker 4: now these kids don't even make phone calls anymore. I
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: mean this, they would die, They would die. I enjoy
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: the boundary. I believe that good fences make good neighbors,
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: but the ancient Greeks sure did not. These public commodes
• 17:39
  Speaker 4: did have technological innovation, though. It's the first evidence of
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: water being actively used to carry away waste instead of
• 17:47
  Speaker 4: stuff just dumping into a river. And you know, the
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: Romans come along, They rip off all the Greek stuff
• 17:54
  Speaker 4: the way that we ripped off that law and order
• 17:56
  Speaker 4: sound c apparently, but they took the latrine technology as well.
• 18:01
  Speaker 4: So if you look at Roman latrines, they're pretty similar
• 18:04
  Speaker 4: to the earlier Greek ones, and they have rows of
• 18:08
  Speaker 4: bench seats with holes positioned above a sewer, no walls.
• 18:13
  Speaker 4: The Romans are also the ones that figured out like
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: aqueducts and stuff, right, So, like the Romans were definitely
• 18:18
  Speaker 4: leveling up the idea of moving water. I'm not one
• 18:22
  Speaker 4: hundred percent sure how quickly they got to the idea
• 18:25
  Speaker 4: of fleshing out waste, but they were able to move
• 18:28
  Speaker 4: water using gravity, right, like to transfer water long distances,
• 18:32
  Speaker 4: so they could have drinking water.
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: And they had centralized plumbing when it introduced a guy
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: named Christoph Luti, a sanitation infrastructure planner at the Swiss
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, he says the
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: Romans did have this one sophisticated innovation. It was their
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: centralized plumbing. So instead of having to do the chamber
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: pot hustle, which is what they called it, obviously, what
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: you would do is just fun funnel all this excreta
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: into the centralized sewer using that slow moving gravity powered water.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: And then after that it it did go to a river.
• 19:12
  Speaker 4: Yeah, not great. That was you know, they made miss
• 19:15
  Speaker 4: missed the boat on that one. But then you know,
• 19:17
  Speaker 4: we'll get there. When the Roman Empire falls, it affected
• 19:22
  Speaker 4: a lot of things. They were in a very advanced
• 19:25
  Speaker 4: civilization and with that fall it kind of set back
• 19:30
  Speaker 4: some of these advances.
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, man, the sophisticated toilet culture entered a bottleneck.
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: Innovation was once again clogged. It was back to chamber
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: pot hustles. That's why in pretty much any Western film
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: about this period of Europe, that's why inevitably when someone's
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: walking through the street, you'll see somebody from the second
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: floor throw out a bucket of piss and filth because
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: the sewer at that time was the middle of the street.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 20:01
  Speaker 4: It reminds me of that line from Monty Python The
• 20:03
  Speaker 4: Holy Grail where they're talking about like who the king
• 20:06
  Speaker 4: is and he's like, oh, he must be the king
• 20:07
  Speaker 4: because he's the only one who isn't covered in.
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: Yes, which is not an unfair choke. Private and public
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: toilet's pretty scarce in the Middle Ages. And yes, it
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: is true that people who lived in castles would poop
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: and pee through these small niches basically in the castle
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: walls the privy right. Yeah, yes, they've been called privies.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: But the big problem is they should have called these
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: the disease holes. Because launching poop and piss outside of
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: your castle, it lands in the moat. It creates epidemics
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: that were pretty frequent, cholera, typhoid, plague. And years went
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: on and the bathroom situation did not really improve. If
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: you were the average person at this day and age,
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: you just go outside and crap in a field because
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: that is fertilizer.
• 21:04
  Speaker 4: Well, I believe we've talked about the fact that Louis
• 21:07
  Speaker 4: the fourteenth like never showered. He just put on layers
• 21:11
  Speaker 4: and layers of like fine smelling oils and lotions, which
• 21:16
  Speaker 4: is really gross. It really reminds me of the story
• 21:18
  Speaker 4: that recently took place sort of Atlanta adjacent, No, it
• 21:22
  Speaker 4: was Atlanta, Jason, about an ill fated flight from Atlanta's
• 21:26
  Speaker 4: Heartfield Jackson International Airport too. I believe it was Spain.
