Rescued! A G.E. dryer with a console I've never seen...

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Auntie Em

My aunt got this dryer, a range and a freezer at the same time, in 1961 when my uncle worked for Hanford Nuclear site in the Tri Cities area of Washington state. At that time it was oeprated by General Electric. As a job perk, employees got super buys on selected models and the payments were taken from their weekly checks.
 
Did I hear my name?

Thank you so much for a. Saving this dryer, and b. taking such beautiful close-ups and detailed shots.

 

The short answer is I don't know if this is a "match-all" dryer but it's likely. I think, I say I think, I saw a matching washer once, but I can't be sure. This model is from 1964 and makes sense in that there was a major comprehensive design change for Home Laundry appliances between 1963 and 1964 and GE always came up with models that would utilize, use up, whatever, parts from the previous year's models. I've seen these models in black and white and in blue and white and they are both using toggleswitches from 1960 and 1961 model years. Tom Stiyer has a 1963 BOL that uses the same toggleswitch design.

 

I always wondered whether these models were prototypes for a totally new design of backsplash that used a lot more Lexan than metal, but for some reason never made it to full production.

 

As Cloris Leachman once uttered, in a memorable episode of "Malcolm in the Middle" , "itz a myztery". Nice to see one up so close and personal.

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BOL GE

We had this essentially same dryer growing up, I think ours was a 1958. The one we had was essentially just a box with a dial and levers on top of the machine and had the horizontal handle. As said, I think this is just the BOL model, but I like the console on these, very simple, and to me they don't look cheap...

-Tim
 
Neat find from the mid 60s

I saw lots of these with different features in the 60s. Tim is correct. This control panel sort of replaced the rectangular box from the late 50s that sat in one corner of the top and let things fall behind the dryer, but I don't ever recall a GE "Match all" model. GE's idea: if you want it to match, buy our brand for both washer and dryer. Some washers with this control panel did not even have Filter Flo; a friend had one with the matching dryer. They were usually one cycle rarely had a water level switch and I don't think I saw one with 2 speeds. GE made all kinds of funny low end machines, possibly for markets in poorer areas. Weirdest one I ever saw in the downtown Rich's was a two speed with a single fill valve with water temperature regulated at the faucet; the only switch on the panel was the speed switch.

The only other dryer on which I have seen that door knob was the yellow "Sunshine" dryer seen occasionally in magazine ads for $99.00. Like a "Fertile Myrtle" this knob only needed one screw whereas the larger handle took two screws to mount to the door. The ads usually featured children coming in with wet clothing or a window showing a gray, rainy day to contrast with this bright yellow dryer. Back then, dryers were not advertised except in the fall and winter months in magazines. I was told by someone that this dryer was only 115 volts. It had no control panel, just a timer dial on top and a little round metal push to start button beside it.

Thanks for rescuing and sharing, Drew.
 
GE made all kinds of funny low end machines

I'll second that.

 

GE produced tons of different iterations of many BOL's to grab all sorts of different markets. I've seen GE BOL's featuring mini-baskets with only one speed, one cycle, no temperature choice but a full range of fill selections. I think GE took a page out of the Sears Kenmore playbook. Maytag didn't do anything like this until the late eighties.

 

Bottom-of-the-barrel BOL's  in the sixties usually had a WA3... or WA2... designation and frequently had no filter-flo and only a cycle-dial mounted directly on top of the cabinet covering only one of the panel access holes using in the more expensive units. Here's a model that I've seen from 1960, a WA350T (it features a wash temperature choice, Hot or Warm):

bajaespuma++9-12-2012-13-35-22.jpg
 
You really do some neat designs, Ken. So, the WA-475W is the matching washer to this dryer? Interesting. I wonder what other console designs GE has floating out there?

RCD
 
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