Washer & Dryer

[Gumby]

That is interesting!!! I wonder why that would be but there must have been an issue with lines of some sort to have the law.

Some people think it is ugly and reflects badly on their neighborhood. I don't, but just consider all the horror stories about HOAs we have heard on this board.

 

[audreyh1]

Seems like most urban and suburban places US clothes lines are not allowed.

 

[street]

Some people think it is ugly and reflects badly on their neighborhood. I don't, but just consider all the horror stories about HOAs we have heard on this board.

I see! Just seems like something so petty to complain about.

 

[FlaGator]

60's kid, never remember a time without a washer, but clothes lines were in every back yard. In the dry heat of AZ, made some sense. Neighbors had them too.

Thread drift - the now-common household appliance that was a major upgrade in my youth was a dishwasher. With a total of 7 of us in the house, doing the dishes was a significant chore and the dishwasher was a major upgrade. First one I remember was a portable that had to be rolled out from under the breakfast bar, attached to the kitchen faucet, plugged into a wall socket, and the drain hose strategically placed in the sink. Top loader, I think.

Every time I think about hooking up the dishwasher in time to watch the Batman TV series, I am reminded of how fortunate I was to have the parents I did, the time I have lived in, and the life I have had.

 

[Trailwalker]

My wife still hangs the laundry outside during good weather. Our current house has the two T posts with multiple lines. One time, I got too close with the tractor mower and sprayed fresh-cut grass on the wet clothes. DW was not happy. Didn't happen again.

 

[Ronstar]

We had a small lot - 100’x75’ iirc. Our clothesline was close to our garbage burn barrel. Never really thought about it, but the garbage probably wasn’t burned until the clothes were taken off the line.

 

[EastWest Gal]

I never remember not having a washer and dryer, growing up in suburban SF Bay Area. Even in apartments in medical school, I never had to use a laundromat.

When I decided to escape Silicon Valley for PA, what sold me on the house was that the laundry room is upstairs just outside our master bedroom.

 

[FI_RElater]

You could have been my neighbor in the coal mining region of Pa. where I was raised while Dad for in WWII. We had no indoor plumbing either and a pile of coal! Oh, and the chickens......

...same thing in the coal mining town in CO where my GM was at (old company town)
At some time, cold water line brought in (but not hot)
and had outhouse (but it was a two-hole ! ) { you had to use a "piss pot" at night... unless you needed to go out to the outhouse.... and always had to worry about rattlesnakes and spiders (brown recluse and black widow)}
the stove was old heavy iron coal fired stove
--*** and this was as late as the early 70's ! ! ***--

It was a real hard life for her... and as we experienced when family visited there. Of course, the stove also doubled as the heat source... so in the winter it did get mighty cold (lots of blankets!); didn't have A/C, of course, but where we lived didn't either... just a swamp cooler...

last time I passed by, the town actually put in a town sewage system...
most of the old buildings had been torn down and replaced


The other GM did have a wringer washer...out in the barn (past the chickens and turkeys (beware of the tom))
early one was a hand crank... the last one they had had a motor for the wringer.... until they moved into town and then got a modern washer and dryer (although they often did just hang out on the clothesline

 

[Teacher Terry]

Some of these stories are interesting. I didn’t have laundry when younger and renting. Then after my divorce at 43 I bought a condo with no laundry and had to use the laundry room for 6 years until remarriage and buying a house. Then 2 years ago back to a condo. Like most things being inconvenienced is worse when you are older). Anyway really looking forward to getting my baby washer installed.

 

[DayDreaming]

Like most folks here, my parents didn't have a dryer when I was a kid, but eventually they got one. Myself, I used a dryer most of my adult life, but I guess I've gone backwards, and now I use a clothesline most of the time, weather permitting. I kind of enjoy hanging the clothes out, and on a nice sunny day, things dry faster on the line than they would in my dryer. It's also part of trying live in a more environmentally friendly way.

 

[old medic]

I remember a time when we brought our clothes to Grannys and Mom used her tub washer with a wringer, and the clothes got hung out to dry. At the house Mom had 2 5 gallon buckets and a hand plunger used in the tub, hand wrung and hung out.
When our 1st child was born, I gave DW the choice, Disposables diapers or we would get a washer and clothesline. The same T-post are still there from 1986...
We still use our wind powered solar drier most of the time.

 

[38Chevy454]

I use a clothes line whenever the weather is nice. Love the smell of bedsheets dried in the sun, ditto for towels. Oh, and put the pillows out on sunny days. Sweet dreams!!!

Same for us. We dry a lot of things outside. Why not? As long as it is basically hidden in back yard. The clothes and sheets smell so much nicer air dried. Plus as bonus saves on elec bill a little and wear and tear on the dryer. Air drying works great in summer, not so good when it is colder. Thin items like sheets still dry pretty fast in cooler weather, but thicker jeans or similar need some good sun and heat to really dry good.

I do remember when i was a kid my grandmother had an old style wringer washing machine; along with the clothes line on pulleys that extended out form the back porch. But as a kid at home we had a conventional style washing machine and dryer. My mother did hang some stuff out on a clothes hanger like tree that was on a pole in the yard. It could be removed and put away until needed. She did use the dryer most of the time.

