Here's a blast from the past. Has anyone here ever used one of these?

[Arkansas Granny]

When I was newly married and just had my first child, we rented a house that had one of these out back in the wash house. I also had about 30 feet of clothes line. They certainly got your clothes clean, and they smelled fresh from the sunshine, but it was a lot more work than modern appliances, especially when you were washing diapers and laundry for a newborn.

I think of things like these when people start glorifying the good old days.

[WheelWalker]

1. We were still using one the year of our first born - 1976

[Tikki]

42. 1972...we used a wringer washer with our new baby and for a year more.

We hung up the cloth diapers on a line to dry in the California sun.

Good times.

Tikki

[LakeArenal]

2. I have a girlfriend who lived for the wringer.

When one wore out she would search for another one.

Now she has strength problems and really can’t wrestle wet laundry like she used to.
If she could she would.

[mitch96]

4. "lived for the wringer."

Yup, my Mom had one. I clearly remember getting my finger caught in it too!! mid '50s..

m

[Arkansas Granny]

9. I recall that when putting shirts and blouses through the wringer you had to be careful

of the buttons. If you got one going through "backwards" they would pop off and fly like a bullet.

[Midnight Writer]

18. Yep. Got my finger, too. More than once.

[2naSalit]

3. Have had/used a number of them...nt

[rsdsharp]

5. My parents had one when I was little. I remember putting the clothes through the ringer

Mom couldn't get a washer/dryer fast enough.

We had three clothes lines stung between two T shaped metal poles that were cemented into the ground. They were still in the back yard when my mom sold the house in 1985.

The T poles were hollow and wasps would build nests down inside the upright. On occasion I'd tape 4 firecrackers together, light them, and shove them into the T where they would fall down the upright. BOOM! No more wasps for a while.

[lastlib]

59. We still have a clothesline on the T posts....

One day I bumped one of the posts with my mower, and a swarm of yellowjackets boiled out of it and stung me on the neck four times. That night I took two rags soaked in diesel fuel down to the line, stuffed 'em into the holes (they're steel) and lit 'em. No more yellowjackets. Then I capped the poles with wood plugs so they couldn't get back into 'em.

[csziggy]

6. Yes, my grandmother had one on her back porch in Alabama in the 1950s

Then years later, I had one in the barn to wash horse blankets, about the mid 1980s.

[mikeysnot]

7. Yep I have one under my basement stairs

it came with the house. My grandmother used one of these until the 80's, when they moved to a smaller house that had a new system.

[mopinko]

8. our next door neighbor when i was a kid had one.

she coouldnt have the kids she badly wanted, so she put a lot of energy into making her hubby's and, secondly, her, lives as perfect and orderly as possible.
she was a force of nature.

she hung all her wash out on a line, too. which she wound up when she was done.
everything smelled so good.

[Freddie]

10. There was one in Grandma's basement

By the time I came along she’d gotten an automatic. She never got rid of the wringer but didn’t use it any more. After she died most of the stuff in the house went to auction, so maybe it’s in a place like this.

[smirkymonkey]

64. My grandmother had one in her basement as well.

Thank god I didn't come of age until the modern washer and dryer. I would have not wanted to deal with that. I actually hate doing laundry. I am only one person so I usually send it out. It's not that expensive and it's a huge load of my shoulders to have one less chore to do on the weekends.

[Wellstone ruled]

11. We have a Maytag

we keep in my Spouse's BIL's shop for use when we used to set up our R/V for the summer on his land. Complete with double wash tubs and stand.

[Baitball Blogger]

12. Wringer in action at 2:20.

[Runningdawg]

29. Our was on the "back porch" which is also where the water pump was at.

[juxtaposed]

35. they didn't do the rinse?

[Hoyt]

13. That's what my grandmother dreamed of compared to their washtubs. I think they finally

got one, but it was out in the milk barn because the house was way too small.

[Bayard]

14. I remember helping my mom do laundry

And somehow my arm went into the wringer. She had to dismantle the whole thing to get it out.

[unblock]

15. back when i was playing bridge, i asked an older woman who was very good what her secret was

she said "bid what you can make, make what you bid, and don't get your tits caught in the wringer!"

[sarge43]

16. "Tits in the wringer": An oldie, but goldie

Mom used one of those beasts. The day she had her hand caught in the wring was the only time I ever heard her use a four letter word. It was The four letter one and left a mark on the basement wall.

