PLUMBING

Growing up in Jerome, we had indoor plumbing as did many others in town, but there were many or most who had “out houses”.

I was particularly impressed by the “honey dippers” who would come by in a large truck once in a while to clean out these wooden buildings in people’s back yards.

I also remember watching a teenager I knew take her bath in a wooden round tub in the middle of their kitchen, with her mother pouring warm water over her head to rinse her off. The coal stove for cooking was right next to her keeping the water and the room warm (and this was the same stove where her mother made the best home made bread…but I digress).

As time went on, indoor plumbing was in all houses.

But with this early sorry state of affairs, I must mention that we also had outdoor open sewers in Jerome, like little streams running through town. The one I liked to play in was not far from the Lutheran Church--and not far from our house. It was fun jumping across the little stream. It also had a little tunnel (large pipe) that we could walk through straddling the “water” running along the floor of the pipe. It was all quite exciting, as one certainly didn’t want to fall in.

Needless to say we were cautioned about not playing in the sewers, but….