Thread Number: 73925
/ Tag: Vintage Automatic Washers
Vintage Laundromat Photos |
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Post# 976597   1/2/2018 at 14:45 (2,297 days old) by RevvinKevin (Tinseltown - Shakey Town - La-La Land)   |   | |
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To start off this New Year, here some fun vintage laundromat photos, so... in no particular order.... bring your laundry and come see what's inside! Kevin |
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Post# 976598 , Reply# 1   1/2/2018 at 14:46 (2,297 days old) by RevvinKevin (Tinseltown - Shakey Town - La-La Land)   |   | |
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Post# 976604 , Reply# 2   1/2/2018 at 16:05 (2,297 days old) by pulltostart (Mobile, AL)   |   | |
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These are a hoot! Especially the second batch. Love the one of the chick talking to the guy in shorts, and the next one with the woman in the hat! I've only used a laundromat twice since coming to Mobile and had no idea that the dress code expectations were so high. I'll have to be careful the next time I go up there.
lawrence |
Post# 976616 , Reply# 3   1/2/2018 at 18:28 (2,297 days old) by kd12 (Arkansas)   |   | |
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Ok, in the first post, second picture, there is a sign saying "Do not use Tide, Fab, Wisk, or..." Cant read the rest. Does anyone know what that was about? |
Post# 976619 , Reply# 4   1/2/2018 at 18:38 (2,297 days old) by appnut (TX)   |   | |
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Post# 976626 , Reply# 5   1/2/2018 at 19:03 (2,297 days old) by turquoisedude (.)   |   | |
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Post# 976630 , Reply# 6   1/2/2018 at 19:39 (2,297 days old) by wayupnorth (On a lake between Bangor and Bar Harbor, Maine)   |   | |
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Pinball machine drove me to the local laundromat, but let my friends play and I watched the washers dicretely. We did have a Snow White Westinghouse laundry for a you leave it, washed in a slant front by nice ladies in white uniforms, dryed in a Cissal gas dryer folded and picked it up later a few doors down.
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Post# 976636 , Reply# 8   1/2/2018 at 20:34 (2,297 days old) by toploader55 (Massachusetts Sand Bar, Cape Cod)   |   | |
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Post# 976642 , Reply# 9   1/2/2018 at 21:04 (2,297 days old) by joelippard (Hickory)   |   | |
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Post# 976645 , Reply# 10   1/2/2018 at 21:17 (2,297 days old) by whirlykenmore78 (Prior Lake MN (GMT-0500 CDT.))   |   | |
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Is very reminiscent of the Wascomat/Huebesch with a few MT TLs stores so common in this area when I grew up. Some had mostly MT TLs but more had mostly Wascomats.
Kevin: this is AWESOME!, what a fun trip down laundry lane. Thank you so much, you brought back memories of laundry I did with Mom 30 years ago. WK78 |
Post# 976683 , Reply# 11   1/3/2018 at 02:54 (2,297 days old) by neptunebob (Pittsburgh, PA)   |   | |
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Post# 976702 , Reply# 13   1/3/2018 at 08:00 (2,296 days old) by gansky1 (Omaha, The Home of the TV Dinner!)   |   | |
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Very fun thread, Kevin. I'll add a few that I've snagged around the web as well, we never had many fun laundromats around here. One company dominated most of the coin-laundry biz, Maytag. Lots of Highlander centers all over the area (NE, SD and KS) and what weren't Maytag were SQ solid tub by the 70's. Only once on vacation in Minnesota did I get to see a Frigidaire in a 'mat - mom put a load of my clothes in it to tamp down the over-excited state I was in :-)
#7 is from the opening of the Marina Towers in Chicago - doing laundry in the sky #8 is a photo of a local laundromat after a tornado in the early 70's (that nobody ever took me to!)
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Post# 976708 , Reply# 14   1/3/2018 at 08:31 (2,296 days old) by Tomturbomatic (Beltsville, MD)   |   | |
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#6 of 20 looks like someplace in Eastern Europe. #4 looks like Sister Immaculata the nun in charge of laundry.
