Shitty Melbourne #1
Many years ago, but not as many as you think, there was a guy who would pick up your dunny can from a hole out the back of your outside toilet and replace it with a clean one. It was a shitty job but from stuff I've read it wasn't as bad as it sounded. My mum told me the local dunny guy was so good at it when her mum had the squirts he took the dunny away and replaced it before she spilled a drop of liquid brown. When a house was being built the first thing built was usually the toilet for the tradies to use. That was one reason why the shit collector had a job for years after most outdoor toilets were gone.
As you can see in this photo they were huge and had clips to seal it on the side so the guy could prevent spills. If he spilled any the local council insisted he had to clean it up asap. In the book "The Dunny Man" by John Gardner, it described the end result of the rare spill as "You'd have more gravy on you than a Sunday roast"
The dunny man was know to pad his hat with newspaper to protect his head and spread out the weight. That was the origin of the expression used back then "as flat as a shit carriers hat". An urban myth at the time was that the bottom of the dunny rusted out and the dunny man ended up with his head stuck through the bottom of the dunny. In reality the sides would rust out first, so you'd be more likely to have spillage.
Families would sometimes ask for an extra dunny because they had relatives visiting. It was illegal but if you slipped some money to the guy he'd let you "borrow" one for a week or 2. Xmas and NYE was also a busy time of the year, with families visiting and people eating and drinking a lot more than usual. The dunny mans job was harder around then with the cans being fuller than usual. Some households realised this and would leave out a few beers for the dunny man.
In the early days of dunny collections they would take the contents out to farmland, like those in Preston, and just drive the cart across the paddock and tip the contents out into the ploughed field. They didnt replace the cans, they'd just put them back on the cart and swap them over the next trip out. Eventually there was a machine at the council property that would empty and clean the dunnies at the end of each shift. Ive read about a few different locations for where they used to dump the poo, Preston was a popular one, along with Moorabin and Vermont South and near the old Channel 10 studios in Forest Hill. In the very early days sometimes the dunny guy got slack and would dump the poo in Merri Creek or the Yarra.
Some market gardeners, like one next to Clayton station, used to slip a couple of bob to the nightcart guy and grab some of the stuff to use as fertiliser. The quality of the vegies grown in human poo was quite good. There were also stories of random vegies growing in the paddocks of poo because the seeds from what people ate would be dumped with human made fertiliser and grow in the nutrient rich soil.
Often the dunny man would carry a fake poo for when some smart arse would say "got any good ones today?"which they thought was original but wasnt.
Most places had the usual brick or wooden dunny against the back fence, but there was one house that had an old red phone box as a dunny. Which is really weird because those things had glass on all sides so everyone wouldve been able to see you doing your business, especially at night when the light was on.
Families would sometimes ask for an extra dunny because they had relatives visiting. It was illegal but if you slipped some money to the guy he'd let you "borrow" one for a week or 2. Xmas and NYE was also a busy time of the year, with families visiting and people eating and drinking a lot more than usual. The dunny mans job was harder around then with the cans being fuller than usual. Some households realised this and would leave out a few beers for the dunny man.
In the early days of dunny collections they would take the contents out to farmland, like those in Preston, and just drive the cart across the paddock and tip the contents out into the ploughed field. They didnt replace the cans, they'd just put them back on the cart and swap them over the next trip out. Eventually there was a machine at the council property that would empty and clean the dunnies at the end of each shift. Ive read about a few different locations for where they used to dump the poo, Preston was a popular one, along with Moorabin and Vermont South and near the old Channel 10 studios in Forest Hill. In the very early days sometimes the dunny guy got slack and would dump the poo in Merri Creek or the Yarra.
Some market gardeners, like one next to Clayton station, used to slip a couple of bob to the nightcart guy and grab some of the stuff to use as fertiliser. The quality of the vegies grown in human poo was quite good. There were also stories of random vegies growing in the paddocks of poo because the seeds from what people ate would be dumped with human made fertiliser and grow in the nutrient rich soil.
Often the dunny man would carry a fake poo for when some smart arse would say "got any good ones today?"which they thought was original but wasnt.
As houses got plumbing (outdoor and indoor) they stopped using the dunny can. They'd brick up the hole but you can see the evidence of the hole in the back wall of properties in inner suburban laneways. I've lived and partied at inner suburban houses that kept their outdoor toilet after they got one indoors. The outside toilet is great for parties. If it gets messy you can just hose it down the next day. I knew some guys who put a grow lamp in the outside toilet and grew their dope plant in there.
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| In the photo you can see the bricked in dunny hole. |
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