Oxydol: The Movie
Tuesday, July 7, 2009 at 11:36AM 
"Washday at the FSA Camelback Farms." March 1942. By Russell Lee for the Farm Security Administration. View full size.Shorpy comment of the day: "In the early 70s. I remember that when we finally got a real washing machine (and given my dad's talent at frittering away money on worthless doodads, that was an event), Mom dragged the wringer washer into the back yard and smashed it up with a hammer so that nobody would ever be forced to use it again. She hated that thing with the fire of a thousand suns. I remember her taking two jobs so that we could afford modern appliances, and my dad whining all the while that 'the old stuff is good enough and you're just being picky.' Of course he never did a load of laundry or washed a dish in his life."
- Submitted by Charlene on Oxydol: 1942
Thanks to Jeff for pointing Shorpy readers to this 1938 film for Oxydol distibutors and retailers.
Reader Comments (1)
In 1963 my grandmothers washing machine had some problem that caused her to buy a new one.
I had watched as she heated big buckets of water on the kitchen stove,
then carried them out 250 feet to the shop where the old washing machine stood.
After putting the hot water in the machine, she added soap and put clothes in.
The machine agitated.
Thats the ONLY thing it did.
She took the clothes out, hand cranking them thru the rollers to squeeze the hot water out, keeping the precious hot water in the machine.
Then the clothes were dipped in a tub of cold water and hand cranked thru the rollers again.
Finally the clothes were hung on the clothesline to dry.
When I learned she was going to get a new machine, I thought of my mothers washing machine where you add clothes and soap, spin a dial and come back later to find your clothes completely washed, rinsed and spun to eliminate most of the moisture.
Imagine my disbelief when grandmas new machine was an exact copy of the old one!