7:15am...now it's snowing here in Rogue River.
History
The original showers were neither indoor structures nor man-made but were common natural formations: waterfalls. The falling water rinsed the bathers completely clean and was more efficient than bathing in a traditional basin, which required manual transport of both fresh and waste water. Ancient people began to reproduce these natural phenomena by pouring jugs of water, often very cold, over themselves after washing. There has been evidence of early upper class Egyptian and Mesopotamians having indoor shower rooms where servants would bathe them in the privacy of their own homes. However, these were rudimentary by modern standards, having rudimentary drainage systems and water was carried, not pumped, into the room. The ancient Greeks were the first people to have showers. Their aqueducts and sewage systems made of lead pipes allowed water to be pumped both into and out of large communal shower rooms used by elites and common citizens alike. These rooms have been discovered at the site of the city Pergamum and can also be found represented in pottery of the era. The depictions are very similar to modern locker room showers, and even included bars to hang up clothing. The ancient Romans also followed this convention; their famous bathhouses (Thermae) can be found all around the Mediterranean and as far out as modern-day England. The Romans not only had these showers but also believed in bathing multiple times a week, if not every day. The water and sewage systems developed by the Greeks and Romans broke down and fell out of use after the fall of the Roman Empire.
Modern showers
The first mechanical shower, operated by a hand pump, was patented in England in 1767 by William Feetham, a stove maker from Ludgate Hill in London. His shower contraption used a pump to force the water into a vessel above the user's head and a chain would then be pulled to release the water from the vessel. Although the system dispensed with the servant labour of filling up and pouring out buckets of water, the showers failed to catch on with the rich as a method for piping hot water through the system was not available. The system would also recycle the same dirty water through every cycle.
This early start was greatly improved in the anonymously invented English Regency shower design of circa 1810 (there is some ambiguity among the sources). The original design was over 10 feet tall, and was made of several metal pipes painted to look like bamboo. A basin suspended above the pipes fed water into a nozzle that distributed the water over the user's shoulders. The water on the ground was drained and pumped back through the pipes into the basin, where the cycle would repeat itself. The original prototype was steadily improved upon in the following decades until it began to approximate the shower of today in its mode of operation. Hand-pumped models became fashionable at one point as well as the use of adjustable sprayers for different water flow. The reinvention of reliable indoor plumbing around 1850 allowed free-standing showers to be connected to a running water source, supplying a renewable flow of water. Modern showers were installed in the barracks of the French army in the 1870s as an economic hygiene measure, under the guidance of François Merry Delabost, a French doctor and inventor. As surgeon-general at Bonne Nouvelle prison in Rouen, Delabost had previously replaced individual baths with mandatory communal showers for use by prisoners, arguing that they were more economical and hygienic. First six, then eight shower stalls were installed. The water was heated by a steam engine and in less than five minutes, up to eight prisoners could wash simultaneously with only twenty litres of water. The French system of communal showers was adopted by other armies, the first being that of Prussia in 1879, and by prisons in other jurisdictions. They were also adopted by boarding schools, before being installed in public bathhouses. The first shower in a public bathhouse was in 1887 in Vienna. In France, public bathhouses and showers were established by Charles Cazalet, firstly in Bordeaux in 1893 and then in Paris in 1899.
If you want to read more, go here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shower
- 1 pound elbow macaroni
- 1 stick (1/2 cup) butter
- 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon ground mustard
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 2 cups milk
- 2 1/2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese, divided
- 2 (15-ounce) cans chili with beans
- 1 cup French-fried onions
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Coat a 9- x 13-inch baking dish with cooking spray.
- In a large pot, cook macaroni according to package directions; drain and set aside.
- In the same pot over medium heat, melt butter. Add flour, mustard, salt, and pepper; mix well. Gradually add milk and cook until thickened, stirring constantly. Add 2 cups cheese and continue stirring until melted. Remove from heat and stir in macaroni. Spoon mixture into baking dish.
- Pour chili evenly over macaroni and cheese, and top with remaining 1/2 cup cheese. Sprinkle French-fried onions over top.
- Bake 25 to 30 minutes, or until heated through and golden.
1913 – John Garfield, American actor and singer (d. 1952)
