The panic buying spurred by the Coronavirus has highlighted the products that Americans feel are most essential to their wellbeing. Apparently toilet paper leads the pack since most stores initially reported that they were completely out of toilet paper.
Toilet paper hoarding has become a national joke, with people buying carts full of the stuff in anticipation of long periods of ‘sheltering in place.’
I was surprised to discover that toilet paper has only been around since 1857, which means that humans spent centuries and centuries without this basic item of civilized life. So what did people do before this life-changing invention? Sailors used the frayed end of a rope dipped in saltwater. The Romans used a sponge on the end of a stick. Rural areas used corn cobs hung in outhouses.
Stones and moss were also used as were all kinds of printed paper, which were put to double use. People wiped indiscriminately with everything from newspapers and catalogs to almanacs and literature and even government proclamations.
Then around 1857, Joseph C. Gayetty invented the first commercial toilet paper called “Gayettey’s Medicated Paper.” It was made of hemp, had the inventor’s name watermarked on each sheet and claimed that its four medications combined with the paper pulp prevented and cured hemorrhoids. It was clearly a luxury item only for the rich because it sold for $30 in today’s money for 1000 sheets.
Gayettey’s product was sold only in sheets, as were the other brands that popped up, but it continued to be sold into the 1920s. It wasn’t until 1890 that Irvin and Clarence Scott of Philadelphia’s Scott Paper Company revolutionized the world of toilet paper by selling it on rolls. If you look at the original patent, you can see that the roll was designed to be placed with the sheets coming OVER the roll, NOT UNDER!
Original patent showing OVER was the intended way to position each roll
A later patent tried to address the problem of finding the ‘end’ sheet if it’s not hanging down. It was not successful, nor were the others that subsequently tried to tackle that pressing issue. Later improvements on the toilet paper roll addressed the problem of waste – too many sheets unraveled with each use. In 1891 a patent was granted for a roll of toilet paper with perforations to separate sheets so that only one sheet of paper came off the roll at a time.
Another welcome improvement in quality came in the early 1900s when a company boasted of its super-refined, “splinter-free” toilet paper. Ouch! Before this time, minute wood pulp splinters were a common residue from the papermaking process. By 1943, toilet paper was advertised as “soft and oh so gentle” for the first time!
Toilet paper has also been used as a political tool and numerous American politicians have appeared on rolls, including George Bush and Donald Trump. Prior to World War II, some British toilet paper was made with pictures of Adolph Hitler and other Nazi leaders printed on the sheets. One such roll from the 1930s was recently found in a barn in England. It was thin, war issue paper and was only twenty sheets, but it showed Hitler giving the Nazi salute. It sold for $240!
Are we going to face prices like that for Charmin in the near future? If it had pictures of Donald Trump on it, it might be worth it.
The toilet paper of my childhood came in colors and colorful patterns
I would love to market toilet paper with Trump’s face covered with s—-t all over it.
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They sell the paper, but you have to supply the sh#t.
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Enjoyed this! Gotta say, maybe a biday (not sure spelling) wasn’t such a bad idea, mwhahahaha
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monthlycritic.wordpress.com/2020/03/20/the-invisible-man/
https://monthlycritic.wordpress.com/2020/03/06/parasite/
Good to read, write and share in these odd times. Some of my recent reviews if you fancy reading.
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Thanks, Ellin, this was a fun and interesting piece to read!
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I love learning how common household items came about and what people did without them. Read about the days long process of washing clothes before washing machines!
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I do love the flowered version Ellin.
Leslie
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My mother used to color coordinate the toilet paper with the bathroom decor when toilet paper came in pastel colors as well as white and patterned.
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Pingback: REPOST—A BRIEF HISTORY OF TOILET PAPER – BY ELLIN CURLEY – Ruth Scribbles
Awesome! Thx for the history!!
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Interesting post, Ellin! I don’t remember the floral t.p. but do remember colors. Colored Kleenex/tissues were more common, as well.
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I think they still have colored and floral kleenex. Or maybe that’s just the box design.
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I recall when I was young we would go to a beach house for a holiday, and it had a dunny. that is a toilet out side away from the house, it was basically a tin can with a toilet seat on it. The dunny had a little door at the back and it was situated usually near the rear fence on a lane. This was so the dunny man could come and empty it. They always called out as they approached ‘Dunny Man’ so if you were in there using it you yelled out. So they man did not get covered by anything and you were not mortified that he saw your bottom. We wiped out bottoms with newspaper, we also did this at my grandparents using newspapaer.
I also recall coloured toilet paper, and printed. We even had a crossword roll courtesey off my brother one year.lol
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Now there are all kinds of printed ‘joke’ toilet papers. I got one of stock market graphs for my son when he graduated with a business degree. There are also the political ones with hated political figures faces on them.
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lol Im just happy to have my supply of normal plain paper.
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Oh yes, that floral and even scented paper. Gosh, who would have thought we’d reach the state we’re in now.
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I don’t remember scented TP but I loved the colorful designs on the sheets when they were in fashion. It somehow livened up the whole process of going to the bathroom.
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I remember the coloured and printed TP as well. Perhaps as it became “green” it also became whiter. On a side note, I may never eat another corncob.
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I think toilet paper went white years before environmental consciousness became huge. But I could be wrong.
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Actually, thinking WAY back, I think they discovered the dye was “bad for you” in some obscure way that they never fully explained. it probably caused cancer or something.
Okay, this is what I got off Google:
“Citing poor sales figures due to medical and ecological concerns about the general safety of pastel dyes, colored toilet paper quietly drifted to the island of discontinued items. The experts at Toilet Paper World (yes, such a place exists) say that the colorful rolls were discontinued in 2004.” — Aug 12, 2013
“Apparently, doctors began warning people that the dyes in colored toilet paper could be harmful to their skin. And there were environmental concerns about the dyes, too. … Scott still made colored toilet paper as recently as 2004, but today all their offerings come in a single color: white.” – Mar 24, 2018
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I thought it was something like that. Toilet Paper World. I must visit that 🙂
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It makes sense that dyes in toilet paper might not be good for you and I can certainly see environmentalists making an issue about it. I didn’t realize that colored rolls were still in circulation as late as 2004.
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Me neither. Do you think the one with Trump’s head on it is actually poisonous?
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Don’t you wish you’d made a major investment in toilet paper?
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The Childhood TP is cute. The Donzo TP brings on Monty’s revenge.
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There is also Hillary Clinton TP for Republicans.
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I wish I’d foreseen lots of major stock spikes over the years! If I could go back in time the one thing I’d do is tell my younger self about Apple and Microsoft, among others.
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I remember all that floral TP. What happened to it I wonder? One day, it became all white all the time.
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I thought the colored TP was so much nicer in the bathroom than stark white. Today it’s purely utilitarian wheras it used to be decorative too. The bathroom was a place where you could show some flair and personality!
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