• 21:31
  Speaker 4: I can't recall what the endestination was.
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: I think it was. I think it was fine.
• 21:35
  Speaker 4: Where somebody did a diarrhea down the entire length of
• 21:39
  Speaker 4: the plane, and apparently one of the best quotes from
• 21:43
  Speaker 4: that was that, you know, whatever they tried to do
• 21:45
  Speaker 4: to put on it to make it smell less bad,
• 21:48
  Speaker 4: just made it smell like vanilla scented poop, because that's
• 21:52
  Speaker 4: what it would be.
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 21:53
  Speaker 4: I'm sure whatever Louis, bless his heart, put on just
• 21:58
  Speaker 4: just since you the foul odor in certain different flavored directions.
• 22:04
  Speaker 4: But yeah, I mean, he didn't really care about this stuff.
• 22:07
  Speaker 4: Clearly he was not a showering guy. He didn't attach
• 22:10
  Speaker 4: much you know, sanctity. He did not believe in cleanliness
• 22:14
  Speaker 4: is next to godly, which apparently is not really a
• 22:16
  Speaker 4: thing that exists in any holy scripture.
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: He thought human rules didn't really apply to him because
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: he was, you know, appointed by God. He felt himself
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: somewhat godlike I.
• 22:27
  Speaker 4: For one, have always you know, moved up, I guess
• 22:30
  Speaker 4: a little bit in society. But living with roommates in
• 22:34
  Speaker 4: a home that only has one bathroom, you know, with
• 22:37
  Speaker 4: maybe two other people not great, you know for showering
• 22:40
  Speaker 4: schedule and of course for pooping, because nobody wants anyone
• 22:44
  Speaker 4: to have to come in after they've done the thing,
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: and nobody wants to come in after someone's done the thing.
• 22:48
  Speaker 4: But in a castle Versailles, you know, the son king
• 22:53
  Speaker 4: absolutely did not care, did not give two shakes about
• 22:58
  Speaker 4: having multiple toilets.
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: In fact, how many were there?
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: Ben, Oh, so glad you asked Casey, you'll like this
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: as well as our expert on France. There were two
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: thousand rooms in the castle of Versailles. There was one toilet.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: Oh my god, that's insane.
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: It's like fire festival level logistics, it is. But let's
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: pause here too, because let's get Casey's take on this. Casey,
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: how do the French regard Louis the fourteenth? Did they
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: talk about this poop stuff at all? Or are they
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: more concerned with like him being a bad leader.
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's more the bad leadership thing. Yeah, I don't
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: think there's a whole lot about the toiletry that I've
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: seen pop up in like pop culture and that kind
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: of thing.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: All right, well, we're bringing it back. Also, speaking of
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: bringing things back, the entire reason they set you up
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: for that so that we could say, Casey on the
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: case d.
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: I wonder we can dig that sound que out of
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: the end of the archived.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: Yes, we will dig up the casey on the case
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: sound Q or maybe make a new one. Who knows,
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: So the sun King, you can steal back that order
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: of mind, right, yeah, yeah, we'll just tweet them. The
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: Sun King would host these huge festivals, these parties, his
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: equivalent of raves, and when that happened, the nobles just
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: like the peasants outside. This is pooped in the field.
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: This pooped on the ground like a horse. Super classy.
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: The flushing toilet did not really become a thing in
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: Europe until the last half of the eighteen hundreds.
• 24:31
  Speaker 4: Makes me think of a quote from I'm sorry I
• 24:33
  Speaker 4: keep doing this junior soprano on the soprano is one
• 24:35
  Speaker 4: of my favorite insults that he says.
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: He goes, you hat, that's a good one. Yeah, I
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: don't know, it's a non sequity. I want to use that. Yeah,
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: you know, they were all isn't it funny? Though? I swear?
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: And the whole thing about Louis the fourteenth not bathing.
• 24:50
  Speaker 4: He gets this reputation for me in this resplendent you know,
• 24:53
  Speaker 4: fashion clothes horse kind of cat right, But yeah, he's
• 24:56
  Speaker 4: stunk all the time. And there was only one toilet
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: in the whole Man mansion. This is more than a manchion.
