I have always thought that this was the most beautiful washer GE made. I remember it being on the floor, along with the matching dryer, of our branch of Rich's Department Store and I would visit it there maybe twice a week when we walked to the shopping center to get groceries. If I did not visit the appliances at Rich's, I read about them and looked for ads for them in the huge magazine section at Kroger's.
POD 1959 GE TOL Washer Possibly WA955S
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Tom,
I'm right there with you regarding this washer and dryer. The 1958 is a beautiful machine, but there's something about the addition of color to the timer that really makes this one pop!
Which Rich's store were you haunting in 1959?
lawrence
I'm right there with you regarding this washer and dryer. The 1958 is a beautiful machine, but there's something about the addition of color to the timer that really makes this one pop!
Which Rich's store were you haunting in 1959?
lawrence
Love the turquoise filter-flo mount and matching activator cap!
I couldn't agree more
Tom, don't you have a pair of these in the Museum?
I, alas, only have the control panels, but I was happy to get them.
I think 1959 and 1960 were GE's most colorful years.
Tom, don't you have a pair of these in the Museum?
I, alas, only have the control panels, but I was happy to get them.
I think 1959 and 1960 were GE's most colorful years.
Lawrence, It was the Belvedere store, the second one after Lenox to be opened. Before any suburban stores were opened by Rich's, there was small store that sold appliances and televisions in the first part of the Belvedere Plaza Shopping Center. This was a very smart move by Rich's because of all the new homes that were being built in the area in the mid 50s and that was about 5 years before builders began offering builtin kitchen appliances. Also the mid 50s was when televisions were a hot item for families.
We had the dryer but not the washer
It ran extremely quietly and smoothly to the end. When the folks replaced it, in 1973 or 1974, it was running too hot and blowing fuses. Probably just a simple thermostat. I’ve always wondered how many more years it would have run. It was very well made.
One of the most gorgeous machines ever designed.
Reality, though. It wasn’t a great dryer, design wise. No end of cycle signal. For cool down it had to be manually reset to the timed gray de wrinkle area of the timer dial. The drum was small. The heating element was directly behind the drum, with perforated openings covering the entire back of the drum. So a bulky item could get scorched. And it didn’t have temp settings — just an auto dry area on the dial for delicate medium and heavy. Set on delicate it just ran only a short time and items didn’t dry, and it’d have to be reset multiple times.
Still, they’re gorgeous! And if I were a collector I’d definitely want a set in my collection for sure.
It ran extremely quietly and smoothly to the end. When the folks replaced it, in 1973 or 1974, it was running too hot and blowing fuses. Probably just a simple thermostat. I’ve always wondered how many more years it would have run. It was very well made.
One of the most gorgeous machines ever designed.
Reality, though. It wasn’t a great dryer, design wise. No end of cycle signal. For cool down it had to be manually reset to the timed gray de wrinkle area of the timer dial. The drum was small. The heating element was directly behind the drum, with perforated openings covering the entire back of the drum. So a bulky item could get scorched. And it didn’t have temp settings — just an auto dry area on the dial for delicate medium and heavy. Set on delicate it just ran only a short time and items didn’t dry, and it’d have to be reset multiple times.
Still, they’re gorgeous! And if I were a collector I’d definitely want a set in my collection for sure.
It probably just needed the lint vacuumed from the motor/blower area. There was only one drying temperature. Where you set the auto dry markings determined how long the cycle time was based on how many times the timer motor cycled on when the heater was off. This was known as time/temperature auto dry. The timed dewrinkle cycle was meant for wash and wear garments. There was no end of cycle signal, but the user was supposed to know when to remove garments based on the time set on the dial. Whirlpool and other dryers used timed drying for wash and wear so that the user would know when to remove the load and the 10 minute cooldown made sure that the loads were not hot when the dryer stopped. That timed cycle with the extended cooldown was great for drying heat sensitive items because after an initial drying period with heat, determined by the user, the last 10 minutes finished the drying on the heat that was in the machine without additional heat so the garments were not subjected to higher than optimum temperatures and sort of coasted to a state of dryness as they cooled down. I used to set my cotton twin bedding to 21 minutes on this cycle to get perfectly dry and soft sheets.
Midway through the model run, GE changed the heating element from the heater in a rectangular can that fed into the drum through the rectangular opening on the stationary back of the drum to the round heating element behind the rotating back of the drum. You can see that first arrangement in the pictures Ken furnished of this pair.
Midway through the model run, GE changed the heating element from the heater in a rectangular can that fed into the drum through the rectangular opening on the stationary back of the drum to the round heating element behind the rotating back of the drum. You can see that first arrangement in the pictures Ken furnished of this pair.
