A BRIEF HISTORY OF BATHROOM FREAKOUTS
Second century B.C.: In Rome’s public latrines, up to 80 men and women sit side by side on marble slabs, socializing—and wiping with a communal sponge on a stick.
1739: A Parisian restaurant rolls out some of the first sex-segregated public toilets.
1878: Rose Adams of the Ladies’ Sanitary Association urges London church authorities to create public restrooms for women, which would “help a class who naturally find it difficult to ask for public consideration in this matter, while experiencing grievous suffering.”
1887: To protect women