• 25:03
  Speaker 4: If you guys have ever seen for size, literally Palace
• 25:06
  Speaker 4: of Wonder, it really doesn't kind of line up.
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: But enter sir John Harrington, big deal.
• 25:15
  Speaker 4: He pioneered in fifteen ninety six, one of the very
• 25:18
  Speaker 4: earliest examples of the flush toilet.
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he did also want to point out in Louise's defense,
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: Louis was apparently had a huge phobia about bathing.
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: He was tad.
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: He thought it was bad for your health. Hydrophobe. Yeah,
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: it's a hydrophobe. And look this guy, Sir John Harrington,
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: also a poet, by the way, gold literacy. When he
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: invented the flush toilet, as you said, no nobody cared.
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: Oh, total whimper, not a bang at all. It wasn't for.
• 25:51
  Speaker 4: Two hundred years until people kind of caught into the
• 25:56
  Speaker 4: idea of man, wouldn't it be cool if we could
• 25:58
  Speaker 4: like just shoot this poop out somewhere else far away.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: I picture some guy going on a journey, because most
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: people lived and died relatively close to where they were born.
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: I picture some guy going way out in the woods
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: and then coming back and saying, dudes, I found a
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: place that doesn't smell like maybe we could learn.
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: Something from that.
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: So yeah, our buddy Alexander Cummings says, yeah, let's let's
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: try to make things smell a little less filthy. He
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: applies for a patent and he is the guy who
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: adds the double curved drain pipe you see on the bottom,
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: unlike the neck of your commode.
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: Somewhat of a bevel. Yeah.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it fights against stench because it can't get I mean,
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: it's not one hundred percent stench proof, but.
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: It's nothing in this life.
• 26:50
  Speaker 4: Yeah, and this, of course is a design that we
• 26:52
  Speaker 4: still see. If you've ever had to get down and
• 26:55
  Speaker 4: scrub it, scrub the thing, you know, you've you've seen
• 26:57
  Speaker 4: that that that curved kind of receptacle in the bottom
• 27:02
  Speaker 4: of modern toilets. It's really not that different. So this
• 27:05
  Speaker 4: really did pave the way for what we know today
• 27:08
  Speaker 4: as the modern flushing toilet. You know, once you get
• 27:10
  Speaker 4: something once until we get into the whole Japanese future
• 27:13
  Speaker 4: of toilets, that's its own thing. But you know, it's
• 27:16
  Speaker 4: hard to get something much better than old John Harrington
• 27:19
  Speaker 4: got it. But as we know, Britain in the nineteenth
• 27:24
  Speaker 4: century had a real problem with sanitation, a real problem
• 27:28
  Speaker 4: with sanitation that stemmed from a real problem with overcrowding
• 27:31
  Speaker 4: in its cities. And we know that sometimes you know,
• 27:36
  Speaker 4: this is like aut of a twist type situation. One
• 27:40
  Speaker 4: hundred people might share a single toilet. That's insane, that's wild,
• 27:45
  Speaker 4: and it would of course cause backups and the sewage
• 27:49
  Speaker 4: would then spill out into the streets. The streets were
• 27:52
  Speaker 4: running with with with with poopoo and peepee.
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: They very much were. This was an ideal situation because
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: the no no juices were mixing with all kinds of
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: other terrible stuff in the water, chemicals, horse manure, just
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: dead animals. Someone's pet dies and they're they're like throw
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: oscar in the river. And because of this there were
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: these huge, again continual public health crises colera outbreaks of
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: the eighteen thirties and eighteen fifties in particular, and so
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: as a result, trying to fight back against this, in
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: eighteen forty eight, the government decreed that every new house
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: built had to have a water closet, a toilet, or
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: an ash pit privy. And that's when we go to
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: the night soil men working on night poops the night
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: soil men had a terrible job. We talked about these
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: guys in the Great Stink of London.
• 28:54
  Speaker 4: Remember that's right they you know, they would muck out
• 28:58
  Speaker 4: these pits, They would muck out these whatever ashen privies,
• 29:04
  Speaker 4: right not, you know, one of the original dirty jobs.
