RETURN

It's such a beautiful day for a change we decided to do the
laundry...Seeing the clothes strung out on the lines took me back in
time to when I was a little girl growing up on a farm near Dresden in W.
TN...Washday started very early at our house , as there was a lot to
do...The boys had drug up limbs out of the woods the day before, and set
the legs of the old black kittle up on tin cans so they could build a
fire under it...We knew to be careful around that fire,'cause Mama's aunt
Margaret Bell's long dress caught on fire when she was washing, and she
burnt to death .

We drawed up water till the kittle was filled nearly to the top and
built the fire under it ,set up the tubs and filled them part way with
buckets of water....Mama mixed up the blueing, and a pan of starch...then
she carefully toted buckets of hot water from the steaming wash kittle
and mixed it with the cold water in the wash and rinse tubs till it was
hot enough to just barely keep your hand in....Clothes were sorted into
piles ...Delicate white clothes on down to the work overalls....and then
the mop rags, etc...

Lye soap made back after we killed hogs in the Fall was rubbed onto the
ridges of the scrub board, and the backbreaking job of scrubbing clothes
for 10 people began...Whites were boiled in the kittle, put through the
wash tub if necessary then in the bluing to make them sparkling white...{
This part of boiling the clothes is a little unclear after all these
years .} Bleach mixed with water was used in there , too. When he was
about 5 ,brother Jerry got a jar of this bleach water down off a shelf
in the well house so little sister Reba could drink it.....As I remember
, he had trouble sitting down for quite awhile...Sis seemed none the
worse for wear, but has trouble with her throat all these many years
later...and we wonder...

After hours of scrubbing, wringing, rinsing ,wringing, bluing, wringing
etc. the clothes were hung on lines that went around 3 sides of the back
yard....They looked so pretty blowing in the breeze, and one knew how
fresh and clean the beds would smell that night... After all the folding
and bed making was over , of course ! We tried not to think of ironing
all those clothes...Yes, just about everything had to be ironed , as
there was no Permanent Press back then....Remember the pan of starch ?
Dresses , shirts, dresser scarves, etc. went in first, then the things
you didn't want heavily starched...When they came in off the lines they
were sprinkled with water , [A special thing could be bought to fit on a
bottle .] rolled up and set aside to be ironed the next day...With heavy
flatirons heated on the cook stove....You used one till it got cold then
traded it for another .....

I was about 10 when we got our first washing machine...We had just done
an unusually big wash when we saw a strange pickup truck coming slowly
down our lane...It turned out to be a distant cousin and friends , and
they had a truckload of used washing machines to sell....This wasn't long
after electricity had been put in that area, so they must have gone to a
big town and bought up a load of washers....Well, Mama bargained for the
best looking one, and we just couldn't wait till wash day came around
again....Why, it was SO easy now ! All we had to do was drag up the limbs
to heat the water we had drawed up from the well, etc., etc., etc *grin*

Think of this the next time you casually load your washer, add soap from
a box and fabric softener...Push a button and go on your way.....After
the machine has worked it's miracle the clothes are tossed in the
dryer...push a button, come back later and your clothes are ready to fold
or hang....Friend Kathy's washer quit right in the middle of a load of
clothes awhile back and she had to wring them out ...hurting her
wrist..I'm afraid I wasn't properly sympathetic as I listened to her tale
of woe , remembering all the times we washed, wrung out, rinsed , wrung
out, etc. etc. clothes for 10 people ! { Y'all 'scuse me while I go put
in another load of clothes and push that 'magic' button ! } Jeannie T