The good old days weren't.

[MiniMe]

17. My Grandmother had one. She had a "suds saver" to go with it

So when you emptied the suds out, it would go into a container and you could reuse the water with the suds.

[Arkansas Granny]

19. I don't recall ever seeing one of those.

[MiniMe]

21. It was pretty cool

The water with the suds would empty out into the "laundry basin", then fresh water would go in to rinse. Next load of wash, you could reuse the water with the suds.

[demigoddess]

61. my mother had a couple of other tubs and you placed them around

so you could swing the wringer around and wring them into rinse tub no 1 and then wring them into rinse tub no 2. and then into the basket to go to the clothes line. So a wash, 2 rinses and they were ready to go. Think they came with a house we were renting at that time.

[Floyd R. Turbo]

20. Yep! Got my arm caught in the wringer. Took off a couple of layers of skin.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

22. Yes, we had one in the '50s. I was afraid of the wringer.

[safeinOhio]

23. Sold one at the antique mall a few years ago.

Went quick.

[DiverDave]

24. Got my hand caught in one

Pulled me all the way to my shoulder.
My granny pulled the plug.
I was 3

[Raven]

25. Me too! At about the same age.

[blm]

26. Me. The Maytag one

[sagesnow]

27. 1960's talk of my town was when the neighbor boy

got his arm caught because he was flattening tootsie rolls with the wet clothes wringer. Evidently, flattened tootsie rolls tasted better.

[Runningdawg]

28. You bet! And I still have a brand new washboard, bucket, clothesline and pins.

[dhol82]

30. I remember a program in the 50's called "Queen for a Day."

One of the contestants was a woman who had gotten her hair caught in the wringer and, essentially, scalped herself. She appeared with a kerchief on her head.
That story just really freaked me out since we had a wringer washer in the basement.
Of course that lady won. Don’t remember what gifts she got but there were many.
Made me very, very cautious around that darn machine.

[Arkansas Granny]

31. OMG! I remember that show and I watched that episode. It must have been during summer

vacation from school. Like you, it really freaked me out. I don't remember the name of the emcee, Jack something, but he had this cheesy little mustache.

[dhol82]

37. He really was creepy!

Jack Bailey

[Arkansas Granny]

38. Yep, that's him.

[Siwsan]

32. My mom and grandmother both had those, when I was young

Mom kept hers, for a while, even after she got a 'modern' one. Grandma used hers, right up until the end.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

33. We had one when I was a little girl.

I recall my younger brother getting an arm caught in the wringer.

I have a vague notion of how very much work they were. Automatic washers and driers are wonderful.

[juxtaposed]

34. The one one the right, yes.

It was the first my parents had in our new house in the basement. Not sure if it came with the house or not b/c I was so young.

[greatauntoftriplets]

36. A friend's mother had one, probably into the 1970s.

And there were 8 kids in that family!

[TomSlick]

40. My grandmother had one until the day she died.

As a kid, I was fascinated by watching the wringer.

[Kali]

41. last one I saw in use was in Chihuahua in the late 90s. you could still buy them new then.

saves a lot of water if you plan laundry day out. sometimes wish I had one.

[Wolf Frankula]

43. For a couple years in college I lived in a basement apartment

that had one of these in the laundry room. I was glad to have it. I didn't have to go to a public laundry and I could sip a coffee and write a column while my clothes washed.

Wolf

[KY_EnviroGuy]

44. Yes. Mom and dad had on on the back porch and I helped mom.....

run clothes through and hang them on our clotheslines. This was mostly in the 50s and stretching my memory, but I believe I got a hand caught in it once but mom hit the wringer release real fast and stopped it. There were many horror stories about ladies getting hair caught in those things.

Those machines actually were a luxury to many folks in our little farm town so many just used a washboard in a tub.

KY...........

Edit: I recall they were hard on buttons and some zippers if not ran through with care.

[sinkingfeeling]

45. Yes, my grandmother had one. I lived with her when I was 12.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

46. My aunt had one of these in her basement.

She used it a few months before she died in 1995:
https://www.used.forsale/r/Details/mangle-iron/mangle%20iron_craigslist_7045313193



It ran very hot.

[malthaussen]

47. No, but I got my fingers stuck in the rollers once...

... I was around 3 or 4. My mother tells me I let out such a scream she almost had a heart attack.
Those things were dangerous.