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: This was bad times. Yeah.
• 29:13
  Speaker 4: But of course, despite the best efforts of the night men,
• 29:15
  Speaker 4: the nightmen, this stuff did. It's insidious, you know, it
• 29:20
  Speaker 4: found its way into the water source or into the
• 29:25
  Speaker 4: water supply rather. And of course there were also other
• 29:29
  Speaker 4: chemicals that came from runoff from like coal ash and
• 29:32
  Speaker 4: things like that horse manure, rotting animal carcasses. The water
• 29:38
  Speaker 4: was just absolutely swimming with disease and to your point, Bend,
• 29:43
  Speaker 4: cholera outbreaks of the eighteen thirties and eighteen.
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: Fifties were the result of that.
• 29:49
  Speaker 4: But in eighteen fifty eight there was a particularly nasty
• 29:52
  Speaker 4: summer which resulted in that Great stink. This idea of miasma,
• 29:56
  Speaker 4: remember that one ben the miasma theory, the idea that
• 29:59
  Speaker 4: we didn't really know where this was coming from, where
• 30:02
  Speaker 4: this disease was spreading. It wasn't right away that they
• 30:05
  Speaker 4: realized it was in the water at all. You think
• 30:07
  Speaker 4: that would have been a dead giveaway because the water
• 30:10
  Speaker 4: was like brown, I mean, it was bad. It wasn't
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: just like a hint of the stuff. So there was
• 30:16
  Speaker 4: a theory that it was spreading through the air, but
• 30:18
  Speaker 4: that was dead wrong.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: Just I'm laughing because you've inspired me for a terrible
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: collode or perfume commercial for Louis the fourteenth, like Calvin
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: Klein style. It's a hint of poop.
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: Yes, how about this? A hint of poop in the night?
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: Hint of poop.
• 30:38
  Speaker 4: Sorry, I'm thinking of an Harry Nilsen album.
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: There's one myth we want to bust, and we know
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: we're being a little bit eurocentric heredity, you know in
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: I guess Middle Eastern when you get back to the
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: origins of mankind. But we're gonna get to a little
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: bit of banter about Japan and other parts of the
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: world towards the end. On the way, we're going to
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: pause to bust one quick myth. Folks, you may have
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: heard the story of Thomas Crapper. People will often say
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: he invented the modern toilet, because that's that sounds really cool.
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: Your last name is Crapper, you know, the invention is
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: named after you. The answer is a bit more nuanced
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: because old Tommy Craps didn't burst onto the plumbing scene
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: until the eighteen sixties, so there's been a lot of
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: research beforehand, like Cummings and Harrington and so on. But
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: he took out a lot of plumbing patents, more puanced, yes,
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: more puanced he took out. He took out something like
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: nine different ones between eighteen eighty one and eighteen ninety six.
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: But none of these were for a world changing toilet.
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: They were pipe improvements. And come to find out, thanks
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: to our palace at Life Science, the word crap probably
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: doesn't even come from his name, so we're now we're
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: redeeming his his reputation. He didn't do everything that people said,
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: but the stuff that he did do do is pretty important,
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: the pipe innovations.
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: But where does word crap come from?
• 32:20
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it's actually you know, I mean, it's it's a
• 32:22
  Speaker 4: weird one, right, because it certainly seems like it would
• 32:25
  Speaker 4: stem from this gentleman's name, which is an unfortunate thing
• 32:28
  Speaker 4: to be associated with, and it very well, may you know,
• 32:31
  Speaker 4: this is actually a little bit kind of up up
• 32:34
  Speaker 4: up in the air. I would argue, I think so
• 32:36
  Speaker 4: with historians, but it was actually potentially the word crap
• 32:41
  Speaker 4: was derived from a Latin word crappa, meaning chaff, which
• 32:45
  Speaker 4: I guess that's you know, the idea of separating the
• 32:47
  Speaker 4: wheat from the chaff. I think the chaff is like
• 32:49
  Speaker 4: the casing of the wheats, or the outer part, so
• 32:52
  Speaker 4: it's the part you throw away.
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: So that does make sense, you know.
