Cathartic Art

This distinguished structure is one of ten outhouses-or "privies"—on a poster produced by Bob Averill '72 and available through the Dartmouth Bookstore. The pictures are all of "classic privies" stretching from the forties to 1994—all built or acquired by the Dartmouth Outing Club, according to Averill. The one shown served the recently demolished Beaver Brook shelter in Kinsman Notch (the door has been preserved and resides at Averill's camp in Warren, New Hampshire).

Averill, a podiatrist and Cabin & Trail alum, often can be seen pitching in on trail-maintenance or shelter-building projects when he is not publishing his Chubbers new slerter for DOC alums or other New Hampshire-oriented books and posters. But he reserves a special place in his heart for the outhouse with a view.

The poster comes in several versions featuring three different mottoes, "Box clamantis in deserto," "Sit free or die: New Hampshire," or an Emerson quote: "The Ornament of a house...the friends who frequent it."

On a more philosophical bent, Averill has just published some ideal privy reading: Sit Freeor Die: John Stark, Clear Thinking, DanielWebster, and New Hampshire's Outhouse Heritage, by M.J. Beagle.