 Re: Sticker shock on washer and dryer
Both my mother and my grandmother had the wash boards that were used occasionally, but fortunately, from the time I was old enough to remember, they both also had electric wringer washing machines. We never had one of the gasoline powered models, and I don't even recall anyone else that we knew having one. My granddad had made some stools for us. Kids used them to sit on at the table to eat, but 3 of them were used on wash day. The washing machine was kept on the back porch. In pretty weather it was moved out into the yard to do the laundry. In bad weather, it was brought into the kitchen. Three wash tubs were placed around it on the stools; 2 rinse tubs; one bluing.
Another tub was needed if you wanted to apply starch, but we just used almost no starch. And then, in addition to the work of washing, rinsing, and wringing out clothes, they had to be hung on the outdoor clothes line; not a bad job in pretty weather, but sure tough on your hands in cold weather.
And after all that, then all dresses, blouses, shirts, and pants (including the blue jeans), pillow cases, etc. had to be ironed. My grandmother still had some of the irons that you heated on the stove, but they were more or less souvenirs and not used anymore since we had electric irons. No steam irons, of course, so you had a bottle of water to "sprinkle" the clothes before ironing.
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