If tthe year was 1976,What would you be washing with?

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If I remember right, we had a Wizard Citation (Western Auto brand as that was where dad worked as a mechanic and got our fridge and washer there). I was 7 years old, we didnt have a dryer so our clothes got hung outside to dry in the summer and on the line in the basement in the winter. We didnt get a dryer until 1981 and it was a Kenmore "Match All" dryer.
 
If the year was 1976,What would you be washing with?

Well,

I unfortunately wasn't around yet. BUT...my mom and dad, married two years at this point, lived in a brand new funkadelic mobile home that had space, and came with a gold Lady Kenmore Portable set that was stacked in the corner of the bathroom complete with gold and white shag, and brown sink toilet and tub. The cabinets were all dark wood paneled looking too. As my mother recalls all the appliances were Kenmore in that place.... She also said that the machines were hidden behind some beaded drape type deal to kinda hide them from view. She also said it was the first thing in her life she ever destroyed out of hatred for the idea.

She puts it this way now...my mother; it was "better than the laundromat (but just barely). You could only wash two, maybe three pairs of jeans at once. And heavy blankets....forget it".

Needless to say they weren't taken with when we moved to our new house built in 1978-79. We got Maytag Fabric-Matics. I wanna say it was a Fabric-Matic as it had Automatic in one area where in others it would have two speed buttons, the four temp buttons and three water levels.

My grandmothers were using at that time, a Lady Kenmore TOL set (mom's mother) which she disliked for several reasons (no longer here to ask anymore) but one of the reasons is that her husband, my irrepressible grandfather, got a deal on them from his brother who was a Sears Tech back then.

Then there was my favorite washer later in my young childhood which was my dads mom. Grammy was still using her LBB30 Westinghouse Laundromat similar to the one above in the Pic shown...

Thats what I would have been using, had I been around in 1976. Had I been able to choose tho, someone would have had a 1-18. Maybe my mother would have before she bought the boring Maytags. LOL, today I no longer feel that way... Centerdials are the best for longevity and infrequency of repairs...
 
1976

I wasn't around yet either but not far from it. In 1976 my parents were newlyweds living in an apartment in the Houston suburbs. I actually happened to come across a photo or two of the inside of that apartment and they had their portable Lady Kenmore set. They used those for about 4 years so I vaguely remember them but that was the washer that got me hooked even when I was too young to remember. When I finally came across the portable LK I have now that brought back a flood of very distant memories, particularly how the water enters the tub. I remember thinking that it was just like water from a waterhose. Very smooth and quiet.

Now, as far as what machine I would be using if I were to run out and buy one??? Honestly, it I were in that position I'd be running all over town filling my basement with what Robert and some of the others have! Ok, and probably a TOL 1-18 as my new set.

:-)

Jon
 
Hotpoint + Hotpoint

We had a 1957 or 1958 Hotpoint washer with that red coffee-can-type filter canister that fit over the black straight-vane agitator. It walked across the floor a lot. Had a partial lighted backsplash although it didn't work ever.
We added a Hotpoint Silhouette (labeled "Custom" or "Custom-Crafted") 1968 dryer later although it didn't say "Silhouette" anymore. Dad said it was still considered a Silhouette because of the styling.
Washer died in 1977. Dryer died in 1985.
We tended to use this strange powdered detergent he bought at the employee store. It was called "SUPA-SAFE". Came in a big 10lb (?) box. If you were a Hotpoint employee they'd sell you the machine and the detergent.
 
1976 would be the 2nd half of my jr. year and the 1st half of my sr. year in college. the spring would have been avocado coin-op speed queens in the laundry room (was a brand-new complex then); the summer & fall I lived at the back of an older complex and across the street from the complex was a washateria. I odn't remember whar the top loaders were (maybe speed queen); but it also had 2 or 3 20-pound Norge front loaders, which are the ones I used when I did do laundry. Otherwise, I would save up and take laundry home to the black-face 1976 Kenmore 70 series washer & dryer at the lake house or at Christmas time tka ie all to Houston and wash in the 1971 Kenmore 800 and 1964 Wrinkle-Out Norge dryer.
 
Filter-Flo -- Two Generations

If I were home from college, my Mom's 1968 MOL GE Filter Flo; otherwise, my Grandmother's 1960 GE Filter_Flo.
 
Bob, you reminded me. In winter/spring 1976 I was living in the dorms at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. We had coin op standard capacity one-speed Maytag machines in avocado with companion HOH dryers. I loved listening to the washer, every bit a center dial -- except for its lack of one. By 1976 they were probably three years old, original equipment for Yosemite Hall, one of the newer dorms on the campus at the time.
 
that was the last year before

our 1965 coppertone frigidaire custom deluxe rollermatic bit the dust! replaced by a boring kenmore that i bought my aunt. wish i would have gotten her a 1-18!