#3 of 17 What are those chrome risers of different heights behind the Bendix machines? |
Post# 976723 , Reply# 15   1/3/2018 at 11:35 (2,296 days old) by Bigterkc (Kansas City)   |   | |
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Post# 976734 , Reply# 16   1/3/2018 at 13:37 (2,296 days old) by Unimatic1140 (Minneapolis)   |   | |
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Now I know what heaven looks like!
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Post# 976738 , Reply# 17   1/3/2018 at 13:51 (2,296 days old) by vacbear58 (Sutton In Ashfield, East Midlands, UK)   |   | |
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Post# 976739 , Reply# 18   1/3/2018 at 13:57 (2,296 days old) by vacbear58 (Sutton In Ashfield, East Midlands, UK)   |   | |
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Post# 976740 , Reply# 19   1/3/2018 at 14:02 (2,296 days old) by vacbear58 (Sutton In Ashfield, East Midlands, UK)   |   | |
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Post# 976767 , Reply# 20   1/3/2018 at 18:58 (2,296 days old) by wft2800 (Leatherhead, Surrey)   |   | |
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I love those Primus and Norge front-loaders. Were they hard or soft mount? |
Post# 976807 , Reply# 21   1/4/2018 at 06:25 (2,295 days old) by Frigilux (The Minnesota Prairie)   |   | |
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Excellent thread! Thanks to everyone who contributed photos, videos, and anecdotes.
The local laundromat where I grew up had two rows of the Westys shown in photo #1 below. They had an exposed fill tube and ran with the door open. Those machines were eventually replaced with two rows of the Westys shown in photo #2 below. No more exposed fill tube; machines stopped when door was opened. Photo #3 below: Have never seen Maytag Highlanders in a laundromat---and with the coin box mounted on front, no less! Had forgotten about those wooden bushel baskets. We had a few of them when I was a tyke in the early 1960s. All three photos in this post courtesy of Kevin and Gansky upthread. |
Post# 976846 , Reply# 22   1/4/2018 at 14:01 (2,295 days old) by RevvinKevin (Tinseltown - Shakey Town - La-La Land)   |   | |
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Thanks everyone, I'm happy you all are enjoying these "blast from the past" photos!
Lawrence: Yeah that girl talking to the guy in the shorts (part 2, photo 8) that pose is so unnatural, but funny too. The woman in the hat (Photo 9) is Jayne Mansfield (another below).
Paul: Yes I was thinking the same thing about the residential Westinghouse slant front washers made into coin-op machines in #9 of 20. Looks like they just removed the timer and knob assembly and added the coin slot/box on top.
Steve: I could tell the Frigidaire machines in some of those shots were were different, but don't know enough to tell which are which. The only one I kinda figured out is the 1-18's in photo 8 of 20 (part 1).
Greg: Thanks for adding a few more photos. So odd to see the coin box just slapped on the front of those highlanders. Wow that last photo after the tornado is something!
Robert: Yes I agree 100%! I could easily spend DAYS in that laundromat!!!
Eugene: Thanks for your comments about the Westinghouse machines. I was impressed by the sheer numbers of them in that photo!
While I grew up with a Maytag washer in the house, I could often be found checking out, or hanging out in the local laundromats. The one closest to us had Maytags, but also a couple of the larger "big load" FL machines. I find it interesting that front load washers were popular in laundromats back into the 1940's(?).
Here are a few more photos, including another of Jayne Mansfield. I don't know anything about what's left of the laundromat in photo #8. I'd like to know what brand those front loaders are, but I can't tell.
