When holiday makers came to Mount Evelyn in the 1920s and 1930s to build shacks on their small bush blocks, most had been city dwellers with access to water and sewerage systems. The need to move back in time and to construct family one-holer, waterless, dunnies caused some anxiety, which led to an often grotesque folk humour.

Wally and Ted Newton went through the streets of Mount Evelyn with a bell and a home-made megaphone inviting people to attend the Grand Opening of their 'One Holer'. Ted dressed as a parson to bless the new dunny, wearing his shirt back to front and his hair plastered down very flat. So ashamed to see a crowd assemble for this significant event, the two sisters, Nancy and Gwen, hid.

If building your own dunny created anxiety and humour, employing someone to remove your body leavings was even more embarrassing, and often led to poor treatment of the man who took the job others shunned – emptying the dunny cans.

The nightman took on a marginal identity in the small community, and his work was in the dark of night, unobserved. People were disturbed when he crossed over into 'normal' society and they met him and his family in the day. He too used humour to deal with his work. Once the nightman's cart overturned when it hit the railway tracks on York Road. The policeman came over and asked him what he was doing. He sharply answered: 'Stocktaking, what do you reckon!'

Ted Newton blessing the new dunny at Mount Evelyn. Photo courtesy Janice Newton.