Joan Crawford’s Weird Obsession with Plumbing
August3
Joan Crawford, super star of the 1930s and 40s, had a little obsession with bathrooms. Every time she stayed in a hotel room, she scrubbed the bathroom (including the toilets, tubs and bathroom faucets) herself before using it. Her other weird bathroom obsessions included:
- After a workman installed a new toilet and bathtub in her home, he used them. She immediately had everything torn out.
- Every time Joan married, she would change all the toilet seats in her house.
- Joan wore gloves whenever she left the house because of her germ phobia.
The movie Mommie Dearest is starting to make a little more sense now!

This is so very true; I used to work at hotels in Waikiki way back in the 1970s. These were the smaller, “local” hotels so all the maids knew each other well. They talked about Joan Crawford, checking into the hotel and promptly changing, getting the cleaning supplies and scrubbing the bathrooms till you could eat off the floor! Very intense woman.