Thomas Crapper
Born	c. September 28, 1836 Waterside, Thorne, Yorkshire, England
Died	January 27, 1910 Anerley, London, England
Occupation	Plumber, Businessman
Spouse	Louise Fargo

Thomas Crapper (baptized September 28, 1836; d. January 27, 1910) was a plumber who founded Thomas Crapper & Co. Ltd. in London. Portrait of Thomas Crapper, populariser of the flush toilet. ... is the 271st day of the year (272nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1836 (MDCCCXXXVI) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian Calendar (or a leap year starting on Wednesday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ... Waterside is the name of more than one place: In the United Kingdom: Waterside, Aberdeen Waterside, Ayr Waterside, Buckinghamshire Waterside, Dunbarton Waterside, Renfrew This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... , Thorne is a market town in South Yorkshire, England, that lies east of the River Don, on the Stainforth Canal, and is located at approximately , at an elevation of around 5 metres above sea level, on the Yorkshire side of the border with Lincolnshire. ... Look up Yorkshire in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... For other uses, see England (disambiguation). ... is the 27th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1910 (MCMX) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Friday [1] of the 13-day-slower Julian calendar). ... Anerley is a suburb of London in the London Borough of Bromley, England. ... London — containing the City of London — is the capital of the United Kingdom and of England and a major world city. With over seven million inhabitants (Londoners) in Greater London area, it is amongst the most densely populated areas in Western Europe. ... Joe Kessler is a plumber! A plumber is a tradesperson who specializes in installing and maintaining systems used for potable (drinking) water, sewage, drainage, venting, heating and air-conditioning, or industrial process plant piping. ... A businessman (sometimes businesswoman, female; or businessperson, gender neutral) is a generic term for a wide range of people engaged in profit-oriented enterprises, generally the management of a company. ... is the 271st day of the year (272nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1836 (MDCCCXXXVI) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian Calendar (or a leap year starting on Wednesday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ... is the 27th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1910 (MCMX) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Friday [1] of the 13-day-slower Julian calendar). ... Joe Kessler is a plumber! A plumber is a tradesperson who specializes in installing and maintaining systems used for potable (drinking) water, sewage, drainage, venting, heating and air-conditioning, or industrial process plant piping. ... This article is about the capital of England and the United Kingdom. ...

Despite urban legend, Crapper did not invent the flush toilet (the myth being helped by the surname). However, Crapper did much to increase its popularity and came up with some related inventions. He was noted for the quality of his products and received several Royal Warrants. The noun "crap" was in use long before he was born, but no longer used in Victorian Britain. An urban legend or urban myth is similar to a modern folklore consisting of stories often thought to be factual by those circulating them. ... Close coupled cistern type flushing toilet. ... For other uses, see Toilet (disambiguation). ... It has been suggested that this article be split into multiple articles accessible from a disambiguation page. ... ...

The manhole covers with Crapper's company's name on them in Westminster Abbey are now a minor tourist attraction. For other uses, see Manhole (disambiguation). ... The Collegiate Church of St Peter, Westminster, which is almost always referred to by its original name of Westminster Abbey, is a mainly Gothic church, on the scale of a cathedral (and indeed often mistaken for one), in Westminster, London, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. ... Tourist redirects here. ...

Headline text

Jonh Crapper and his company

The story of Thomas Crapper and his achievements has been somewhat confused by Wallace Reyburn's 1969 book Flushed With Pride: The Story of Thomas Crapper (ISBN 1-85702-860-0), a heavily fictionalised satirical biography in the style of scholarship [1]. Adam Hart-Davis' later writings on Crapper help set the record straight. 1867 edition of Punch, a ground-breaking British magazine of popular humour, including a good deal of satire of the contemporary social and political scene. ... Dr. Adam John Hart-Davis (born July 4, 1943) is a British author, photographer, and broadcaster, well-known in the UK for presenting the television series Local Heroes and What the Romans Did for Us, the latter spawning several spin-off series involving the Victorians, the Tudors, and the Stuarts. ...

Crapper was born in Waterside, Yorkshire (near Thorne), in September 1836 (the exact date is unknown). His father Charles was a steamboat captain. At the age of 14, Crapper was apprenticed to a master plumber in Chelsea, London. After his apprenticeship and three years as a journeyman plumber, in 1861 he founded his own company at Robert Street, Chelsea. In 1866 he moved the business to nearby Marlborough Road (now part of Draycott Avenue). Waterside is the name of more than one place: In the United Kingdom: Waterside, Aberdeen Waterside, Ayr Waterside, Buckinghamshire Waterside, Dunbarton Waterside, Renfrew This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... Look up Yorkshire in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... , Thorne is a market town in South Yorkshire, England, that lies east of the River Don, on the Stainforth Canal, and is located at approximately , at an elevation of around 5 metres above sea level, on the Yorkshire side of the border with Lincolnshire. ... Year 1836 (MDCCCXXXVI) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian Calendar (or a leap year starting on Wednesday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ... Statue of Thomas More on Cheyne Walk. ... Year 1861 (MDCCCLXI) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Sunday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ...

