1775

Alexander Cumming Patents the Flush Toilet

Alexander Cumming, a Scottish watchmaker, and inventor became the first Englishman to patent design of the flush toilet. The design still survives today and was the forerunner of the modern toilet.

1778

Joseph Bramah’s Toilet is Patented

Joseph Bramah improvised Cumming’s invention using hinged valves. His creation may look slightly familiar to the modern eye: It is the prototype for toilets aboard ships, boats, and airplanes.

1829

Tremont Hotel Becomes the First to Install Indoor Plumbing

The Tremont Hotel in Boston commissioned Isaiah Rogers, an American architect, to build the interiors. The Tremont was the first hotel to have indoor plumbing and running water for guests. However, it was not an in-room convenience. Eight water closets (toilets) were provided on the ground floor while bathrooms were located in the basement area.

1833 

Plumbing First Installed in the White House

Water was first piped into the White House in 1833 during Andrew Jackson’s presidency when the first floor saw running water installed. Sometime within the next year, a "bathing room" was established in the East Wing.

The upper floors of the President’s residence were not plumbed until two decades later. President Franklin Pierce made significant improvements to the plumbing and toilet facilities, including the installation of a bathroom on the second floor with the first permanent bathing facilities. The new bathroom was luxurious: It had both hot and cold water piped in. Before 1853 bathing on the second floor required portable bathtubs, and kettles of hot water had to be hauled up from the existing East Wing bathing room.

1851

First Public Toilets

The first public toilets were installed at the Crystal Palace, a cast-iron and plate-glass structure originally built in Hyde Park, London, to house the Great Exhibition of 1851. Called Retiring Rooms, the toilets were the work of sanitary engineer George Jennings. During the exhibition, 827,280 visitors each paid one penny to use them. It is often suggested that the euphemism "spending a penny" originated at the Exhibition but the phrase is more likely to date from the 1890s when public lavatories, fitted with penny coin-operated locks, were first established by British local authorities.

1857

Joseph Gayetty Invents Toilet Paper for Flush Toilets

Gayetty's Medicated Paper, the first commercially available toilet paper, was sold in packages of flat sheets. In a bold marketing move, the sheets featured a watermark of the inventor's name on each one.

Earliest advertisements stressed its medicinal value, claiming the sheets prevented hemorrhoids (referred to as “piles” in the day). The product carried the taglines "The greatest necessity of the age! Gayetty's medicated paper for the water-closet."

To combat the prevalent use of free paper (newspapers and the like), the advertisements warned of the dangers of using writing paper and printed materials (presumably including the Sears and Roebuck catalog) because of the chemicals they contained. Considering the bleaching agents used to whiten paper and the heavy metals used in inks at the time, this was probably sound advice.

Employing these free sources had other drawbacks versus true toilet paper. While the average outhouse had no problem accommodating use of the entire Sunday edition of the Chicago Tribune, not so flush toilets. This is particularly true of the imperfect technologies employed by early models.

1870

Thomas Twyford Invents the Ceramic Flush Toilet

A pottery manufacturer in England, Thomas Twyford created the single piece, ceramic flush toilet. Early advertisements also offer a range of other ceramic bathroom fixtures including sinks and urnals. Notice the use of Crapper’s “U” trap in this later advertisement.

In the same year, water heaters were first seen in private homes. These utilized the same gas as gas lights. However, they were quite dangerous, often scalding users or exploding due to a build up of steam when valves did not work properly.

1871

Seth Wheeler Creates Perforated, Rolled Toilet Paper

Seth Wheeler of Albany, NY was the first to have the idea of perforating a roll of paper so that it could be conveniently torn off in sheets. He subsequently patented a number of improvements including the cardboard tube at the center of the roll as well as the holder for his new creation, creating all the elements of modern toilet paper still in use.

Despite what some commentators contend, Wheeler’s patents do not solve one controversy that has long plagued toilet paper users, namely: “Over” hangers versus “Under” hangers. Wheeler’s patents show both approaches.

1880

Thomas Crapper Invents the “U” Bend Trap and Other Improvements

Although he did not “invent” the toilet, Thomas Crapper improved and popularized the invention, making it practical and simpler to use.

The “U” shaped trap was revolutionary, permitting sewer gases to be controlled without the need for complicated valves or the “S“ shaped trap approach which tended to dry out and clog. Crapper’s invention of the floating ballcock to stop water flow into the tank was simple and effective. Crapper also championed siphonic action flushing (his nephew holds the 1897 patent on the siphon mechanism). All are still commonly used today.

The company owned the world's first bath, toilet and sink showroom in King's Road, London. Crapper was noted for the quality of his products and received several royal warrants. His tanks proudly proclaimed that each was a “Valveless Waste Preventer.”

American GIs brought the term “crapper” for a toilet home with them after WWII. However, the word “crap” as a synonym for waste is older. Sources say the most likely etymological origin is a combination of two older words: the Dutch krappen (to pluck off, cut off, or separate) and the Old French crappe (siftings, waste or rejected matter, from the medieval Latin crappa). By the time it was incorporated into English, the term was used to refer to chaff but also weeds and other rubbish. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the first application to bodily waste appeared in 1846 in a reference to a crapping ken, or a privy, where ken means a house.

