Street Elbow

by RIXFORD KNIGHT

IT SEEMED to me that while the plumber was right there in the house was naturally a good time to find out why a street elbow was called a street elbow, so I went down cellar and said, “Good morning. How is everything going this morning?” And then I said, “Say— by the way; why is a street elbow called a street elbow?

I can see why it is an elbow all right. But where does the street part come from?”

The plumber explained. He said, “I’ll tell you. You see a street elbow has one mate and one female end. On a regular elbow both ends are female. Here; let me show you.”

I said, “Yes, I understand about that; but what I mean is: Why does its having one male and one female end make a street elbow of it ? Streets don’t have one male and one female end that 1 know of. So why a street elbow?”

The plumber said, “Wait now. Just let me show you. Look at this here. See? On this end the threads are on the outside. That’s because it is the male end. And on this end the threads are on the inside. That’s the female end. Now you take a regular elbow — like this here— the threads are on the inside on both ends. That makes it a regular elbow instead of a street, elbow. You can see how it is.”

I told the plumber I could see what the difference was between a street elbow and a regular elbow. “Only what I can’t understand is why they show the difference by calling one a street elbow. Why not call it a mixed elbow? Or a hermaphrodite elbow? Or something that would mean something? Street doesn’t mean anything, so far as I know; that is, not in this connection.”

The plumber said, “But it does mean something. Like I’ve just been telling you: it means a street elbow has one male end and one female end. If it had two female ends it would be just a regular elbow.”

“Listen,” I said. “Take a piece of pipe, now. If you say ‘This is a brass pipe,’ that means something different from what it does if you say‘This is a galvanized pipe.’ Anybody would know what you meant. But when you say ‘This is a street elbow,’ that doesn’t mean anything except to somebody who already knows what a street elbow is.”

“I can’t help that,” said the plumber. “There’s a lot of things people don’t know about the plumbing business. But any plumber knows what a street elbow is. You ask any plumber, I don’t care who he is, and he will tell you a street elbow has got one male and one female end. That’s what makes it a street elbow.”

I said, “Yes, sure. It is called a street elbow. But it could be called a whattentot elbow and it would still have one male and one female end; so why pick on street to call it?”

The plumber said, “Well, I’ve been in the plumbing business for thirtyfive years now and a street elbow has always been called a street elbow for as long as I can remember. And my father was in the plumbing business for longer than that and he always called it a street elbow, and I guess he ought to know if anybody would.”

“Of course he would,” I told the plumber. “I’m not saying he wouldn’t. All I’m saying is, how did they come to be called street elbows in the first place? Why did your father or whoever it was pick out street elbow as the name to call them?”

“Jeez, I wouldn’t know about that,” said the plumber. “I suppose they had to call them something or nobody would know what anybody else was talking about. Why do you call a pipe a pipe or a house a house or a kitchen a kitchen? You just do, that’s all.”

“But calling a pipe a pipe or a house a house is altogether different from calling a street elbow a street elbow. The word for house may have come from the ancient Aryan or something, and we call it that because they did. There is a reason for it. But I can’t see any reason at all for calling this thing a street elbow.”

“Maybe the ancient Aryans called them street elbows,” said the plumber.

“But for cripe sake the ancient. Aryans didn’t have street elbows. They didn’t have pipes and I doubt if they even had streets; and even if they did, why would they call a piece of curved pipe a street elbow unless they called one end of a street the male end and the other end female? Maybe they did. That’s what I am trying to find out. Why did somebody start calling this thing a street elbow?”

“You mean, why did they call it a street elbow?” said the plumber.

“That’s it! Why do they call this thing a street elbow? Did maybe a man named Street invent it or something?”

The plumber said, “Well, I couldn’t say as to that. I never knew of a man named Street in the plumbing business; though of course they might have been, sometime. I don’t claim to know everything. Maybe if you were to look in some of those books, or something.”

I said, “I have already looked in the encyclopedia. All it says is that a street elbow has one male and one female end.”

“That’s right. The book is right about that,” said the plumber.

“But what has that got to do with its being called a street elbow? Why call it of all things a street elbow?”

The plumber thought that one over. He said, “Y’know, I’ve been wondering about that myself. Why,” he wanted to know, “do they call it a street elbow?”