A radically change variant of a Turkish bath became fashionable in the US in the late 1800’s. Although a small box for one person to sit in and sweat hardly resembled a communal Turkish bath, the publicity agents advertised it as a “Turkish bath” to make it more appealing and exotic. Before that, in the Middle Ages, such method of sweating had been already used in Europe, where the boxes were heated by hot rocks or burning whiskey. At that time they were named either “Russian” or “oriental” baths; later in the US they were reintroduced as the “steam” or “Turkish” bath.
In the 19th century such boxes were used in the American rural areas solving the problem of having to sweat naked in front of others and the problem of inaccessibility of big public baths. Moreover, the advertising industry added to the popularity of the bath cubicles highlighting the health benefits they bring.
There were possibilities to buy simple constructions of the small sweat cubicles for a fairly acceptable cost. Apart from it, there were also recommendations placed in the Britannica on how to make such a box at home by yourself:
• first, to hit a brick in the oven and put in into a metal basin;
• then pour water in the metal basin to create steam;
• put the chair over the steaming basin and sit down on it, previously having wrapped yourself in the towel.
In 1814 appeared a more carefully planned alteration of the steam bath, which consisted of a boiler (quite impressive in size) that produces steam under the bed cover and a tent with the walls on the four posts to create a so-called steamy room.
In general, such private “saunas”, as they can be called today, hadn’t acquired wide recognition of the customers and were not extremely popular. Their usage today is reduced mostly to health spas, trailer courts, massage parlors, local gymnasia, and some private homes.
| 