• 32:56
  Speaker 4: But this guy Crapper's toilets did prominently feature on it,
• 33:01
  Speaker 4: So you know, the idea of maybe the term using
• 33:04
  Speaker 4: the crapper is separate from the term crap. I would
• 33:08
  Speaker 4: have to see some etymological evidence, you know, to the
• 33:13
  Speaker 4: contrary right to really track the providence of this word.
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: And that's a good point because etymology can be some
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: tricky poop. He did manufacture these toilets, he just didn't
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: necessarily invent them. Other people got in the toilet game
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: during the Sanitation Revolution, George Jennings, Thomas Tweeford, Edward Johns,
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: Henry Dalton, and so on and so on. They began
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: producing the toilets that are increasingly similar to the toilets
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: we know today, and these contraptions start appearing throughout major
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: European cities. Thankfully, around the same time, people started creating
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: sewage treatment plants to help protect rivers and streams in
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: Europe from a flood of human dodo And sadly this
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: wasn't the case in some other parts of the world.
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: So it really is kind of a mixed bag, you know.
• 34:07
  Speaker 4: It's it's sort of a lot of cases of parallel thinking,
• 34:10
  Speaker 4: a lot of cases of folks laying the groundwork and
• 34:13
  Speaker 4: then other folks coming along and improving again. You know,
• 34:16
  Speaker 4: people pooped as long as there have been people or
• 34:20
  Speaker 4: any you know, animal for the right.
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: Oh my god, you're so right, Ben, We're so wrong.
• 34:26
  Speaker 4: Though, History will not forgive us for this episode, and
• 34:29
  Speaker 4: we aren't technically, uh in service of history.
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: So I don't know, however, going to come back from this.
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: We're gonna do our damnness.
• 34:36
  Speaker 4: But yeah, it's it's like, bunch, oh my god, stop me,
• 34:39
  Speaker 4: stop us all we're out of control. Yeah, but I mean,
• 34:42
  Speaker 4: like it makes sense, this would be an innovation that
• 34:45
  Speaker 4: has been a long time coming, you know, not not
• 34:47
  Speaker 4: to mention that the Romans kind of figured it out
• 34:49
  Speaker 4: and then got wiped off the map and all that
• 34:51
  Speaker 4: technology was sort of lost to history until you know, later,
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: right when it was sort of more unearthed this they
• 34:56
  Speaker 4: had to kind of restart the whole search for for
• 35:00
  Speaker 4: the toilet. So but again it's it's a very basic
• 35:03
  Speaker 4: function that a lot of people could have had the
• 35:05
  Speaker 4: same idea for, and then it just became this amalgam
• 35:09
  Speaker 4: of ideas and tweaks over time. And you know, you
• 35:12
  Speaker 4: wouldn't get to the idea of sewage treatment plants without
• 35:15
  Speaker 4: getting to the idea of a flush toilet, without getting
• 35:19
  Speaker 4: to the idea of the poop goes in the hole
• 35:21
  Speaker 4: and down into the pit.
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: You know, it all kind of was staggered.
• 35:25
  Speaker 4: And I think that makes sense to get to where
• 35:28
  Speaker 4: we are today, which is of course Japanese toilets.
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, Japanese toilets, most particularly toto they have their
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: own different evolution, you know, traditional Japanese toilets. When you
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: go to that country and a lot of parts of Asia,
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: you'll see squat toilets right based on the floor or
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: a place where you you know, you assume like the Slavic.
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: Squatly better for your tract, right, yes.
• 35:55
  Speaker 4: Which tracked track, Yeah, we're not talking about treatises here.
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: Depends but Yeah.
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: The most I think impressive thing for a lot of
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: travelers from outside of that part of the world, in
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: Japan in particular, is the crazy sophisticated modern toilets that
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: you see in a lot of Japanese buildings. So there's
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: a dichotomy, right, Sometimes they will be the really fancy
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: ones that do all the things we already mentioned, and
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: then sometimes it'll be a ceramic hole in the ground,
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean.
• 36:29
  Speaker 4: Have you guys ever happened upon something that's usually referred
• 36:33
  Speaker 4: to as a chemical toilet?
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: Yes?
