The wringer was two rubber rollers on a frame bolted to the top of the wash tub. You fed the wet clothes between the rollers and you turned the crank and the rollers squeezed the water out and the clothes came out the other side flat as paper. The wringer was the most honest machine in the apartment. You put in effort and it gave you results. No shortcuts. No settings. Just the crank and your arm.

My grandmother ran the wringer on Mondays. Wash day. She boiled the clothes in a tub on the stove and she fished them out with a wooden stick and she fed them through the wringer one piece at a time. The water poured back into the tub. The clothes came out stiff and damp and ready for the clothesline. The wringer turned laundry from a bath into a process.

The wringer caught fingers. Everybody knew somebody whose fingers went through the wringer. The rollers did not stop. The rollers did not know the difference between a shirt and a hand. You fed the clothes carefully and you kept your fingers out of the way and if you did not the wringer taught you. The wringer was the most dangerous appliance in the apartment and the most necessary.

There was a release lever. A safety. You hit the lever and the rollers separated and whatever was caught came free. My mother showed me the release lever before she showed me how to turn the crank. The first lesson was how to stop. The second lesson was how to start. The wringer taught you that safety comes before skill. Every machine should teach you that.

The spin cycle replaced the wringer. The washing machine spins the clothes at a thousand revolutions per minute and the water flies out and the clothes come out damp and nobody turns a crank and nobody catches a finger. The spin cycle is better. The spin cycle is safer. But the wringer gave you something the spin cycle does not give you. The wringer gave you the feeling that you did the work. The spin cycle does the work while you watch television. The result is the same. The feeling is not.

See also: Clothesline Pulley, Clothesline