Thomas Crapper did not invent the flush toilet — credit for that is usually given to Sir John Harington in 1596, with Alexander Cummings' 1775 toilet regarded as the first of the modern line and George Jennings installing the first public toilets at The Great Exhibition in 1851 — but he did help increase its popularity. He was a shrewd businessman, salesman and self-publicist. In a time when bathroom fixtures were barely spoken of, he heavily promoted sanitary plumbing and pioneered the concept of the bathroom fittings showroom. Sir John Harington (August 4, 1561 – November 20, 1612) was the inventor of the first modern Flush toilet. ... Events February 5 - 26 catholics crucified in Nagasaki, Japan. ... Alexander Cumming invented the flush toilet under English patent number 814 in 1775. ... Year 1775 (MDCCLXXV) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Thursday of the 11-day slower Julian calendar). ... George Jennings (10 November 1810–17 April 1882) was an English sanitary engineer and plumber who invented the first public toilets. ... The Great Exhibition in Hyde Park 1851. ... E. Coli bacteria under magnification Sanitation is the hygienic disposal or recycling of waste, as well as the policy and practice of protecting health through hygienic measures. ...

In the 1880s, Prince Edward (later Edward VII) purchased his country seat of Sandringham House in Norfolk and asked Thomas Crapper & Co. to supply the plumbing, including thirty lavatories with cedarwood seats and enclosures, thus giving Crapper his first Royal Warrant. The firm received further warrants from Edward as King and from George V both as Prince of Wales and as King. Contrary to popular belief, however, Crapper never received a knighthood and was never styled Sir Thomas Crapper. // Development and commercial production of electric lighting Development and commercial production of gasoline-powered automobile by Karl Benz, Gottlieb Daimler and Maybach First commercial production and sales of phonographs and phonograph recordings. ... Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, of the British Dominions beyond the Seas, and Emperor of India from 22 January 1901 until his death on 6 May 1910. ... Norfolk (IPA: //) is a low-lying county in East Anglia in the east of southern England. ... It has been suggested that this article be split into multiple articles accessible from a disambiguation page. ... George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was the first British monarch belonging to the House of Windsor, which he created from the British branch of the German House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. ... This article is about the title Prince of Wales. ... The silver Anglia knight, commissioned as a trophy in 1850, intended to represent the Black Prince. ...

In 1904 Crapper retired, passing the firm to his nephew George and his business partner Robert Marr Wharam. Crapper lived at 12 Thornsett Road, Anerley for the last thirteen years of his life and died on January 27, 1910. He was buried in the nearby Elmers End Cemetery. 1904 (MCMIV) was a leap year starting on a Friday (see link for calendar). ... Anerley is a suburb of London in the London Borough of Bromley, England. ... is the 27th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1910 (MCMX) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Friday [1] of the 13-day-slower Julian calendar). ... Elmers End is a place in the London Borough of Bromley. ...

In 1966, the company was sold by then-owner Robert G. Wharam (son of Robert Marr Wharam) on his retirement, to their rivals John Bolding & Sons. Bolding then went into liquidation in 1969. The company fell out of use until it was acquired by Simon Kirby, a historian and collector of antique bathroom fittings, who relaunched the company in Stratford-upon-Avon, producing authentic reproductions of Crapper's original Victorian bathroom fitting. Year 1966 (MCMLXVI) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display full calendar) of the 1966 Gregorian calendar. ... Also: 1969 (Stargate SG-1) episode. ... Stratford-upon-Avon Stratford-upon-Avon is a town in Warwickshire, England. ...

Crapper and the syphonic flush toilet

Crapper's Valveless Waste Preventer

Crapper held nine patents, three of them for water closet improvements such as the floating ballcock, but none were for the flush toilet itself. Thomas Crapper's advertisements implied the syphonic flush was his invention — one having the text "Crapper's Valveless Water Waste Preventer (Patent #4,990) One moveable part only" — but patent 4990 (for a minor improvement to the water waste preventer) was not his, but that of Albert Giblin in 1898. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (1402x1721, 225 KB)Crappers Valveless Waste Preventer, patented by Thomas Crapper. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (1402x1721, 225 KB)Crappers Valveless Waste Preventer, patented by Thomas Crapper. ... A ballcock is a mechanism for filling water tanks, such as those found in flush toilets, while avoiding overflow. ... Year 1898 (MDCCCXCVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Monday of the 12-day-slower Julian calendar). ...