• 36:36
  Speaker 4: Yeah, And of course a porta potty is essentially a
• 36:39
  Speaker 4: large scale chemical toilet, but you can get these little
• 36:42
  Speaker 4: ones that are like portable that you might have with
• 36:44
  Speaker 4: you in an RV or something, and it has whatever
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: that blue gook is that apparently just makes everything smell
• 36:50
  Speaker 4: like what do they call those things? Those bricks? This
• 36:54
  Speaker 4: kind of urinal cakes? Yeah, exactly Why do they have
• 36:57
  Speaker 4: to call them cakes? Well, I'll take speaking of do
• 37:00
  Speaker 4: they have to call it? There is a quite large
• 37:03
  Speaker 4: national they're they're they're found in California, Oregon, Utah, Washington, Texas, Colorado,
• 37:07
  Speaker 4: and Georgia. Porta potty company called Honey bucket. Why who
• 37:14
  Speaker 4: greenlit that? Is despicable.
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: I wonder if it's a spin off of another company
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: that already had honey in the name honey buckets. It's
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: just that, No, I don't want even not applied to that.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Honey bucket is not a term that I enjoy.
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: It's just unpleasant. It's incredibly unpleasant. It's it's foul. It
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: ruins the idea of honey for me.
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: If someone if, like if I walked into a diner
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: and the server called me honey bucket, I would be
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: very uncomfortable.
• 37:42
  Speaker 4: Yeah, honey bunches, maybe pie bucket. That's a that's a
• 37:46
  Speaker 4: bridge too far.
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: There's also a composting toilets. These are dry toilets, and
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: I gotta tell you, I hope the technology has improved,
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: because you guys know, I have some friends, hippie friends
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: who are off the grid and they're compost. Toilet does
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: not compost to the degree that I would have hoped,
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: and it's inside.
• 38:06
  Speaker 4: Oh it's always a bit of a bait and switch
• 38:10
  Speaker 4: with those kinds of things. Back to the Romans, though,
• 38:13
  Speaker 4: you know, we talked about how they really were leading
• 38:15
  Speaker 4: the charge for this kind of stuff, and then you know,
• 38:19
  Speaker 4: because of their annihilation, everything kind of got set back.
• 38:22
  Speaker 4: They also, you know, we haven't talked about wiping much, right,
• 38:27
  Speaker 4: if at all. We did talk about how we did
• 38:28
  Speaker 4: an episode on bidays. I think we're all here in
• 38:31
  Speaker 4: this room pro baday, and the fact that other parts
• 38:34
  Speaker 4: of the world have really, you know, have always kind
• 38:36
  Speaker 4: of been pro baday and somehow the US has lagged
• 38:38
  Speaker 4: behind is very strange, and I would argue, we would
• 38:41
  Speaker 4: all argue. I think we even made the argument in
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: our episode. It's a product of big tpe.
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 38:46
  Speaker 4: Yes, a lot of money to be made in those sheets,
• 38:50
  Speaker 4: you know, those cylindrical sheets. But the Romans, well they
• 38:55
  Speaker 4: weren't quite at the level of bidets yet with their aqueducts.
• 38:59
  Speaker 4: They didn't quite figure out how to get a dispray
• 39:02
  Speaker 4: upward against gravity. They did have a pretty relatively sophisticated
• 39:08
  Speaker 4: wiping mechanism in the form of a sea sponge.
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: On a stick. Ah, the tyssorium. Yes, wow, it also
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: sounds like a Mars volt.
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: It sounds also like an obscure anatomical thing, all.
• 39:26
  Speaker 4: Right, Yeah, like from the what's that book with all
• 39:28
  Speaker 4: the fake science stuff, the Codex serp codex serphin. It
• 39:32
  Speaker 4: sounds like some yeah, exactly, some alien organ of some stripe.
• 39:37
  Speaker 4: But yeah, but these were not uh, these were for
• 39:40
  Speaker 4: repeat use though, which does give me pause between multiple people. Oh,
• 39:47
  Speaker 4: you know, you know again, poop is pretty insidious, and
• 39:50
  Speaker 4: and and washing it away with water on a porous
• 39:54
  Speaker 4: thing piece of organic material, probably not going to get
• 39:58
  Speaker 4: it all.