 

[folivier]

Yes like everyone else we had a clothesline out back. But also remember that evil finger pinching white machine on the back porch!
Once we retired and started traveling in the motorhome we had a washer and dryer but would hang the clothes on a rod over the bed especially when we were out west.

 

[Sue J]

Washer & Dryer

When I was a kid my Mom had one of the umbrella type clothesline things out in the back yard. It was used in nice weather but we also had a clothes dryer in the basement. I was fascinated by it and all the wooden spring loaded clothes pins and the wicker baskets she used. I loved helping with all that.

We have nice modern high efficiency laundry appliances now in a large laundry area in the basement of our house. There is also a 20ft long clothesline with 4 rows strung up down there and I like to hang all my shirts and sweaters. I think they last longer if hung to dry, but that may be a myth.

I like to do laundry. It brings back a lot of nice memories of Mom.

 

[Sojourner]

Seems like most urban and suburban places US clothes lines are not allowed.

I don't know if they're actually prohibited here in my metro Atlanta suburban community, but no one dries their laundry outside. If clothes lines are, in fact, prohibited, then it's almost certainly by our HOA and not by local/state law.

The situation overseas, though, seems quite the opposite. When DW and I were in India recently, absolutely everyone dries their clothes outdoors. Even people living in fancy, high-rise apartment buildings. So much so that virtually every single residential building is coated with unsightly black mold stains caused by decades of wet laundry drippings running down the sides of the buildings. It's quite the eyesore, IMHO.

 

[Jerry1]

Posting for Street.

 

[Ian S]

I remember my parents having a Bendix front-load washing machine in our kitchen! Clothes were hung out to dry but eventually, an electric dryer was purchased. It was set up in the bathroom off the kitchen. Our Bendix looked exactly like this one so must have been a similar vintage:

Oddly enough, my first job after grad school was with The Bendix Corporation which never actually manufactured washing machines.

 

[street]

LOL!!! I wasn't smart enough to make it work. Thanks Jerry1

I was going to post it in the washer and dryer thread. I never seen of those in really life, but I did have one in the old ranch house property I bought. I overhauled that .5 HP gas engine, and it runs like a champion. Called a kick start, hit miss engine.

Thanks Sir. Lol

 

[audreyh1]

I don't know if they're actually prohibited here in my metro Atlanta suburban community, but no one dries their laundry outside. If clothes lines are, in fact, prohibited, then it's almost certainly by our HOA and not by local/state law.

The situation overseas, though, seems quite the opposite. When DW and I were in India recently, absolutely everyone dries their clothes outdoors. Even people living in fancy, high-rise apartment buildings. So much so that virtually every single residential building is coated with unsightly black mold stains caused by decades of wet laundry drippings running down the sides of the buildings. It's quite the eyesore, IMHO.

Yes, generally it would be neighborhood or building owner rules.

 

[N02L84ER]

Our neighborhood has a lot of dogs. Almost every time I go outside, I smell wet dog. I would not dry my clothes outside here. Growing up, we used clotheslines to dry the clothes when the weather was good.

 

[Philliefan33]

All of you that love to hang your laundry outside must not suffer from hay fever. I can think of nothing worse than sleeping on sheets that have been hung out to catch all the pollen!

 

[rodi]

I have clotheslines set up in our side yard. I use it for heavier stuff (sheets/blankets/towels/jeans). I refuse to do socks/undies on the line because it would take too long clipping them all up.

We're in an older urban neighborhood, no restrictions... but most of the newer neighborhoods (20 years old or less) have HOAs that restrict against laundry lines.

Growing up we had a washer and dryer.

When travelling, I bring my own bungy/clippy laundry line for drying stuff I wash out in the sink.

 

[Morricol61]

My mum worked in the days before it was really common and was therefore able to afford a top loading automatic washing machine, back in the early 1960s. All our clothing was and still is, hung on the line to dry in the sun. I do have a tumble dryer but it is seldom used, mainly when we have lots of rainy days and I just can't get anything dry outside.


When I was growing up I remember visiting our neighbour's who mostly had coppers which were either gas or wood fired. The clothes, sheets, towels, nappies and baby clothes were placed in the copper with about 50 litres of cold water which was heated perhaps to near boiling point and a copper stick was used to stir the water as it heated up. After enough time in the copper, the clothes were lifted out of the copper with the stick and loaded into the concrete wash tubs for rinsing and wringing out either by hand or with the aid of a manually operated rubber roller wringer. The final rinse water had a "blue bag" swished through the water which gave a blueish tint to all the clothes to ensure the whites were whiter than white after they came in off the line.


Mum used to buy fancy starch to spray on the clothes during ironing, but the lady next door had a glass bottle with a screw cap lid with holes in it which she used to fill with water to sprinkle on the clothes before they were ironed.

 

[Teacher Terry]

I have horrible allergies and asthma so have never been able to hang clothes outside to dry. I do use a drying rack inside for my pants, shirts and sweaters. We have low humidity so no mold. I do it because I don’t want my clothes to shrink.

 

[Gumby]

....
Mum used to buy fancy starch to spray on the clothes during ironing, but the lady next door had a glass bottle with a screw cap lid with holes in it which she used to fill with water to sprinkle on the clothes before they were ironed.

There's a memory. My mum used an old Coke bottle with a sprinkler cap for the starching.