Since we had no washer or dryer, here's how my mother had to do laundry. Carry laundry to basement. Build fire under huge kettle with wood. Boil clothes while stirring intermittendly with big stick. Good work out over hot kettle. No need to sit in sauna and waste time. Take 200 lbs of soggy clothes and rinse them several times. Wring them by hand. Carry 120 lbs of clothes up the stairs to outside to hang on line to dry. When dry, gather up 50 lbs and carry them to kitchen to iron, fold and put away. To get wood for this fire ....

-- trying to forget (seenitbefore@ww2.com), September 24, 1998

Answers

Umhmmm. Another charming aspect of the process: my mother's mother's mother (my great grandmother) died from burns she received washing clothes in this manner when her dress caught fire from the flames used to heat the wash pot. Since my grandmother's father had died a couple of years before from TB, this left my grandmother an orphan, along with her several siblings. They were scattered all over the southwest to various relatives and friends, and some of them didn't see each other again for more than 40 years.

And they say those were the good old days... .

-- nemo (nemo@deepsix.com), September 24, 1998.

The hot chimney flue from the woodstove in my grandparents' home started a fire in their house in the middle of the night. The only liquid available to my grandmother to throw on the fire in the emergency was the chamber pot partly full of pee. Fortunately, it worked, to save the life of my father and the others. Life has gotten considerably more convenient and comfortable over the last 80 years. <<<<<>>>>>

-- Dan Hunt (dhunt@hostscorp.com), September 24, 1998.

I grew up in the hills of Appalachia and I still remember the wood stove heat, outhouse, hoeing the garden (more like a field) etc. Anyone who thinks its a romantic way to live is nuts.

-- R. D..Herring (drherr@erols.com), September 24, 1998.

>Since my grandmother's father had died a couple of years before from TB, this left my grandmother< That's one of the little inconveniences I suffered also..... >liquid available to my grandmother to throw on the fire in the emergency was the chamber pot partly full of pee. < We always kept a pot with pee under our bed.....

-- trying to forget (seenitbefore@ww2.com), September 24, 1998.

> In a room, you would not be able to read by it, but one person would have to crank continuously while the other "read".< I'm sorry M/M Cook I have to disagree with you. We rode bikes with dynamos and they were quite bright, much brighter than what I had to study with: one candle.

-- trying to forget (seenitbefore@ww2.com), September 24, 1998.

TTF

I concur, I have seen a bicycle powered TV (on TV) powered by hormone fueled teens, watching what ever the hell it is that they they watch. Congrats to the inventive Papa who brainstormed that one.

"You wanna watch, you're gonna pedal."

-- Uncle Deedah (oncebitten@twiceshy.com), September 24, 1998.

In nineteen forty-seven and forty-eight the worst winter of the century paralyzed much of Europe and little fuel was available. Trains froze to the tracks. There was so much snow that Siggi and I did not have to go to school. We burrowed tunnels in the snow and walked over them without collapsing. General Lucius Clay, commander of the occupying American troops called Germany's predicament "truly appalling." Fortunately during the previous autumn, Ma, Siggi and I had cut some peat out of the bog and stacked up the blocks to dry before carting them home. We burned this peat, and a little coal that we scavenged, in our living room stove, and on the coldest days we all huddled around it. When someone entered the room and left the door open moments too long, Ma would shout, "Coal thief." To save fuel, Adele also cooked our meals there instead of on our kitchen stove. At night the temperature in the living room, where Oma slept on the couch, dropped below freezing. Ma wrote to Pa that "the chamber pots under the beds froze nightly for almost three months." Even though this was a frozen-pisspot winter, Pa, as always, dismissed this as complaining and had no words of comfort for us. Oma spent the end of her life on the couch, over her frozen chamber pot and under a down blanket. For twenty years she had suffered bronchial catarrh and entertained us by coughing and spitting into a mug. According to scientific computations, at a rate of two an hour, for fourteen hours a day, she had produced at least two hundred thousand green blobs in her lifetime. In other words many, many liters of it. Like Mrs. H she never seemed to get empty. Or did she die because she became empty? We kept a damp cloth by her sofa so she could wipe her face. One morning her cloth was frozen as stiff as the pee in her pot. And so was Oma. She was tired of expectorating and simply died. Days later she was loaded onto a farmer's cart and hauled to the nearby village where she had been born, to be buried. Her set of teeth that she always kept beside her went with her. Oma, white and stiff, rested in a black box and rumbled over the brick road to her grave. She was followed by a small procession of figures dressed in black. They walked quickly behind her so they would not freeze stiff also.

-- trying to forget (seenitbefore@ww2.com), September 24, 1998.

I was actually surprised at how quickly my 70-year-old Mom grasped the significance of Y2K. I figured we'd be arguing about it up until 12-31-99 or beyond. But she jumped right in, though she isn't online (said 5 years ago she thought computers would be the downfall of the Western world -- sheesh is she a prophet? -- absolute truth LOL) and depends on the paper, the TV and me for news about it.

It's comforting, though, when I talk about things with her, possible hardships and all that, and she says, "Aw so what". She grew up in the Depression, on a farm. Walked to school, uphill both ways, she says. (Still trying to figger that one out.) And her Daddy taught her what to do when the gas runs out. Once when they were fishing, the motor conked....Granddaddy just cast out with the flyrod and hooked a 50-lb. bass; tied off the rod, and the bass pulled the boat home.

There's always a way. (Parts of this story are true) (^_^)

-- John Howard (pcdir@prodigy.net), September 25, 1998.

