Anyone know what this brick pit is under a Pennsport backyard?
Have you ever wondered what lies below your home? Well, these Pennsport homeowners took some initiative by digging a hole in their backyard, and they found something pretty interesting.
Their home on the 200 block of Dickinson Street was built around the 1830’s. Upon digging the hole of the outhouse pit in their backyard, they found arched bricks that continue down into what they say “appear(s) to be tunnels.” So, Pennsport experts, any idea of what this brick pit could be?
The homeowners said they could always tell something was there, because the bricks from privy stack for the outhouse always dipped in a lot. But below that outhouse pit, it continues down with arched bricks into this tunnel-like structure. So it appears that whatever lies below was built first and then the owners later knowingly covered it with the outhouse structure.
If you recall, just recently a wood-blocked street was discovered in Pennsport. So let’s hope for some more cool urban archeology finds.
Anyone out there have any ideas of what this could be?
It looks like a Cisturn for trash
“It puts the lotion in the basket…”
That close to the river, they could be a series of tunnels like the ones that run under South St. Speculation is that they were used for smuggling.
The arched bricks support the structure of the privy itself, but there is a shaft that continues below it. The appearance of “tunnels” is just the shaft expansion below the arches. This is how they were constructed. The shafts in that part of the city can be in excess of 30 feet deep.
I live on the west side of Dickinson and also have this in my backyard.
Found this too: http://ask.metafilter.com/91380/What-is-this-hole-in-my-backyard
Water storage.
http://www.phillyh2o.org/backpages/Maps/A_HistoricStreams.jpg
That small offshoot stream between Hollander’s and Dock Creek runs near Dickinson. The archway could be to house the original stream when converted into a sewer line.