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: You're probably not going to get it all.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: And then passing the poopstick to the next guy while
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: you're talking about, you know, the olive oil trade or something.
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: It's just not a good look. And thank goodness, toilet
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: paper was mass produced in eighteen fifty seven.
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: It is very imperfect.
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: We have learned some troubling things about toilet paper on
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: the way, but it's still better than sharing a poopstick
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: with people.
• 40:24
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it really gives a whole new meaning to the
• 40:27
  Speaker 4: insult poopstick.
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: Yes, which we thought was universal. It turns out that's
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: just something we've been saying.
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: Turns out it has a historical precedent.
• 40:36
  Speaker 4: But you know, again, to the Romans credit, they had
• 40:39
  Speaker 4: a built in mechanism for rinsing the poopsticks right there
• 40:43
  Speaker 4: at their feet, in the form of a little flowing trough,
• 40:47
  Speaker 4: a little kind of lazy river of water. They would
• 40:50
  Speaker 4: just switch the thing around. I don't I don't buy it.
• 40:54
  Speaker 4: I'm a little skeptical of this mechanism here. I think
• 40:58
  Speaker 4: they probably were spreading some spreading some disease, some part
• 41:01
  Speaker 4: of it.
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but it was one of those things where they
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: couldn't see it. They didn't know as much about how
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: disease is spread. And this maybe gets us to our
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: final points here. It's fun to have, like the food humor,
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: we obviously love it. In casey, we hope we have
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: impressed you. Thank you for coming back. The big point
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: about this is that sanitation can save billions of lives,
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: and right now, nearly one half of the world's population
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: lacks access to proper toilets, proper sanitation, or both. This
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: is why the CDC says there's an estimated three point
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: six billion people without safely managed sanitation, and then of those,
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: one point nine billion only live with basic sanitation, which
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: means you'reus in outhouses, latrines, things that fill up or
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: worse overflow in heavy rain. This is particularly dangerous for women,
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: for young girls when they have to go outside at
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: night in poorly lit places. Just to use the restroom,
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: you know. And then the other thing. We don't think
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: about it too much because we live in a city. Snakes, insects,
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: predator tics, ticks, ticks as well, lie disease.
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, insidious. But we have we talked about the Japanese
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: word shimogo.
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: We have not talked about the Japanese words.
• 42:24
  Speaker 2: This is fun.
• 42:26
  Speaker 4: We have talked a bit about how the Japanese, you know,
• 42:28
  Speaker 4: are the modern innovators of like no one does nobody
• 42:31
  Speaker 4: does it better than the Japanese when it comes to toilets.
• 42:34
  Speaker 4: So many options and opportunities to live in the lap
• 42:37
  Speaker 4: of luxury. Uh, when it comes to Japanese toilets. But
• 42:40
  Speaker 4: in the olden times, in I believe Japan and China,
• 42:45
  Speaker 4: they did actually use human waste as fertilizer. Yeah, there's
• 42:52
  Speaker 4: a word for it, yeah, yea yeah, no, But there's
• 42:55
  Speaker 4: another word for it, shimogo, which loosely translates to from
• 43:00
  Speaker 4: the bottom of a person.
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: And the reason flush toilets became a thing in Japan
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: at all is because eventually there was a law made
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: after World War Two that said you gotta stop using
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: night soil, even though it still happens in parts of
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: the Korean Peninsula, parts of China.
• 43:20
  Speaker 4: It's funny though, too, Ben, weren't we talking about in
• 43:23
  Speaker 4: the Middle Ages the night soil men. So this is
• 43:26
  Speaker 4: a term that is not exclusively you know, from from
• 43:29
  Speaker 4: the East. This is very much a you know, European
• 43:32
  Speaker 4: term as well.
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's definitely a it's a common thing, right, It's
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: a lot of people solving a universal problem and it
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: has been such a journey. So the next time you
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: pull that lever, folks, give a big thanks to the
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: inventors of the past, the nightmen that they were, and
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: remember to close the lid. And So, Noel, what do
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: you think are we Are we flush this episode? Are
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: we did we miss any more poop puns?
• 44:04
  Speaker 2: We couldn't possibly have.
