Did Paul Revere poop here? Maybe, say Boston privy excavators
Archaeologists have found pottery and a clay pipe in the filled-in outhouse, and they're flush with enthusiasm.
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Must ... resist ... making "No. 2 if by sea jokes." (Somebody give that Associated Press writer a raise!)
An outhouse next to the home of famed Revolutionary War figure Paul Revere is being excavated, and workers from the City of Boston Archaeological Program are posting the results on Instagram.
They are working in the yard of Boston's Pierce-Hichborn House, built in 1711, next door to the Paul Revere House and once owned by a cousin of his. It's now one of the earliest remaining brick structures in the city.
No, the excavated space isn't full of what you think -- no centuries-old human waste has been, uh, flushed out. But diggers have found parts of colorful dishes, a broken clay pipe, 17th-century pottery and more. And if they do find any you-know-what, they could use it to learn about the diet and possible diseases of early colonists.
The mix of discarded items from different time periods tells the team the privy was deliberately filled in with "random yard debris" sometime after 1840. So what we think they're saying is that someone decided to take a dump -- er, make a dump, that's MAKE a dump -- in what had been a privy.
On Friday, the team discovered the privy wasn't as deep as expected, comparing the news to the 1986 moment when Geraldo Rivera opened Al Capone's vault and found it all but empty. That might sound like crappy news, scientists. Urine trouble? Nah, they still seem flush with enthusiasm.
But did the famous rider and silversmith actually use these facilities? Maybe, if only to get away from his many kids.
"Paul Revere might well have come over here for dinner and used the bathroom," Boston city archaeologist Joe Bagley told the AP. "He had 12 kids in his own little house next door. It's easy to imagine they didn't stay cramped up in there all the time."
Hey, there's more than one way to seek relief.
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