London Wash House (1971)

Unissued / Unused material -
Bethnal Green, London.
Good shots of large scale washouse for use of local residents. Lots of old fashioned boilers and bubbling soapy water. A man keeps checking on the large washing machines. VS of women doing their laundry in the wash house. Lots of shots of machinery working the washing machines. VS of women doing their ironing in communal area. More shots of bubbling washers. Woman washes her whites in very hot water. MS of woman using scrubbing brush and washer board to clean shirts. Women using electric mangles to press water out of washing. Shots of drying racks and general laundry area. CU street sign 'Ramsey Street' Pan across blocks of flats and housing development. Exterior of Wash House.
FILM ID:3290.07
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British Pathé also represents the Reuters historical collection, which includes more than 136,000 items from the news agencies Gaumont Graphic (1910-1932), Empire News Bulletin (1926-1930), British Paramount (1931-1957), and Gaumont British (1934-1959), as well as Visnews content from 1957 to the end of 1984. All footage can be viewed on the British Pathé website. www.britishpat...

[@matthewperry848]

Damm hard work doing the washing in those days.

[@bumboseat1235]

Fantastic! Shame no sound

[@johnwalton2019]

Bethnal Green. The good ol' days.....(?)

[@ruthm.6071]

As everyone else has said , this cries out for narration . How long were these wash houses in existence ? Was the service free? When did they close down?
I have never heard of anything like this here in America. Does anyone know if we had public wash houses ?

[@bogavai]

In the United Kingdom wash houses were not free but affordable.They were build in the 19th century in order to improve hygiene and sanitation by using very hot water.Women used to carry all the clothing in bundles on the head and in buggies and was done usually once a week.Also it was a way for the women to socialize with a cup of tea while waiting for the clothes to dry in the drying racks after those hot washes.They had a small canteen for a drink and in some of them they had a creche to look after the children while the mums were busy.I say mums because in that time it was a job done by women with families.Eventually those places were replaced with the more modern launderettes but in the 60's some places still had wash houses.

[@ruthm.6071]

@@bogavai Thanks for the information. I had never heard of the public laundry facilities until seeing RUclips videos. It is an interesting story .

[@TroyLewis-v7n]

Homes in the uk back then didn’t have running hot water in all homes so heating water wasn’t always easy plus if you lived in a flat or somewhere small a wash house was a good option and very cheep all gone by the 80s replaced by laundrette

[@KbB-kz9qp]

There is no sound

[@mauromazzoncini5711]

Great video shame there's no sound

[@londonparticulars2968]

Here's the version with sound

[@mauromazzoncini5711]

@@londonparticulars2968 Thank-you 👍

[@gregorymalchuk272]

​@@londonparticulars2968Where is the version with sound?

[@silasatlas3835]

where is the dam sound

[@davidkennedy8929]

Damn!