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: We really leaned into it.
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, we nope, not going.
• 44:12
  Speaker 3: To where you're going.
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm just kiding.
• 44:17
  Speaker 3: We all got it.
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: Let's let the imagination. I don't know if I got
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: it prooping down you know that. See, that's the thing.
• 44:23
  Speaker 4: Poop is insidious, you know, both as a physical substance
• 44:27
  Speaker 4: and as a substance.
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: Of the mind.
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, and with that we want to thank everybody
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: as always for tuning in to the first of a
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: couple reunion episodes. We're going to have Casey. Thank you
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: so much, man, it's so good to see you. We,
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: like the rest of the Ridiculous Historians, are just huge
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: fans of yours, and we can't wait to journey into
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: another strange story which will be less poop related, we promise,
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: uh later on this week.
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: Let's see who else.
• 44:58
  Speaker 3: Oh.
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: Thanks also to white Pants Williams.
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: That's what he goes by. Now did you hear about
• 45:03
  Speaker 2: this case? I have not heard this. How did it work?
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: He texted us. He's like, I got to get these
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: white pants.
• 45:10
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we Labor Day half a suit. Okay, you know, uh,
• 45:15
  Speaker 4: it's it's in the back, it's in the past episodes.
• 45:17
  Speaker 4: But you know what, white pants don't take very well.
• 45:20
  Speaker 4: What's that poop in your pants? It's everyone knows.
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: It's a gambit for sure, you know what I mean.
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: And also thanks to Alex Williams who composed this slap
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: and bop uh white pants Williams.
• 45:32
  Speaker 4: Alex Williams, And it was apparently very all of these
• 45:35
  Speaker 4: people were all very continent.
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: Yes us, Yeah, I love that key and peel sketch
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: cottonenttal breakfast. It's just a genius. Yeah. Thanks also to
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland, aka the quizt, who sends his regards. I
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: always I like that phrase, sends regards because you don't
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: know whether it's good or ominous.
• 45:56
  Speaker 2: It can be very ominous. I think it's all in
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: the tone.
• 45:59
  Speaker 3: It's a weird win in email when people say best
• 46:01
  Speaker 3: regards or regards or it's like.
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: I don't know what to do with that?
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: How do you feel about just best?
• 46:07
  Speaker 3: I mean, I don't do it. It's okay, It's.
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: It's a little formal.
• 46:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I would say my best wishes to you and yours.
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: Kind of a literary flourish, a little bit of a
• 46:20
  Speaker 3: flex publishing people.
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: Maybe immediate servant, your faithful servant.
• 46:25
  Speaker 4: How about capital thanks? Exclamation mark, exclamation mark, exclamation mark?
• 46:29
  Speaker 4: You guys loving that one?
• 46:29
  Speaker 2: That means you messed up.
• 46:30
  Speaker 3: Somebody's really mad at you to say that.
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know. Lol, all good here.
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I still think it's better than ending with a quotation.
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: When I see emails that end with a quotation, I'm like, yeah, dude,
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: I also like words worth, but we're talking about how
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: how to schedule an admin meeting.
• 46:51
  Speaker 4: Well, how do you feel about quotations in a signature
• 46:53
  Speaker 4: file on an email?
• 46:56
  Speaker 3: Uh?
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: Not great, each their own. I mean it's like a
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: bumper sticker. Not great.
• 47:00
  Speaker 3: But if it's in the body that's deranged, oh, I
• 47:02
  Speaker 3: would never Who would do that?
• 47:03
  Speaker 4: Who's psychos are you dealing with, Ben that are ending
• 47:06
  Speaker 4: signing off emails with literary quotes? Yeah?
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: Run away, dude.
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: And we of course want to thank Christophrasiotis Eaves, Jeff
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: cot here in spirit, Gabe lose Yer, and thank you
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: to you, Noel, and and props to both of us.
• 47:23
  Speaker 2: Props all three of us for closing the lid. And
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: my best wishes in regards to you and your family
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: as well.
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: Benjamin, looking forward remember that one.
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: We'll see you next time. Folks.
• 47:42
  Speaker 4: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
• 47:46
  Speaker 4: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.