Kevin |
Post# 976850 , Reply# 23   1/4/2018 at 14:38 (2,295 days old) by Unimatic1140 (Minneapolis)   |   | |
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This one is also interesting..,
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Post# 976860 , Reply# 24   1/4/2018 at 16:10 (2,295 days old) by RevvinKevin (Tinseltown - Shakey Town - La-La Land)   |   | |
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Post# 976862 , Reply# 25   1/4/2018 at 16:25 (2,295 days old) by Tomturbomatic (Beltsville, MD)   |   | |
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Those are the Whirlpool dry cleaners. They also made a version of that that was a large capacity washer called a Whirlpool Wash-a-Lot, I believe. A small coin laundry in Decatur had two of them, both broken down as was the owner. |
Post# 976917 , Reply# 29   1/4/2018 at 22:12 (2,295 days old) by Ultralux88 (Denver)   |   | |
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Some of those older pictures show some really primitive laundromats! All the schlepping of wet washing from the agitating machine to the spin-dry machine, oy vey iz mir! I always found the HUGE dryers and the big commercial front loaders fascinating. We always had our own washer/dryer at home, so the laundromat was a rare experience, usually reserved for items too large or too dirty for mom to want to wash them at home. What I remember being the most interested in were the "Tumbletta" dryers, some Dexter front loaders, and later on some 70s looking Wascomat machines. |
Post# 977093 , Reply# 31   1/6/2018 at 03:32 (2,294 days old) by potatochips ( )   |   | |
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Great thread, Kevin! I really enjoyed the colours and decor of some of these laundromats! I also really liked seeing GE FFs in coin op flavor. |
Post# 977098 , Reply# 32   1/6/2018 at 05:26 (2,293 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage)   |   | |
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If you are referring to picture #6 in first set, that was taken in a wash house, not a laundromat per se, and likely was somewhere in Europe. IIRC that picture may have been taken in UK.
Once American laundromats moved from hand powered wringers or using wringer washing machines to top loaders things were by and large fully automatic. Some places did offer "extractors", which were large spin dryers, but that was due to the poor extraction of top loaders (and even the front loaders that were on offer then), in order to speed up drying time. Remember early Bendix and other front loaders didn't have suspension systems, so they needed to be bolted into floor. But they did spin even if at low rpms compared to modern H-axis washers. |
Post# 977326 , Reply# 34   1/7/2018 at 14:14 (2,292 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage)   |   | |
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We've done them before here in the group several times.
See: www.automaticwasher.org/cgi-bin/T... Yet more: Amazing to think wash house shown above was still in operation at 1971 when film was made. However there were plenty of modern laundryettes about as well: Interestingly but not surprisingly in UK wash houses were on same site as public baths. Makes sense in a way in that both required large amounts of water and modern (for their time) indoor plumbing. Not something every home had in late 1800's. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baths_and_... surveyoflondon.org/map/feature/1... Extensive list of UK bath and wash houses, part of a quite good website. www.bathsandwashhouses.co.uk/arch... |
Post# 977367 , Reply# 35   1/7/2018 at 19:53 (2,292 days old) by bendixmark (Winchester Mass)   |   | |
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Those are tombstone bendixes.I have 2 of them one nice one and one for parts to fix 2 others.Kevin I promised you some time ago I would post pics of mine and I will as soon as I get my computer straight. |
Post# 977527 , Reply# 36   1/8/2018 at 19:59 (2,291 days old) by cuffs054 (MONTICELLO, GA)   |   | |
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Those were some well feed chilrens. |
Post# 977562 , Reply# 37   1/9/2018 at 00:45 (2,291 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage)   |   | |
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Post# 977597 , Reply# 38   1/9/2018 at 08:44 (2,290 days old) by mayken4now (Panama City, Florida)   |   | |
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Post# 1117567 , Reply# 40   5/18/2021 at 15:18 (1,065 days old) by Unimatic1140 (Minneapolis)   |   | |
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Another good one to add to this collection in this thread!
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Post# 1117586 , Reply# 41   5/18/2021 at 18:35 (1,065 days old) by luxflairguy (Wilmington NC)   |   | |
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I've never hear of Breeze or Trend brands. Any idea of machine brands? |
Post# 1117591 , Reply# 42   5/18/2021 at 19:48 (1,065 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage)   |   | |
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Breeze was a budget brand detergent from Lever Bros. Key to their fame was boxes included a free Canon towel as give away. Of course that towel ate into how much product could be put in box.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeze_det... Trend is another budget brand made by Henkel/Dial Corp www.trenddetergent.com/po... Origianlly a Purex product introduced in 1946 as a light duty powdered detergent. Trend morphed over the years into a general wash day product the rest is here. "In 1982, Purex Industries, Inc. was acquired in a leveraged buyout by Gibbons, Green and van Amerongen Ltd., the predecessor of Leonard Green & Partners.[6][7] In 1985, the household and consumer products business of Purex Industries, Inc. was acquired by Greyhound Corporation[8] and was combined with Greyhound's Armour-Dial to form The Dial Corporation. By the 1990s, Purex would discontinue its bleach product to focus on laundry detergents." https://www.ebay.com/itm/294172864698QUE... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purex_...(laundry_detergent) |
Post# 1117592 , Reply# 43   5/18/2021 at 19:56 (1,065 days old) by Kenmoreguy89 (Valenza Piemonte, Italy- Soon to be US immigrant.)   |   | |
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Trend still is a brand today.
