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Story: Washing, cleaning and personal hygiene

Bath time, 1889

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Bath time, 1889

Emily Fell is bathing her young daughter Phyllis in a tin bathtub at the family home in Wellington on a Saturday night in 1889. At the time weekly baths were common and Saturday was the favoured night for bathing. A basin and ewer are visible on a washstand on the right-hand side of the photograph. These would have been used by the adults of the house. 

Using this item

Alexander Turnbull Library, Fell Collection

Reference: PA1-q-075-28-1

by Charles Yates Fell

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page

Kerryn Pollock, Washing, cleaning and personal hygiene – Bathing and personal hygiene, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/40796/bath-time-1889 (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Kerryn Pollock, published 1 February 2013.