Vision

Our out-back, down-wind, gets-no-respect outhouse

It looks like Mom, the photographer, may have surprised Glen when she took this picture. She was probably surprised when the picture was developed and included the outhouse—which she tried so hard to keep out of her pictures! 

Photo by

  
Margaret Walls  

Written by 
LeRoy Walls 
CEO and Founder 

The February wind was howling and creating its own unique wind song through the cracks.  Snow had drifted slightly through these same cracks.

I could barely keep my mind on my business.  The familiar Sears-Roebuck catalog lay open beside me.  Even the women’s lingerie section held no appeal for this 12-year-old farm boy on this cold morning.

The indoor facilities at school and at a few of my friends’ houses who lived in town were a marvel to me. From that experience, I felt that perhaps warmth and convenience could offset the quiet solitude of our outhouse. In fact I’m sure it was on this cold, snowy morning that I pictured a warm bathroom.

Our town of Cabool got electricity in 1928. The main reasons that electricity didn’t reach our farm until 1949 were the high cost of bringing electrical service through the rugged Ozark hills, delay due to World War II and the sparse population "out our way."

We got electricity (which is the normal power for water pumps) in 1949 but due to the droughts and hard times on the farm in the early 1950’s we didn’t get an inside bathroom on our farm until 1957.

We kept our outhouse for a year or two after that because Dad still preferred the quiet and solitude or maybe he liked the Sears-Roebuck lingerie section too. I believe it was after this cold winter of 1958 that Dad decided that the inside version with pre-softened paper was going to be okay after all.

My first vision for the bathroom was to have it inside the house!

12/31/1999