4 Lessons Little House On The Prairie Can Teach Us About Dirty Laundry
We don’t have a time machine, but we do have Hollywood portrayals of past eras. Little House On The Prairie was an amazing book series adapted for television in 1974. Through the long-running series, we got to see what Hollywood directors thought families did with dirty laundry back in the 1930s and 40s.
Here are a few things we learned about dirty laundry and line-drying based on Little House On THe Prairie.
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1. Manage your wardrobe so you don’t have to do so much laundry every week.
It seemed like Ma was always doing laundry. Today, we just throw our dirty laundry in the washer and then the dryer. Maybe we fold it. It is ready to go! In Little House On The Prairie, we saw how much work laundry used to be.
Characters didn’t wash their garments after each wear. They kept them fresh and washed them if they got dirty — say Laura fell in the mud for comic relief during the show.
2. You don’t need a huge wardrobe.
Characters wore their garments until it was laundry day. They had Sunday dresses and school clothes. It was socially acceptable — and probably within the show’s budget — to have characters repeat outfits.
If you have a wardrobe with quality garments that work for respective occasions, you will have much less to deal with on laundry day. Your closet will also be easier to manage.
3. Line-drying is where it‘s at.
Line-drying might be the only laundry practice that has stood the test of time. No drying machine can freshen clothes quite like fresh air and the sun. The sun naturally whitens white garments — no harsh chemicals needed. Line-drying is also better at ridding your garments of any stale smells.
Line-drying is also a much gentler way to dry your clothes. Every time you put a garment in a dryer, you strip down the fiber — those are the fibers filling-up the lint collector.
Just be careful of bad weather.
4. Strong fabrics are worth the extra cost.
Seeing Ma and the girls scrub their dresses against a washboard really gives us a good perspective of what our garments go through in the washing machine. They needed to have strong, durable fabrics for everyday wear.
