This was the ultimate gross out book, but ever more so because I have OCD which mainly manifests itself in numerous showers and clean clothes daily.

I was so grossed out reading how dirty, smelly and filthy people were in the 1700s. Bad breath from not brushing their teeth and having their teeth fall out and become rotten, no underwear, very very infrequent baths, outer garments never washed, and chamberpots kept under the bed at nite had their contents dumped right out of the window !!!! Poop everywhere from people, animals - all over the roads. No refrigeration meant eating parasite filled meats and other foods. Smallpox, lice, flies and bedbugs everywhere.

Ugh !!!!!!!!!! ( )

A great way to make the American Revolution come alive---teach them about smallpox, head lice and bedbugs. Great illustrations with lots of text boxes make this painless history to read. ( )

The author, an archaeologist, really knows how to captivate her audience. She seems well aware of the notion that to ten year olds, gross is the new black. This book made my skin crawl. It also made my children sing its praises. It was a little freaky, and the part about bedbugs made me want to saran-wrap my bed, but it was informative and went at a fast paced "bathroom reader" style of information delivery. The unsavory historical facts really stick with the reader. The book was filled with a mish-mash of historical photos, modern day photos and illustrations of bugs, smears and splats. I do not recommend this for the squeamish, but I could absolutely see a crowd of 4th graders circled around it to discuss the finer points of leeches, tapeworms and chamber pots.

From the chapter, "The Awful Smells,"

"Your nose runs as you approach the people in a room. When a woman smiles at you, you see she's missing several teeth. Her breath is horrid. You can't escape it. Almost everyone in the room has bad breath from rotting teeth. Plus, both men and women smoke white clay pipes. So their breath (and clothes and hair) also smells of strong tobacco. People aren't completely unaware of the smells. They know they have bad breath. Women try to hide it by chewing cinnamon, cloves, orange peel, and honey melted in ashes. Men don't bother. Women mostly wave fans to keep the smell away and to cover their own black smiles."

As a traveler from the future, you'll visit a cobbler's shop (also full of stomach-churning smells), a tavern complete with bedbugs and rotting food, a barbershop (where people go to have their rotting teeth ripped from their jaws), and the homes and wardrobes of wealthy, poor and working class Americans.

Colorful inset boxes offer facts about smallpox, bathing habits, and other public health issues of the time. Period illustrations, photographed realia, and other buggy and bloody spot illustrations, add interest and break up the small text.

An introduction, "The Yucky Past," and four chapters, "The Awful Smells," "The Creepy-Crawly Bugs," "The Nasty Germs," and "The Uncomfortable Fashions," are followed by an Author's Note, Glossary, Source Notes, Selected Bibliography, Further Reading, Places to Visit and Index.

The author's note is well worth reading, and finishes with,

"I don't think we should feel superior to the people of the past. They knew of nothing better than the conditions in which they lived. Despite all the hardships they faced, they worked hard, raised their children, and made the best of what they had."

A well-done look at our nation's earliest days.

More at http://shelf-employed.blogspot.com/2013/10/ick-yuck-eew-our-gross-american-histo... ( )