John- Your Mom sounds quite a bit like mine - except that she walked 10 miles to school through 6' of snow, uphill both directions! Of course that's what I tell my kids that I did, too. 8-)

-- Tricia the Canuck (jayles@telusplanet.net), September 26, 1998.

Tricia-dont forget to mention to your kids the part that you didn't even have shoes!

-- madeline (runner@bcpl.net), September 26, 1998.

You're right, Madeleine, I usually do say barefoot in the snow! I should add that my kids take this about as seriously as most of us take TTF... 8-)

-- Tricia the Canuck (jayles@telusplanet.net), September 27, 1998.

P.S. Sorry I misspelled your name, Madeline!

-- Tricia the Canuck (jayles@telusplanet.net), September 27, 1998.

< I should add that my kids take this about as seriously as most of us take TTF... 8-)< Dear Tricia, everything I've mentioned about my y2k rehearsal is true. I am only posting so that others may benefit. I'm hoping for questions, but I'm getting more insults because it sounds so unbelievable. As a kid I was firebombed, ate animal guts from a manure pile, cat pealed off road, lived 2 years without water, heat or toilet and other fun stuff. Studied by candle light. True, so help me God. TTF

-- Trying to forget (seenitbefore@ww2.com), September 27, 1998.

I've had whooping cough, diphtheria, middle ear infection rotted out one ear but now I am in a better shape now than most people at any age. TTF

-- Trying to forget (seenitbefore@ww2.com), September 27, 1998.

TTF - I think you should work on your presentation. Avoid sensationalism. Facts will get the idea across much better than constant colorful references to things like "festering gobs of putrid green puss." If you really plan to publish your memoirs, maybe you should work with a writer who knows about these things. Having a good story, telling a story well, are two different things.

-- Mike (gartner@execpc.com), September 27, 1998.

I knew it was you Mr (Mrs?) he he he or is it heeheehee @ no brain. drip.

-- Uncle Deedah (oncebitten@twiceshy.com), September 27, 1998.

Oh before I forget, you never told us about being 'striped bare by two dozen lawyers and becoming a slave'.

For those of you who don't remember, see "No Hope" in the uncatagorized archive.

I will say that you're quite the writer Mr "?" I am sorry that I cannot match your prose, regardless of its inspiration.

-- Uncle Deedah (oncebitten@twiceshy.com), September 27, 1998.

Sorry, too quick on the submit button

Please do continue with your stories, dont let lil' ol' me stop you.

-- Uncle Deedah (oncebitten@twiceshy.com), September 27, 1998.

I caught that too, Uncle Deedah. It was the repeat of the cat scraped off of the road. TTF, you obviously have been through something very traumatic, please get some professional help.

-- Gayla Dunbar (privacy@please.com), September 28, 1998.

Sorry that some of you can't face the future. "Shooting the messenger" won't teach you anything and won't make the problem go away.

-- trying to remember (see@before.com), September 28, 1998.

TTF,

After all that you say you have been through, I'm disappointed that a few 'doubting Thomas (or doubting Deedah) posts could shush you. What can it harm you if we are't sure that you are the real deal? I think you may be a group of bored teens, but so what? How bad can a little ribbing be compared to eating kitty pizza?

-- Uncle Deedah (oncebitten@twiceshy.com), September 28, 1998.

There's only one problem with taking this story as a "rehearsal" for Y2K. Germany's infrastructure in the 1940s was gone, not disabled. That's a big difference. Also, TTF, your command of English seems very good for someone who grew up in war-torn Europe.

-- Buddy Y. (buddy@bellatlantic.net), September 28, 1998.

Compliments to you, Buddy, for your knowledge. Infrastructure was gone. Germany's currency was also destroyed. I had a few Deutsche marks in grade school piggy banks. Lost it all. In Sept. 1945 my mother, brother and I travelled across Germany in cattle cars and coal cars for 7 days. He and I were still young enough to pee our pants. Made easier than for adults. There were no WC's in cattle cars. My English is excellent because I was tricked into coming to the US by my Krautian relatives here. Once here, they enslaved my brother and me. We had to yank cows 2x a day, 7 days a week without pay. Of course where there are cows there is tons of cowshit..... Uncle Deedah, if you poopooh me again, I'll make you jealous.

-- trying to forget (seenit@before.com), September 28, 1998.

I'll say you were young enough in 1945. You were 5 years old according to your other post. I have a few memories from when I was 5, but I find your ability to recall all of these details a little questionable. Also, if other readers of this thread will go back and read "no hope", the thread Uncle Deedah mentioned down below under Uncatagorized, TTF's true attitude will show through very clearly. And now he's making threats? TTF, you said you were trying to help people- I don't believe that's true.

-- Gayla Dunbar (privacy@please.com), September 28, 1998.

Gayla

He, she, they are trying to help us. Help us vomit.

-- Uncle Deedah (oncebitten@twiceshy.com), September 28, 1998.

Dear Gayla, dear Uncle Deedah, if my experiences don't give you any insight of might happen, then I can't help you. I think your Weltanschauung will change during the imminent Goetterdaemmerung. Experience is the best teacher.

-- trying to forget (seenit@before.com), September 29, 1998.

TTF says, "I think your Weltanschauung (world outlook) will change during the imminent Goetterdaemmerung (twilight of the gods.)" So educate us, TTF, what is your definition of the "twilight of the gods?" And I'm not talking about your past- what will happen in 2000?

-- Gayla Dunbar (privacy@please.com), September 29, 1998.