Stink is the thread that pulls the exhibition together

Splish, splash I was takin a bath

Long about a Saturday night

Bobby Darin

Judging by the runaway success of Rose George's recently published book, The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters, which I haven't read yet and am still trying to obtain a copy of, fascination with bodily functions seemingly knows no bounds.

My interest in the subject was additionally piqued by a recent e-mail from the Johns Hopkins University that announced the opening of "Next to Godliness in Early Maryland," a student-curated exhibition at Homewood.

The exhibition, which opened in late January, explores the myths, manners and material goods of personal hygiene and cleanliness in 19th-century Maryland.

Off I went to Homewood, the summer home of Charles Carroll Jr., built in 1801. He moved his family there in the summer to escape the searing heat and yellow fever epidemics that routinely swept through the city.

Taking a look at the exhibition, one is immediately struck with the notion that our ancestors were just as obsessed with such matters as we are today.

The research and artifacts in the exhibit were the work of about a dozen Hopkins undergraduates enrolled during the fall semester in Catherine Rogers Arthur's Introduction to Material Culture class.

"My students learned that people are more the same over time than different," said Arthur.

They used the Carroll family as the backdrop for their research, which encompassed reading period newspapers, health manuals and other contemporary accounts.

Some of the objects on display were of a Carroll family provenance, while others were borrowed from local and regional museums.

Arthur, who has been Homewood Museum curator since 1997, said her students met weekly to discuss bathroom habits, bathing, shaving, dental care, cosmetics, feminine hygiene and other elements such as laundering and housekeeping that helped reduce or control household or bodily odors.

"Stink is the whole thread that pulls this exhibition together," Arthur said, with a laugh, as she led a visitor to a room in the house where a gorgeous dark polished Hepplewhite nightstand stood against a wall.

Inside nestled an English white stoneware chamber pot, where it was placed after being used until a servant emptied its contents the next morning, scrubbed, and then placed it in the sun for drying.