In Season 7, Episode 7 of MASH, entitled None Like It Hot, the 4077th was experiencing a heat wave of epic proportions. Hawkeye and B.J. receive a package in the mail that turns out to be a canvass bathtub they ordered from Abercrombie and Fitch. Now they can soak in cold water and beat the heat! If, that is, they can keep the tub a secret. But, was there ever such a thing as a canvas bathtub? And could you order one through the mail?
None Like It Hot Episode Summary
Hawkeye and B.J. want to be able to use the bathtub as often as possible, meaning that the fewer who know about it, the better. Winchester finds out immediately because he walks into the swamp when they are unpackaging it and setting it up. He threatens to tell everyone in camp about it if they don’t share it with him.
Winchester tells Margaret about it. Father Mulcahy comes into the scrub room where they have set up the bathtub. Hawkeye lets Radar use it to bring down his fever from tonsilitis. From their, their efforts to keep it secret are futile. The whole camp eventually finds out and a long line is form outside the bath tent. Arguments occur about how long people are taking and their rightful place in line. Then, fight breaks out, involving the hot-headed Zale, of course, and Col. Potter orders the bathtub to be gotten rid of saying, “That’s it! I don’t care how you do it but get rid of that tub! It’s a menace…I want it out of town by sundown.”
Klinger is the only one not using the tub. He is trying a new Section 8 scheme. He is wearing a fur coat and a stole and plans to either be discharged or die from the heat. Initially, Colonel Potter is irritated and orders him out of his office. But when Klinger ups the ante by wearing a skintight rubber suit (“The latest in rubber reducing suits”) along with his fur coat, stole, and other clothing. Potter is impressed and tells him that that if he can stand being in his super-hot get-up for another 24 hours, he could have his discharge. Klinger is overjoyed and can taste his freedom.
In the end, Klinger makes it to within an hour before he runs in a panic to the scrub room and jumps into the tub while Margaret is using it. Oddly, Margaret, wearing only her towel, runs into the mess tent instead of her own tent. She was in a tizzy, though so maybe she didn’t realize where she was going.
Meanwhile, Hawkeye and B.J. have traded the tub to a sleazy “procurer” who had offered to buy it earlier. They get two cases of ten-year-old Scotch and ten gallons of strawberry ice cream for Radar, who is recovering from his tonsillectomy. Potter is happy and tells them he is proud of them because, “That was not only obedient but damn nice!”
Could Hawkeye and B.J. Have Ordered a Canvass Bathtub?
Now back to the question, were canvass bathtubs real? And could you order them from Abercrombie and Fitch? Those familiar with the modern Abercrombie and Fitch may be confused. Why would a fashion retailer sell a canvass bathtub? Well, the company today bears no resemblance to the original company. In fact, it is an entirely different company. Originally, Abercrombie and Fitch was a high-end sporting goods company. And, yes, canvas bathtubs are something the company might have sold. It is said they supplied the gear for Teddy Roosevelt’s safari.
Did Abercrombie and Fitch sell canvas bathtubs? Yes, indeed! The company advertised these tubs from at least the mid-1920a. They would have been very much like the one shown on MASH. The company sold them as part of its “Automobile Camping” outfit, which included a line of tents, sleeping bags, cooking supplies, food and the often forgotten but essential portable canvas bathtub so that the “automobile tourist” could “convey a party completely across the continent without being dependent upon hotels or even stores for accommodation or food supplies.
The bathtubs Abercrombie and Fitch sold were 5 feet long, 27 inches wide, and 16 inches deep. The one in the show seems deeper than this but I could be mistaken. As well, other sporting good stores also sold portable canvass bathtubs.
U.S. Army Canvas Bathtubs
In fact, the U.S. Army supplied portable canvass bathtubs and so did the British military. Theoretically, with the help of Radar, Hawkeye and B.J. may have been able to scrounge a bath from military supply without having to buy one from Abercrombie and Fitch. This would have made it more difficult for them to keep secret, though.
I don’t know how practical it would have been for a couple of army surgeons to get a bathtub into Korea from the states and have it delivered close to the front lines at a MASH unit, but all in all, yes, those things existed. The one in the show is built just like the tubs you can find pictures of on the web. It wasn’t something they built as a prop. It was just what it was claimed to be, a canvass bathtub.
Monster Mash Wiki points out that after Potter tells the doctors to get rid of the bathtub, leaving Winchester to enjoy the bathtub alone while listening to his music, a line reforms outside the tent as if the incident with the fight and Potter’s order never happened. I’d like to point out that Potter ordered them get rid of the tent before sundown. He did not order them to stop using it in the meantime, so, obeying his order to the letter and all…
Continuity Error Related to Canvass Bathtub
In the episode Life Time, Season 8, Episode 11, the canvass bathtub appears again. This episode is about a race against time, as a solider comes in with a lacerated aorta. Hawkeye compresses the aorta against the soldier’s spinal column to keep him from bleeding to death. However, this cannot be maintained for more than 20 minutes or the loss of circulation or the solider may be paralyzed. A countdown clock appears on the screen, counting the time left as B.J. waits for another solider with a fatal brain injury to die so he can remove his aorta and Hawkey can transplant it into the soldier whom he is keeping alive by compressing the artery.
To buy more time, the doctors decide to induce hypothermia by putting the patient on ice. Hawkeye order Klinger to get all the ice he can and for him to fetch “my canvass bathtub.” Klinger does indeed bring the bathtub, which is used to immerse the patient in ice.
This appears to be a continuity error since the bathtub was traded away in the original episode. While it’s possible that Hawkeye could have gotten another canvass bathtub, his possession of it would render the shenanigans in the original episode anachronistic. The presence of the bathtub should have caused the same type of trouble, once again!