His nephew, George Crapper, did improve the siphon mechanism by which the water flow is started. A patent for this development was awarded in 1897. Not to be confused with Psiphon. ... 1897 (MDCCCXCVII) was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ...

The words "crap" and "crapper"

Main article: Crap

The word "crap" is old in the English language, one of a group of nouns applied to discarded cast offs, like "residue from renderings" (1490s) or in Shropshire, "dregs of beer or ale", meanings probably extended from Middle English crappe "chaff, or grain that has been trodden underfoot in a barn" (c. 1440), deriving ultimately from Late Latin crappa, "chaff." ... ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... Middle English is the name given by historical linguistics to the diverse forms of the English language spoken between the Norman invasion of 1066 and the mid-to-late 15th century, when the Chancery Standard, a form of London-based English, began to become widespread, a process aided by the... Vulgar Latin (in Latin, sermo vulgaris) is a blanket term covering the vernacular dialects of the Latin language spoken mostly in the western provinces of the Roman Empire until those dialects, diverging still further, evolved into the early Romance languages — a distinction usually assigned to about the ninth century. ...

The word had fallen out of use in Britain by the 1600s, but remained prevalent in the North American colonies which would eventually become the United States. The meaning "to defecate" has been recorded in the US since 1846 (according to Oxford and Merriam-Webster), but the word did not hold this meaning in Victorian England. The connection to Thomas Crapper is conjectured by Hart-Davis to be an unfortunate coincidence of his surname. Many inventions and institutions are created, including Hans Lippershey with the telescope (1608, used by Galileo the next year), the newspaper Avisa Relation oder Zeitung in Augsburg, and Cornelius Drebbel with the thermostat (1609). ... 1846 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... The Oxford English Dictionary print set The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is a dictionary published by the Oxford University Press (OUP), and is the most successful dictionary of the English language, (not to be confused with the one-volume Oxford Dictionary of English, formerly New Oxford Dictionary of English, of... Merriam-Webster, originally known as the G. & C. Merriam Company of Springfield, Massachusetts, is a United States company that publishes reference books, especially dictionaries that are descendants of Noah Websters An American Dictionary of the English Language (1828). ...

In Welsh, "crap" is the word for "inkling," but the version of "crap" being a vulgar term for feces is still used.

The occupational name "Crapper" is a variant spelling of "Cropper". In the US, the word "crapper" is a dysphemism for "toilet," although it is not clear if this has anything to do with Thomas Crapper. The term first appeared in print in the 1930s. It has been suggested that US soldiers stationed in England during World War I (some of whom had little experience with indoor plumbing) saw many toilets printed with "T. Crapper" in the glaze and brought the word home as a synonym for "toilet" — a sort of back-formation from "crap." In language, both dysphemism (from the Greek “dys” δυς = non and “pheme” φήμη = speech) and cacophemism (in Greek “cacos” κακός = bad) refer to the usage of an intentionally harsh word or expression instead of a polite one; they are rough opposites of euphemism. ... Year 1930 (MCMXXX) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display 1930 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... “The Great War ” redirects here. ... In etymology, the process of back-formation is the creation of a neologism by reinterpreting an earlier word as a compound and removing the spuriously supposed affixes. ...

Yet another purported explanation is that Crapper's flush toilet advertising was so widespread that "crapper" became a synonym for "toilet" and people simply assumed that he was the inventor.

References

• Thomas Crapper: Myth & Reality (Plumbing & Mechanical, June 1993)
• Hart-Davis, Adam (1997) Thunder, flush and Thomas Crapper : an encycloopedia [sic], London : Michael O'Mara, ISBN 1-85479-245-8 — addresses many of the myths surrounding Thomas Crapper and his inventions.
• Thomas Crapper — Fact & Fiction (Adam Hart-Davis)
• Flushed With Pride — The Story of Thomas Crapper (Outhouses of America Tour) — with a letter from Simon Kirby of Thomas Crapper & Co. Ltd.
• Crap (Online Etymology Dictionary)
• Thomas Crapper (Snopes Urban Legends Reference Pages)

Dr. Adam John Hart-Davis (born July 4, 1943) is a British author, photographer, and broadcaster, well-known in the UK for presenting the television series Local Heroes and What the Romans Did for Us, the latter spawning several spin-off series involving the Victorians, the Tudors, and the Stuarts. ... An etymological dictionary discusses the etymology of the words listed. ...

External links

• Thomas Crapper & Co. Ltd. — the current company of that name