1945, WW II ended, and we rural Cascade slope children lived a rugged life (barely giving it a thought). We learned to read by kerosene lamps and if fuel was short, by candles on the long winter nights beginning at 4 PM. (There was no Daylight Savings Time, except in Seattle.) The roads were gravel, electric lights did not exist, nor did phone poles. Phone systems consisting of hand turned “handles” (1 to 10 rounds = rings) on wooden boxes hung on a wall on a community system where one could “listen in” via lines strung on conifers along the way. Many washed their clothes in the creeks (‘remember cloth diapers’)
and farms used springs for drinking water. Visits to town were called “white trips,” as mothers would purchase only flour, salt, yeast, baking powder and sugar. Oranges appeared at Christmas time in a hung stocking (a tradition that still exists). Elementary schools were 1-room; teachers taught 6 grade levels identified by 6 columns of 1-seat wooden desks with ink pen holes. “Run Spot Run” set the tone to talk, walk, and “go places” (future Admiral McPhail sat to this writer’s right in Snohomish’s Forest Glade Elementary). Each farm had a hillside where junk was thrown. These areas still exist today, their locations unknown to today’s owners. Also lost to memory were the outhouses. One’s social status was defined by having a “one-seater” vs. a “two-seater” vs. a “three-seater.” Dried native plant leaves were found within (along with Ward and Sears’ catalogs). If seeing is believing, one could not purchase insurance that included structures, unless they were “mapped” by the Sanborn Company. The map photo is of Stanwood in the 1930s, the small squares are Sanborn’s “recorded history” (and excellent places today to plant a flowering tree.) The map shows the home of Adah Pearson Bellinger, a godmother; a site now serving as Stanwood’s Historical Society Museum. She and this writer’s mother were hiking the slopes of Pilchuck to a mountain lake in their late 70’s, Adah fell and broke a bone and then walked out. They were Norse and tough, tough (and very much) ladies.
http://www.gfhistory.org/Maps.html
https://www.sahs-fncc.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Echoes21PearsonHouseHist.pdf
https://www.cottonelle.com/en-ca/tips-advice/toilet-paper-101/what-did-people-use-before-toilet-paper
https://www.csun.edu/social-behavioral-sciences/sanborn-collection/sanborn-fire-insurance-maps-washington
If you live in a city in the West and are interested in where the outdoor toilets once sat on an urban parcel, the company map to review is:
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