PUBLIC
CONVENIENCES IN BELFAST, etc.
from 1970s
photos mostly by others
As
originally conceived for Gentlemen (which was the associated sign)
a genteel man's convenience (with an attendant)
looked like this:
The
cost for using a closet was 1d (a penny fed through a slot in the
door)
right up to the 1960s
Typical Victorian/Edwardian
rinal.
Less grand ones looked like this:
By
the 1970s, many looked uninvitingly like this:
Though
something exciting (to some) might occur therein
despite (or even because) of the sordidness.
If the repeatedly covered-over hole was not blocked or obscured by
toilet-paper,
messages, as
well as body-parts, were often passed through.
The
above photo was taken in the small cottage behind the main
Belfast Public Library
opposite the offices of the Belfast Telegraph in 1983.
Apart from Library Street and the Great Northern Railway Station
opposite the famous Crown bar (now National Trust property)
there were subterranean 'cottages',
modelled on the famous ones outside the National Portrait Gallery
in London
and The Bank of Ireland in Dublin.
Donegall
Square North before the second world war...
...and
in my cruising days.
Shaftesbury
Square quite recently.
Victoria
Square, 1950.
Unfortunately, I can find no photo of the fine Edwardian convenience
with handsome skylights and stained glass
in Custom House Square, whose interior has been completely modernised.
link:
historic
cruising venues in Belfast >
A
tasse outside the Gare d'Orsay, in 1950.
Sweet
grafitti, Solignac, Limousin 1981.
At
least it has a seat with a lid.
.
Modern urinals
have been made fairly cruise-proof!
Photographs
of cottages, inside or out, anywhere, are very rare on the
world wide web,
but here is a pick-up-resistant one-person street-urinal in Amsterdam.
beyond
pornography
BACK
Cruising has never been illegal in France, unless it outraged Public
Decency, whih was pretty unlikely.
Outside Belfast, a favourite and picturesque cruising area
was
The
Giant's Ring.
Though I lived close by it for 5 years
I had no idea that it offered possibilities for meeting a Pal.
Another missed opportunity due to ignorance.
