Ken, the haphazard dispersal of the air freshener was sad. It depended on the release of the atomized spray into the air near the end of the cycle. It was supposed to be sucked into the dryer's intake air stream to perfume the clothes, BUT could not be done at the start of the cycle or it would be blown away by the time the clothes were dry. The fragrance hung nicely in the air every time I visited the appliance department at our branch of Rich's and pushed the key.
Thank you for the history of the Pull-To Start GE dryers. I never saw the lower models without Push-to Start. It did make them harmonious with the washers.
While the slanted control panels might have been easier to read for some, to me they were mostly ugly in the extreme and lacked the style of the earlier years. Whether the vertical control panels were chromed or painted or a combination of the two, they had style. The color-coordinated plastic dials and various styles of keys seemed more impressive than the subsequent two or three position side-to-side white plastic switches. The later, solid tabs on the vertical panels reminded me of stop tabs on an organ, always a plus for me, but the earlier ones with the key at the end of the lever had a sophistication of their own. No doubt these observations are important only to a collector or style connoisseur. As I typed "connoisseur", I remembered the cartoon in which that terribly fey mountain lion Snagglepuss explained the word, its spelling and pronunciation. We had black & white TV at the time, so I did not know he was pink. While the link is not to that cartoon, it will give younger readers an idea of his style.
