NEB&W Guide to Outhouses This file is open to website members only
Last Update: 2007-04-24
Structures Table of Contents
Scenery, Structures & Details Table of Contents
Nowadays, we use the term "outhouse" for these, but a more polite and and specific term back then was "privy", from "private". In the '70's and '80's, the NMRA Bulletin featured a lot of childish "toilet" jokes about "biffies", their term for outhouses.
If you ever go camping, you will still encounter outhouses, although the "port-a-john", with its chemical holding tank, is even making inroads here.
In settled ares, outhouses were still seen in 1950, although rare. My mother had