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And while looking through those books, you begin to wonder
what life was really like long ago. Those guys wearing heavy
armor, for instance – how did they go to the bathroom? If
people didn’t have bathrooms, what did they do with their
doo-doo? Learn the answer to that, and other yucky questions
in the new book Poop Happened! by Sarah Albee.
Humans have eliminated since the beginning of time, of
course, but they didn’t write about it until kind of
recently. We know that the Harrapans built the first sewer
systems 5,000 years ago in Pakistan. Ancient Romans had
large open restrooms where merchants could conduct business
while they were takin’ care of business. Medieval servants
tossed potty contents out the window to the ground or into a
moat. In Henry VIII’s time, waste went straight into a
river.
And that was a big, messy problem. Because most people
didn’t care much about where their waste went, it usually
went into water sources, which became contaminated. People
drank, washed and bathed in the icky water, which made them
sick - sometimes to death. To make matters worse,
disease-carrying bugs loved people who were smelly and
unhygienic.
People tried everything: just 300 years ago, if you needed
work and your nose wasn’t good, you could be a night-soil
man whose job was to clean cesspools every night. Everyday
furniture with hidden trap doors became popular. But over
time, humans learned and by 1776, inventors were going with
the right flow.
Still, things weren’t perfect. For decades, water closets
(early toilets) were mostly found in upper-class homes,
while poor folks continued to use rivers and pits as
potties. The White House has only had running water for
about 150 years. Even your grandma might have used an
outhouse as a kid, since just half of U.S. houses had indoor
plumbing in the 1930’s.
Ain’t that the pits?
Does your child have a number-one interest in the history of
going Number Two? Then Poop Happened! will satisfy
his inquisitive mind in three different ways.
Without descending into coy, cutesy language, author Sarah
Albee presents delightfully icky information to her audience
in a way that will make them laugh as they learn, but that
won’t shock adults who read it.
And read it you will, because Albee’s childlike interest in
little-known (but interesting) history is contagious for
both you and your child. Add in a heavy dose of the
Eeeeuuuuw Factor, and you know this is a book that curious
kids (and adults) will love.
If your nine-to-14-year-old wants something unusual to read
this summer, Poop Happened! just happens to be a good
choice. Anything less would be flushing his summer away. |
