Shall we explore laundry today? Yes, let’s.

Today’s population is used to having standard electric (or gas) washers and dryers–top load, front load, stacked, all-in-one, you name it. Having raised 4 kids, I always went for the heavy duty, extra large capacity machines and wished I could have 2 sets of each to get through the laundry quicker. When I say we had mountains of laundry, I do mean mountains.

However, I am actually old enough to be familiar with older methods of doing laundry. We weren’t out there beating clothes on rocks by the river, but there were definitely ways that were more labor-intensive than tossing in a pod and pushing a button.

Although I grew up with the standard electric washer and gas dryer on the farm, we kept a wringer washer on the premises. This is what those generally look like:

My mom had a healthy respect for wringer washers, and she didn’t let me or my brother operate it due to the misfortunes she suffered in her youth–namely getting her long hair caught up in the wringer once and also having her arm wrung clear up to the shoulder another time. But she kept it on hand in case we had a power outage and absolutely needed to get laundry done, or in case our electric and gas machines decided to stop working. We had a lot of power outages on the farm, and machines always broke down, so it was not unusual to see old reliable put to use. See that round plug on the bottom half of the machine? A hose was attached to this hole and then the water was drained outside. One day we learned that it was a very very very bad idea to leave the hose outside overnight–Mom went to take a load of wash out of the tub and discovered that a black snake had shimmied up the hose and curled up inside the washer to take a nap.

(cue all of the heebie jeebies here–<shudder>)

We still have our wringer washer, but Mom has decided that maybe we won’t need it anytime soon. It is currently a flower pot and lovely cat napping location.

We also have a two-tub setup similar to this dollhouse model:

We also have your standard wash tub such as this:

However, our galvanized tub hasn’t been put to use since it was last used as a bathtub many years ago:

You do what you gotta do when there are 2 toddler boys and no bathtub in the house.

Now these galvanized tubs are what my Volga German grandma used back when my dad was growing up. She also did her laundry outside, which was probably a good idea since we hopefully all know that mixing bleach and lye soap needs to be done in a well-ventilated area if it has to be done at all–and we all know that if you wanted those clothes to be clean, it was going to be done.

Water was boiled hot and the tub was filled with bleach and lye soap. This is where sorting laundry was very important:

Whites.

Lights.

Darks.

Jeans–turned inside out to minimize fading, because let’s face it–there was still going to be a bit of bleach left in that water by the time the last loads were scrubbed.

My grandma was very particular about her lye soap. If it was too yellow or, God forbid, had dark flecks in it where bits of sooty ash got mixed in when it was made, Grandma Bieker didn’t want it. Any time we went to garage sales or thrift stores and spied big blocks of lye soap sitting on a shelf, we grabbed it for Grandma if it was WHITE and left it if it was dingy. My mom also resorted to making lye soap on occasion for Grandma. She’s still got several blocks of it.

May not be snow white, but it passed muster well enough. Grandma also used the wooden clothespins pictured above. She was very old school–none of that spring-loaded nonsense for her. She kept a little sliver of lye soap in the bathtub, too, but we grandkids got to use her Irish Spring soap because the lye would be too harsh for our delicate skin. My dad was astonished at the pampering his mother was capable of when it came to grandchildren and wondered out loud many times just why in the hell he didn’t get that treatment as a child.

Now, if you think I’m done mentioning slithering reptiles, you are mistaken. You would think that laundry and snakes shouldn’t mix so frequently, and I really wish that were the case. I have a very strong phobia of snakes, and I am pretty sure my Grandma Bieker felt the same after one laundry day. I heard this secondhand from my dad, but it still gives me the willies. Dad was outside playing while Grandma did her washing in the wash tub out in the yard below a shade tree. For some reason, Grandma couldn’t find the stick she used to stir the clothes with in the wash tub, so she reached up to snap off a branch on the tree. The branch she grabbed was not a branch–she found herself with a handful of a snake that had been hanging down from the tree over her wash tub. Grandma dropped the snake and reached down to grab a stick off the ground to beat the snake to a pulp. The stick wiggled and she threw it. She looked around for her trusty hoe to chop the snake in half and hurry him along to meet his maker and saw that there were several snakes and no sticks or hoe. Skirt and apron were hiked up, shouts were bellowed, and she ran for the house–she didn’t even wait for Dad to get in the house before the door slammed shut. He’s lucky she even opened it up so he could also reach safety. The laundry sat in the tub and waited for Grandpa to get home from working on the Union Pacific railroad and dispatch all known snakes in the vicinity. When Grandma upgraded to a wringer washing machine, I’ll bet she didn’t leave the drain hose out at night.