Imagine having to use an outhouse on a regular bases! Well, that is exactly what the early settlers in our county had to do. Their homes lacked all of the modern conveniences that we take for granted. Indoor plumbing and electricity were unheard of, and simple tasks like doing the dishes or running bath water involved many steps.
Consider all that needed to be done to wash dishes. Since there was no running water, it was necessary to either pump it up from underground or fetch it from the lake. Next, you had to heat the water on the stove, the wood burning stove. This meant that you needed to have a supply of chopped wood on hand at all times. Then there is the need for soap. Most frequently that was homemade soap made using lye as its base which made it very caustic and hard on the hands. To recap: fetch water, chop wood, heat water, and make soap. Now you could wash the dishes. Quite different from turning on the tap, rinsing dishes and putting them in the dishwasher!
If you would like to see some of the other ways that our daily lives are so very different from our pioneering forefathers, come to Clermont’s Historic Village located at 490 West Ave, not far from the downtown historic shopping district. The Historic Village is a unique partnership between the City of Clermont and the South Lake County Historical Society and is a collection of historic buildings and replicas of historic buildings dedicated to giving people the opportunity to see what life was like in Lake County over 100 years ago. The Village is open every Friday from 1:00 pm to 3:00 pm and every Saturday & Sunday from 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm. Admission to the Village is free, however, a donation of $2.00 per adult is requested. If you would like to tour the Village with a group at a time when the Village is not regularly scheduled to be open, call and leave a message for the Village Manager, Roxanne Brown, at 352-593-8496 and she will get with you to make arrangements.
If you are interested in history in general or the history of Lake County in particular, contact the South Lake County Historical Society by going to our website, ClermontVillage.org; by calling Roxanne Brown, Village Manager, at 352-593-8496; or by attending membership meetings which are held on the second Monday of the month at 7:00 pm in the Train Depot in the Historic Village.