IIRC only liquid form now but until a couple years back it still came in powder form. The brand is a Dial Brand subsidiary of Henkel now totally Henkel. Looks like it was common in the North East area, NYC area. Could see lots of powder packets displayed in shop's windows in the Queens or Harlem back in 2016...and tried it out. Not bad but not even impressed. |
Post# 1117593 , Reply# 44   5/18/2021 at 19:57 (1,065 days old) by Kenmoreguy89 (Valenza Piemonte, Italy- Soon to be US immigrant.)   |   | |
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Post# 1117594 , Reply# 45   5/18/2021 at 19:58 (1,065 days old) by Kenmoreguy89 (Valenza Piemonte, Italy- Soon to be US immigrant.)   |   | |
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Post# 1117596 , Reply# 46   5/18/2021 at 20:04 (1,065 days old) by luxflairguy (Wilmington NC)   |   | |
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Thank you Laundress! |
Post# 1117598 , Reply# 47   5/18/2021 at 20:33 (1,065 days old) by rpms (ontario canada)   |   | |
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My mom,grandmother and aunt all used Breeze detergent just for the free towels. They came in pink,green,yellow and blue floral. Not the greatest towel but they seem to last. My cousin still has a couple of her mom's. They seem to be heavy on harvest gold and green. You had to wait forever to get the nice pink and blue. You could take the towel out of the box and it was so heavy ladden with soap you could toss it in the wash and didn't have to add detergent.
At the end they started only putting wash clothes in. |
Post# 1117617 , Reply# 49   5/19/2021 at 01:14 (1,065 days old) by Adam-aussie-vac (Canberra ACT)   |   | |
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Unfortunately the house closed got taken over by a mean old bat |
Post# 1117622 , Reply# 50   5/19/2021 at 06:55 (1,064 days old) by Adam-aussie-vac (Canberra ACT)   |   | |
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My bad |
Post# 1117623 , Reply# 51   5/19/2021 at 06:56 (1,064 days old) by chachp (North Little Rock, AR)   |   | |
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Post# 1117624 , Reply# 52   5/19/2021 at 07:18 (1,064 days old) by gansky1 (Omaha, The Home of the TV Dinner!)   |   | |
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#40 - Looks like Norge washers there.
Ironing -
There is an old coin laundry store in Minneapolis that has coin operated ironing equipment, a steam flat press, etc. Robert and I stood and watched a couple of ladies press nearly all of their laundry, t-shirts, jeans, etc. It was fascinating and all of the clothes looked so neat and crisp. The washers were still double-load Bendix/Dexter.
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Post# 1117625 , Reply# 53   5/19/2021 at 07:20 (1,064 days old) by Adam-aussie-vac (Canberra ACT)   |   | |
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Was in attended laundromat which probably explains why there was an ironing board in front of the two vintage Westinghouse washers |
Post# 1117630 , Reply# 54   5/19/2021 at 07:51 (1,064 days old) by seedub (South Texas Hill Country)   |   | |
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Post# 1117632 , Reply# 55   5/19/2021 at 08:16 (1,064 days old) by Unimatic1140 (Minneapolis)   |   | |
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Post# 1117694 , Reply# 56   5/19/2021 at 15:26 (1,064 days old) by Tomturbomatic (Beltsville, MD)   |   | |
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Was Snorge the only top loader with a spring-loaded lid? |
Post# 1117695 , Reply# 57   5/19/2021 at 15:29 (1,064 days old) by appnut (TX)   |   | |
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Post# 1117701 , Reply# 58   5/19/2021 at 18:14 (1,064 days old) by Unimatic1140 (Minneapolis)   |   | |
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Post# 1117743 , Reply# 59   5/20/2021 at 06:18 (1,063 days old) by Tomturbomatic (Beltsville, MD)   |   | |
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Great to know. As a kid, I was impressed with the Norge "weightless" lids hanging in mid air, neither all the way open nor crashing closed. |