Episode Details

Visitors to the Truck Yard beer garden in The Colony, Texas (outside Dallas) are treated to a very unusual art collection: a sweeping array of around 1400 hand-painted toilet seats, many of which are also collaged with objects ranging from tortoise shells to Zippo lighters to Pez dispensers. This is the life’s work of Barney Smith, a beloved Texas outsider artist who spent decades creating these “seats” of art, inspired by his day job as a plumber. James McCandless, a reporter at the San Antonio Business Journal, once visited Barney back at the original home of the collection – which was Barney’s garage. He tells us the story.

For more information about visiting the Toilet Seat Art collection today (you can event rent it out for events): https://truckyard.com/the-colony/toilet-seat-museum/

Read James McCandless’s original story for Atlas Obscura about visiting Barney: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/toilet-seat-museum-barney-smith

If you can’t get enough of these seats, Roadside America also has done some delightful profiles of Barney over the years: https://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/6166

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