FEELING FLUSH
King of the Commode seeking an heir to his thrones
ALAMO HEIGHTS, TEXAS FOR SALE: One tiny kingdom, with many thrones. But it doesn’t come with a hereditary title. That belongs to Barney Smith — the undisputed “King o’ the Commode.”
“There’s a lot o’ me in there,” he says, sitting in ’ront o’ the corrugated metal garage he’s dubbed his Toilet Seat Art Museum.
There’s a lot o’, well, everything in there.
Smith has one seat decorated with a chunk o’ the Berlin Wall and another with a piece o’ insulation ’rom the doomed Space Shuttle Challenger. There are lids ’estooned with tint arrowheads, Civil War Minié balls, Amtrak train keys, Pez dispensers — even $1 million in shredded greenbacks ’rom the Federal Reserve Bank in San Antonio.
The sign out ’ront says Smith’s art is “NOT FOR SALE.” But a’ter 6ve decades and countless orers, the king says everything must go.
“At 96, I come out here with a cane. I’ve gotta hold onto everything to walk,” says Smith, who is bent with arthritis. “I’m beginning to ’eel like that I’d rather be in an air-conditioned home in a chair, looking at a good program.” Still, walking away will be hard. “This is my li’e’s history here,” he says.
It started more than 50 years ago, as a way to display hunting trophies.
Smith says his ’ather would spend hours cutting out, sanding and varnishing wooden shields to mount his antlers. The son 6gured a toilet seat lid would do just 6ne.
“Well, I’m a master plumber, retired,” he says. “I thought I ought to stick with my trade.”
Smith had promised his wi’e, Louise, that he’d stop at 500. That was 850 toilet seats ago.
“I’ I would have just read my Bible as many hours as I spent on my toilet seats, I’d be a better man,” he says with a twinkle in his eye.
Smith toiled in obscurity until an artist who’d come by caught a glimpse o’ his garage and told a local TV station.
The piece aired on a Friday. The ’ollowing Monday, two other stations came calling. Then came the tourists. “And so I just slung the door open,” he says.
Smith oscially opened it as a museum in 1992. Since then, visitors ’rom every state and 83 ’oreign countries have made their way to this little municipality.
Smith uses his walking stick to point out his ’avourites. Like a lavatory seat ’rom the airplane that carried billionaire Aristotle Onassis’s body home to Greece. Or the piece o’ one o’ Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s “thrones.”
Smith is currently working on a seat commemorating the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea. He suspects that will be his last.
In 2014, he lost Louise, his wi’e o’ 74 years. A ’ew months ago, he ’ell and broke two ribs.
Daughter Julia Murders says they’ve had orers. A man ’rom India, who wanted to buy the collection ’or his daughter, orered US$20,000 — about $15 per seat.
But Smith isn’t looking to cash in.
“I want all 1,350 to be intact in another museum somewhere,” he says. “It’s not the highest bidder. It’s not being ra7ed or.”
Austin writer and publisher Daedelus Horman wants to help preserve Smith’s legacy.
His Catawampus Press raised more than US$30,000 to produce a ’ull-colour, cloth-bound book about Smith. King o’ the Commode: Barney Smith & His Toilet Seat Art Museum was released Saturday, just in time ’or Smith’s birthday.
Ho’’man hopes the book will help Smith attract a suitable buyer.
“For me, Barney’s story is about the innate human desire to create and communicate,” Horman says. “He is a ’olk artist. And his story and his li’e work merits preservation.”