Who Needs Washing Machines?

[Buenchico]

[Barsel]

Yes, have seen that before. It's true though that life was very tough, especially some of the jobs we were given to do.

Still, not as tough as the lives some of our parents lived.

[10ClarionSt]

That film takes me back to early 50's Chris. We also called it the wash house. It was on Osborne St, in Collyhurst and I used to go and help my mother with her washing, along with my sister. Occasionally, my dad would take us to the swimming pool next door afterwards. But there was also public baths, not swimming baths; these were for us great unwashed who didn't have a bathroom. And we didn't. Twas the old tin bath, outside toilet, only one tap in the house and no electricity. When my mother didn't use the wash house, she used a tub and posser at home. MacMillan said we never had it so good. We just never had it!

[david small]

The same here. Tin bath in front of fire. Shared communal toilet. One cold tap in kitchen. We didn’t feel deprived, it was just the way it was in the slums of Birmingham and many other places. I recall the excitement when we moved to a maisonette with a bathroom and a little garden.

[Barsel]

We didn't know any different except when my Mum used to take me to my Aunty Annies who had a bathroom in her house and we would both have a lovely bath.

Dad would take my brother to the slipper baths to use the facilities there.

[roopower]

That was interesting. We lived next door to my grandparents when I was very young and used to do all the washing in their old copper. That arrangement finished when I was four but I can still remember it , particularly as I was afraid of the integral mangle, having got my fingers caught in it. I can vividly remember the excitement when dad bought mum a Hotpoint Supermatic washing machine, such luxury.

[Buenchico]

Thanks for all of the posts.

I now see how lucky I was that, shortly after I was born in 1953, my parents were allocated a brand new council house.  By modern standards, it was far from perfect but clearly a lot better than the conditions that some others here were living in around that time!

One thing I remember in particular about that house was that it had been built on the principle that the 'back boiler' could be used to heat water.  It was brought into play by sliding a metal sheet above the coal fire, which then diverted some of the heat into warming the water supply.  There were two problems with it though:
(a) it meant that (other than when using the copper or a kettle) hot water was only available during the winter months ; and
(b) sliding that metal sheet above the coal fire not only diverted the heat to the water, it also diverted all of the smoke from the fire into the living room!

My parents were delighted when, many years later, the council installed an immersion heater into the water tank.

[roopower]

We were lucky in a way as the previous owners of our house (between the wars mid terrace) had converted the outside loo and coal hole into an indoor bathroom. It was extremely cold and got very mouldy plus the water pressure was such that you had to start running your bath an hour before you wanted it and the water was never very warm! We had a raeburn with a back boiler, I can't remember how it worked but can vaguely remember it bursting! In the winter we had a little paraffin heater that sat outside the bathroom door to stop the pipes freezing. You could smell it all over the house. Oh, the joys! 

[piggynose]

This puts me in mind of Bangalore India in 1991, while i was travelling around india. I stayed in this pleasant cheap hotel, and the cost included your laundry. I remember leaving my clothes in a bag on my bed, going out for the day, coming back about 7 hours later, to freshly washed clothes and by the looks of things ironed too, and laid on my bed in a tidy pile!!

[Buenchico]

My dad tried to heat our living room with a paraffin heater for a while, Roo. He finally gave up when he realised that everyone's clothes were absolutely stinking of the ruddy stuff!

 

[Buenchico]

A lot cheaper than I have to pay at the launderette, no doubt, Piggy!

[10ClarionSt]

Chris, my dad called the "metal sheet" the damper. That's what we knew it as. And like David Small, we also move to a maisonette, the groundfloor one. And what do you know? It had an indoor toilet, a bathroom and electricity! Woo hoo! That was when MacMillan got it right for us. 1957. 😊

[Buenchico]

>>> "Chris, my dad called the "metal sheet" the damper".

Yup, so did mine.  I just couldn't remember the word (after more than half a century) when I posted!

[bhg481]

Whilst we had a bathroom, as a small boy I used to get bathed in a tub front of the fire. That was fine until we got one of those new-fangled television things and my elderly grandmother, who didn't understand these things, was disgusted because she thought all the people on the TV could see me with no clothes on.