A salty secret behind the outhouse

By Joan Janzen

Back in the day not many people used valuable film to photograph an outhouse. However, this lopsided structure was captured on film in the 1940s. There are likely some interesting stories out there involving outhouses. As a child, I remember my mother disposing of a mound of bread dough which she had mistakenly overloaded with salt. She hid the dough behind the outhouse. Unfortunately, the temperature rose significantly on that particular day and her secret mound of dough quadrupled in size and was no longer a secret.

A lopsided outhouse from the 1940s. Photo: Provincial Archives of Saskatchewan