When looking for facts to support my recent post Why Europe Sucks €. 1 Pay Toilets, I stumbled on the little known history of a band of Great American Patriots on Wikipedia.* They were called The Committee To End Pay Toilets In America (CEPTIA), and their mission was to rid America of the European phenomena of pay toilets.
A campaign by the Committee to End Pay Toilets In America (CEPTIA) resulted in laws prohibiting pay toilets in cities and states. In 1973, Chicago became the first American city to enact a ban, at a time when, according to the Wall Street Journal, there were at least 50,000 units in America[1], mostly made by the Nik-O-Lok Company [2]. CEPTIA was successful over the next few years in obtaining bans in New York, New Jersey, Minnesota, California, Florida and Ohio[3]. Lobbying was successful in other states as well, and by decade’s end, pay toilets were almost unknown in America. By then, those remaining toilet owners who had pay toilets found they were losing more money than they made, due to stolen or vandalized pay boxes, as well as lost business.
We are all indebted to this fearless band of Great American Patriots.
Liberty or Death!
*In the true American fashion, I did not start researching my topic until after I had already posted my thoughts.
I find it utterly depressing that no sociologist has yet studied this extremely successful and utterly patriotic movement. CEPITA!
So I was just talking to my mom, and apparently while in college she was a card-carrying member of SEPTIC–Society to End Pay Toilets In Chicago.
You know that free toilets is the communist way of living?
Never forget that sharing is caring…;)