No. 139 The Trusty Servant
Tubs, Swills and Bidets
Suzanne Foster, the College Archivist, writes:
Our request in November for help in identifying the pupil on the river in a tub had an excellent response.
The photograph was taken by David Price( E, 77-82) and shows Robert Sergeant( E, 77-82) on the river. David says that the photograph was taken at about 6am in their last week at Win Coll in June 1982. Thank you to David for providing all the information we needed.
The picture that started it
Thanks too to all the OWs who took time to write in an describe their experiences on river and their memories of tubs and tub-rooms. Most recalled deliberately blocking the drains to flood the tub room and allow the tubs to float, allowing‘ a sort of aquatic dodgems’ to be played. One Collegeman called this a‘ naumachia’ and recalled‘ One night we got word that housemaster Martin Scott was coming on his rounds while we were in the middle of a naumachia. In our haste we only removed one of the drain plugs. As a result, water poured out of the bidet enclosure, but could not proceed further down the drain. Instead, a wall of water headed off down the stairs, just in time to coincide with Martin making his way up. He was extraordinarily decent about it, I have to say.’
Many remembered the sliminess and dirtiness of the tubs which were often only thoroughly cleaned in the holidays. One OW commented‘ you could write your name in the scum and still find it at the end of term’.
The shape and size of tubs( or swills as they were known in Phil’ s) varied from house to house, and photographs came in of some re-purposed into planters.
Jane Massen telephoned in with her memories. She says that the tubs were
The hip bath-shaped tubs in Chawker’ s have been re-purposed
also used as toboggans and remembers the increasing difficulty of acquiring new ones until she found a builders’ merchant in the Midlands that sold metal tubs in which to mix cement. The other alternative were rubber tubs but Jane says that these were unpopular – too heavy when filled and they sank when used on the river. Jane also told me about being the de-facto handyman and boilerman in Trant’ s …… but that’ s another story!
My thanks to everyone for their assistance.
Tub Room in Phil’ s c1966, the inside of College Bidet( near 10 th Chamber)
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