OT - Story - Clothes that are whiter than white

..even if they didn't start out that way.

Doing laundry at my grandparents' home is serious business, and makes
our method of dumping clothes and detergent in a machine and turning
the dial look wimpy and inadequate. Like so many things they do, it
involves a lot of work and time, and just a little bit of fire.

From the time I was small, I was in total awe of Oma's laundry
procedure. It was tough, and not a molecule of dirt stood a chance
against it. You may not have clothing by the end of laundry day, but
you certainly wouldn't have dirt.

First, the clothes are closely examined for spots, and each spot is
scrubbed with laundry soap (read lye soap) and a little brush. Then,
they need to be boiled for a while on the stove in the laundry room.
The laundry room is only slightly smaller than my kitchen, and nearly
as well equipped. It has a wood stove (naturally), a sink, washer,
washboards, wringer, and all the acoutrements necessary to make dirt
run away screaming. The room has a door that opens onto the
backyard, for easy access to the clothesline. In winter, there is a
duplicate clothesline in the basement, just outside the other laundry
room door.

After the clothes have boiled, the boiling water is dumped down the
sink, and the clothes go through the wringer, to make sure the dirty
boiling water is removed. They are now ready for the washing machine.
German washing machines aren't like the ones we have in the US. They
are much smaller, have no agitator, and clothes spin on a horizontal
axis. They also heat their own water (of course), and take a good
two hours to run through one cycle.

Oma uses Persil detergent, a tough chemical brew that would take your
skin off under the right circumstances. It is especially effective
in hot water, which is good because Oma is not about to use that
wussy cold water to clean clothes. I think she'd faint if she saw my
"All Temperature Cheer Unscented," which is perfectly fine in cold
water, and isn't toxic in the least. And I don't even own a wringer!
(My washboard is stuck to the wall as a decoration in the pantry)

The clothes go through their two hour torture cycle in the washer,
and are now considered clean. They then move in an equally clean
laundry basket to the clothesline, where the sun and breeze do their
thing in making sure that clothes are white and fresh.

The only problem is that most of my clothes didn't start out white to
begin with. I generally prefer colored clothing, probably because I
am neither a nurse nor a ghost. Most dyes do not stand up to this
treatment, and my jeans become more than stonewashed in one cycle.
Two rounds of Oma-laundry equals about five years of daily wear.

The other gotcha is that modern fabrics (most synthetics, anything
lightweight, and anything with elastic or lycra) cannot stand this
kind of treatment. I've gotten back underwear that I thought was new
the previous day, but now resembles cheesecloth. Oma mutters about
the quality of "cheap American clothing."

Indeed, my clothing is disposable paper towel compared to hers and
Opa's. The most famous example being Opa's one pair of shorts. Not
lederhosen or anything like that, just a pair of men's shorts, worn
with black socks and old loafers, like the ones worn by millions of
old men. I don't know what color the shorts were to begin with, and I
can barely describe what color they are now: a sort of
grey-blue-brown-olive-whatever tone that boggles the mind. (The
shoes are another story - they're probably just as old as the shorts,
but they are shiny and look practically new. Shoes get polished
weekly in my grandparents' home)

Those shorts have been around for fifty years or more, and have
survived countless cycles of Oma's laundry torture routine. The
color might be gone, but the shorts are intact, and Opa loves them.
I try to contemplate what fabric the shorts are made of, and why they
are so durable. I figure that they're a blend of hemp, sailcloth and
fiberglass. Maybe there's some steel wool in there, too.

I know that archaeologists will be examining them several thousand
years from now, shouting in astonishment that they are still intact
after goodness knows how many millenia. They'll carefully remove
them from the layers of soil that once represented this civilization,
and rush them off to a laboratory for examination. How could such a
garment exist after so long, and how could it still be in such
perfect condition? Perhaps it was a cermonial garment, used only for
special religious ceremonies. (hah)

Maybe they'll find the answers that I've sought for so long, and
they'll probably be astonished after carbon-14 dating of the things.
But there's one thing they'll never ascertain: what color the shorts
were when they were new.

Kathy N-V

hemp, sailcloth and fiberglass, huh?
sailcloth, or "canvas" is originally also hemp cloth, the word canvas
is a corruption of cannibus and denim was hemp sailcloth made in Nimes
(de Nimes cloth) that also was extremely long wearing. Some Japanese
hemp cloth is over 200 years old---as is our Constitutiuon, also
written on hemp paper. MUCH stronger than cotton or wood pulp pare ever
could be.

in article , Sarajane
at wrote on 9/1/05 5:00 AM:

hemp, sailcloth and fiberglass, huh?
sailcloth, or "canvas" is originally also hemp cloth, the word canvas
is a corruption of cannibus and denim was hemp sailcloth made in Nimes
(de Nimes cloth) that also was extremely long wearing. Some Japanese
hemp cloth is over 200 years old---as is our Constitutiuon, also
written on hemp paper. MUCH stronger than cotton or wood pulp pare ever
could be.

Fascinating, Sarajane. I love fabric lore. Do you happen to know the origins
of cambric and what it was used for. As in the song from 'Scarborough Fair'
'Tell her to make me a cambric shirt
Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme
Without no seam nor needlework'

I've always wondered about that.
--
Marisa (AU/NZ)
www.galleryvittoria.com
"She who dies with the biggest stash, wins."

Marisa, Cambric is cotton finely woven in the style from Cambrai
France. here's a WAY cool link with much fabric info---
http://www.fabrics.net/joan201.asp