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The Dependability People

Avocado green Maytag matching washer and dryer. I traded a poppy red Frigidaire 1-18 set back in after a few months and got the Maytags. It was my first Maytag dryer that wasn't a Holo of Heat. Mine was highest level two speed with standard capacity. Sold it a year later and moved across the country. Replaced them with a matching coppertone 1963 Frigidaire Imperial set.
 
I was a baby that year....

but my mom was washing with a 1972 Kenmore 800 washer (identical to the one JasonL has) and drying with a 1963 Kenmore Soft Heat 70 gas dryer at home in Virginia. At the cottage on Deep Creek Lake MD she was washing with a 1963 Kenmore 70 (the mate to the dryer in VA) and drying with a circa 1973 GE Jumbo Dryer....PAT COFFEY[this post was last edited: 9/3/2010-16:53]
 
Hi Paul...
Nice choice of twinny...here's mine just to make the fantasy feel a bit more real...can't take you back to '76 though !!
Me on the other hand would have had to have the Servis All-Fabric automatic, (pic 2) great styling, unique Hi-Zone agi & triple rinse..a must for any busy Housewife..lol
Keith

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A 1968 Simpson 4 speed programmed fluid drive...identical to the one Leon owns (and its his pic!)

Saw sterling service in our house until 1988 and then with a friend for another 2 years before being pensioned....

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In 1976 we were still using the

1963 Kenmore 600 which was in its later golden years. It was replaced with a new Kenmore with dual-action agitator in 1980 and in 1989 my parents moved into a new home that came with a brand new Hotpoint set - the GE design Hotpoint. Earlier this year I found a near mint 1963 Kenmore 600 and it's slated for a belt replacement and some minor repairs later in the cooler fall months as is the White-Westy Spacemates FL washer.

Exciting fall ahead - hope to have both vintage machines up and running a full capacity before Christmas arrives and it gets too cold to work.
 
1976 - Definitely Maytag!

My parents purchased a house in 1975. All the appliances came with it - in avocado no less. We did get a A208 and matching gas dryer. They worked well for us. Mom couldn't get used to not hearing the washer running since it was in the basement. It was a quiet machine. On several occasions when my friends were over to listen to the Seeburg AY-160 with all the current hits of the day and play ping pong. Mom would be often doing laundry. Since the laundry room was close by you could hear the washer drain into the laundry tub when it got to the spin cycle. All of a sudden my friends would stop, listen, and ask what the heck the running water was from!
 
Well......

I wasn't born yet, but my parents just bought their first washer, a MOL Whirlpool. Avocado Green. Had that machine up until 1999.
 
1976!

I lived in a apt building in New Jersey in 1976, we had coin op solid tub speed queens. But I spent a lot of time at my Aunts house and did a lot of laundry in her Poppy Frigidaire 1/18 set. That was my favorate!
Peter
 
In our house it was a 1968 GALA Automatic - the export version of the Hotpoint Automatic 1502 (shown on the left here), the second generation of Hotpoint's 1500 series. 10Lb wash-load, 1050rpm spin and Hotpoint's filter-clean system made it one of the most advanced British machines of the time. By 1976, Hotpoint were producing their 1509 re-styled version of the same machine - several of these in existence, but very few 1502s out there!

In my grandmother's house it was the GALA Filtermatic - again the export version of the Hotpoint Supermatic (not sure of the model number for this one) of the exact same year.

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I lived in an apartment house outside of Wash Dc-at that time was Speed Queen washers and dryers in the building laundramat-later they went to Whirlpool washers and dryers.The Speed Queens had the deep overflow rinse.Was really neat to watch.
 
not being alive then nor my parents bene married at that point my Nans Hotpoint 1400 Twinny would of done the wash on the maternal grandparents side,

Unsure about what my paternal Grandparents would of had at the time, either a twin tub - my aunt does not know which sort or possibly an Electra GL2 - big orange dial job.

Cant find pic of a GL2 so a GL3 will have to do lol.

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In 1976, I was doing most of

our family's laundry then, and was a sophomore/junior in high school.

The machine? The 1964 Whirlpool Imperial that shows up as a POD once in a while...the exasperated mother with the dirty twin boys. It died in 1978, and was replaced with a Maytag A208.

I was sad that I had to go off to college soon after. Where the machines in the dorms were GE Filter-Flo's with broken clutches that did not allow gentle action.

Lawrence/Maytagbear
 
I was only 3! but....

If it were 1976 it would look a bit like this as i think i'm about 3 on this photo. My parents had a shiny new (well 3 year old) Hoover Matchbox Auto washer, bought to cope with Terry Nappies and my Mams return to work. It went on until 1982.

Richard

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