1883

John Kohler Invents the Cast Iron Bathtub

Based on an iron livestock watering tough, John Kohler of Sheboygan, Wisconsin, added four decorative feet to the bottom and covered the entirety in an enamel finish to create a bathtub. Although at the time his company was a manufacturer of plows and other farm implements, by 1887 more than two-thirds of the company's business was in plumbing products and enamelware.

The company not only continues to be a major supplier of plumbing fixtures, it is still located in the Sheboygan area.

1890

Scott Paper Company Becomes the First to Successfully Market Toilet Paper on Rolls

Founded in 1879 in Philadelphia by brothers E. Irvin and Clarence Scott, Scott Paper Company is credited with being the first to market toilet paper sold on a roll.

Succeeding where Gayetty’s paper failed, the Scott brothers built the market by initially selling toilet paper to hotels (focusing on the image of high quality and luxury) and drugstores (focusing on an image of health) instead of directly to consumers. This helped counter Victorian sensitivities which greatly inhibited the sale of toilet paper. Mentioning bathroom functions was taboo. People were embarrassed to ask for and buy the product.

Eventually Scott began to sell directly to consumers using the “Waldorf” brand name to build on its success in hotels as well as under the “Sani-Tissue” name. By 1921, Waldorf brand represented 64% of Scott’s total sales and the company became the leading toilet paper company in the world.

Scott brand toilet paper is still produced by Kimberly-Clark Corporation.

1928

Hoberg Paper Company Introduces Charmin Brand Toilet Paper

A new approach to marketing toilet paper began when Hoberg Paper Company, Green Bay, Wisconsin, introduced a brand called Charmin. The product featured a feminine logo that depicted a beautiful woman in profile. The toilet paper was described as "charming" by an employee and from there the name “Charmin” was born. The ad campaign was a major step away from the medicinal approach or the idea that toilet paper was a luxury.

Charmin was enormously successful. Along with the fact that the company began marketing economy-size packs of four rolls in 1932, the tactic helped the brand survive the Great Depression.

1937

Alfred Moen Invents the Single Handle Tap

Alfred Moen, Seattle, Washington, invented the first single handle mixer tap. He was inspired to create this mixer after scalding his hands with hot water from a two-handle faucet.

1964

Toilet Paper Becomes a part of Pop Culture

In the 1950, Hoberg Paper changed its name to the Charmin Paper Company and in 1953 the “Charmin lady” on the packaging gave way to the “Charmin baby” to symbolize the ultimate in softness.

In 1964, Charmin followed with one of the most famous ad campaigns of the 20th century by introducing the character of Mr. Whipple (aka "George the Grocer"). Developed by the ad agency of Benton and Bowles (the character is named after the company’s president), Mr. Whipple admonished shoppers by saying “Please don’t squeeze the Charmin!” to highlight the paper’s "squeezable softness.” Mr. Whipple, played by actor Dick Wilson, appeared for more than 20 years in Charmin television, radio, and print advertising. This television work spanned 500 commercials.

In 1978, Mr. Whipple was purportedly named in a poll as the third-best-known American, trailing only former President Nixon and Billy Graham.

1971

Hawaii Toilet Paper Shortage is All Too Real

In July 1971, dock strikes by the International Longshore and Warehouse Union across the West coast immobilized the shipping that provided about 90 percent of the goods consumed in Hawaii. This led to shortages on many products including toilet paper which symbolized the shortages in many people’s minds.

By October, the Nixon administration ordered a "cooling off period" citing national “health and safety” concerns. The longshoremen were forced back to work for 80 days - just in time for Christmas - but they struck again in January 1972. An agreement was finally reached in February, largely in the strikers’ favor, ending the longest strike in the union’s history. Soon toilet paper and other critical commodities began reappearing on the shelves at Hawaiian stores.

1973

Johnny Carson Sparks a Not-So-Real Shortage

In 1973, the American public was sensitive to shortages. An embargo created shortages of oil, and thereby other products like gasoline and many things shipped by truck. Into this environment, Representative Harold Froelich, who represented the Paper Valley and the rest of northeastern Wisconsin, issued a press release on December 11, on a topic of concern to his constituents: Toilet Paper.

After Froelich had noted that the government’s National Buying Center had fallen far short of securing bids to provide toilet paper for its troops and bureaucrats, he issued another, more serious press release:

“The U.S. may face a serious shortage of toilet paper within a few months...we hope we don’t have to ration toilet tissue...a toilet paper shortage is no laughing matter. It is a problem that will potentially touch every American.”

The media ran with the story often sensationalizing it by omitting words like “may” and “potentially.”

The ground had been set for a consumer panic. When Johnny Carson included a couple of jokes about toilet paper in his television show monologue, Carson’s 20 million viewers took him seriously. A run on toilet paper began the next day. Consumers bought all they could. Stores ordered massive amounts. Some retail outlets set limits on the number of rolls a shopper could buy. Prices doubled. Toilet paper became a rare commodity. Eventually, the American public realized that there had never been a shortage at all, just a baseless frenzy.

In the aftermath, Johnny Carson, who was rather unfairly singled out for blame, issued a serious apology on his show: “I don’t want to be remembered as the man who created a false toilet paper scare. I just picked up the item from the paper and enlarged it somewhat...there is no shortage.”