My mom used one through 1988, on the covered back porch. I learned to use it and you can be darn sure I paid close attention. Never got mangled in the thing, which I know is not common.

I have a Speed Queen front loader myself, and my parents were amazed how clean the clothes got. She harped on Dad all the way back to their place (1,987.8 miles east) and the next day she got the same model.

Dad told me "The next time we come out there, please keep your mom in the living room. It is dam* expensive to come out there!"

*You can imagine the next letter. I tend to post in polite English.

She should be careful, Mothman could be lurking about.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothman

I see a bottle of Little Boy Blue on the top shelf. That was a brand of laundry bluing, a product to make clothes appear whiter. It was made by the Condensed Bluing Company of Chicago, Illinois and trademarked in 1914. I remember my grandmother still using it in the early 1960s. Her wringer washer was originally a hand-crank model but Granddaddy rigged a motor to it after they got electricity out on the farm.

Because I bet your hands would be "Thor" too after using that monstrosity! It looks like an accident waiting to happen. And by the way, the activity she is engaged in would be pronounced "warshing" clothes in that particular neck of the woods! I wonder if Mothman is peeking in that window. After all, that's his hometown!

How luxurious. I guess many people still had a hand-cranked wringer. And cranky teenage kids to do the cranking.

Und the upside, when one has both hands on the crank, they can't get in between the rollers.

[Und? Doch! - Dave]

Wet concrete floor, damp walls, steel pipes, faulty electrical insulation. The type of grounding outlet we use today (seen here, in its very rare original double T-slot iteration) was developed in 1949 to address the specific hazard of washing machines, though it took more than a decade for it to see widespread use. It wasn't a new idea then, either. This illustration is from 1931.

was with her wringer washer. She used it up until the early 1980s when my grandpa bought her an automatic. She hated it. Said it didn't get the clothes as clean. Once in a while we would see her with bruised fingernails from getting stuck in the wringer. Now I take wringer washers to antique farm shows so people can see how it used to be done.

The basement is different, but my mom's setup was very similar up into the mid-1970s. Mom hated when Dad bought her a new modern washer. She said it took her twice as long with the new machine. With the old one, she decided when certain clothes were clean and wrung and rinsed and moved on. With the new machine, she had to wait the predetermined time of the machine. She had a schedule!

I remember getting a fingernail ripped off by one of these. I had a pair of scissors in my hand and was playing in the living room, and came to see what Mom was doing.

Got a wee bit too close to the wringer with my fingers still in the scissor handles.

I got one finger out, but the other, still in the handle hole, pulled the scissors in with my wee little finger still in it and pulled the nail right off my finger.

Needless to say, Mom was not impressed.