-- Mal

[bikebloke]

48. In Australia

I was biking up the east coast. Some camp grounds with laundry facilities had those.

[Aristus]

49. Just the wringer.

There was a self-service car wash near where I lived as a kid in Texas. Each wash stall had a hand-operated wringer for wringing out drying cloths or chamois if you had them.

I thought it was cool that you could roll your cloth through the thing, and it would come out more or less dry in an instant.

[llmart]

50. Oh, yes. I remember it well.

My mother had one up until about 1964. There were seven of us children, the youngest in diapers. Because you couldn't hang the clothes out to dry in the winter time (I grew up in the snowbelt of NE Ohio), she strung clothesline over the bathtub and in a backroom that was used as a bedroom for three of the siblings. In the good weather of course everything got hung outdoors. She had a wash board too, and a white enamel pan where she mixed the starch for some of the items. Then she'd sprinkle the clothes, roll them up and place them in a plastic bag for ironing the next day. Most everything got ironed except socks and underwear. Guess who did all the ironing in the summertime when school was out? I hate ironing to this day.

[TEB]

51. My grandma mid 70s

[Guilded Lilly]

52. Yup! Gramma had one in her basement. I remember it well.

[Harker]

53. No... I only popped in to see if you'd posted a Flowbee...

even though I've never used one of those, either.

[samnsara]

54. in the 50s at my grandmas house..

..i remember the clothes coming out flat flat flat and dry

[MFM008]

55. When my dad was

Stationed in Germany from 69 to 73 .
We lived in a small German town and the only
Washer the landlord provided my mom was
This.
She had to air dry the cloths.

[WestLosAngelesGal]

56. Got my finger pinched in one

Got my fingertip pinched in one at my aunt's house. I was maybe 3 or 4 years old. Oh, it hurt for a long time. I learned that you have to push the clothes in the wringer with a stick so it can't grab your fingers.

[Frustratedlady]

57. I remember that stick that Mom used. It was smooth as silk by the time she went automatic.

I wonder whatever happened to it?

When I see a Maytag washer like that, I can almost smell the clothes and sheets that were hung outside to dry. To this day, no aroma can be manufactured to beat that fresh, clothesline smell. I still buy cotton sheets because the fresh feel comes the closest to line drying and is so neat to cuddle into when the bed is newly made.

Line drying also reminded me of starching and drying can-can skirts we wore in the 50s. Too much starch and you'd leave white dust on the floor. We would stretch the can-cans from line to line to get as much bounce as we could. What miserable things to wear, though. We must have looked ridiculous.

[WestLosAngelesGal]

66. There is just no duplicating that smell of wringer-washed clothes and sunlight drying

We had our fluffy dresses, too. Because of all of the starch, the clothes were stiff and crunched when you sat down!

[SWBTATTReg]

58. I used these ... when I visited my grandmother and great grandmother, they would do their ...

laundry in it (located in the MO Ozarks). Very hands on, especially when we had to draw the water by hand from the well in the back of the house (it was placed outside near the back door and near the well). Doesn't seem that long ago...

[demigoddess]

60. yes, I helped my mother do the laundry with one in the 50s and

used one in the late 60s in my first year of marriage when my husband was stationed in Spain. Also in the 50s when I was staying at a friends farm one summer. More work than a machine from today. Mostly the filling with water and draining. The wringers weren't hard to work.

[zeusdogmom]

62. Used one growing up mid 50's-60's.

And since I was the oldest of 5 kids, I did a lot of laundry especially in the summer. Everything was hung outside. Loved how diapers, etc. froze in the winter time. We had to be careful in the summer, though. If the neighbor across the road or my dad were cleaning out the cow or pig barns we might want to wait a day to wash clothes. The stench clung to the clothes something fierce. 🤢 Or when the cottonwood trees were shedding their cotton. That fluff would stick to everything.

Always hung my own kids diapers in the sunshine. 40 years later I still hang most of my clothes outside despite the fact I have a clothes dryer. I use a folding rack on my deck. Crawled into bed last night with sheets and quilt fresh from drying in the sunshine. Bliss! Love the smell and feel. (I know - takes very little to make me happy)

[Baked Potato]

63. We had one of the round ones.. and it was outside on some bricks.

[benld74]

65. Mother used them until '69

When we finally brow beat dad into getting newer ones.