In Knaresborough, near
where I live, is Tentergate, part of the high sloping bank above the River
Nidd.
Once it was the open area
where cloth from the water-mill was stretched tightly across frames to dry,
avoiding shrinkage.
The tenters – the fence-like frames – were set in rows
across the tenterfield.
The sharp-toothed pegs that held the pieces of cloth so
tightly were known, of course, as tenterhooks.
I have been thinking about
washing and drying, because a new, long-awaited washing line runs along the
length of my lawn, beside my house. One end is fixed to a holly tree and the
other to a sturdy young birch and the area is protected from the street by
hedges. While the sun smiles on Yorkshire, my washing billows in the wind and the
clothes and sheets come back indoors smelling of fresh air.
Before this blissful
event, a short double line ran across the small yard just outside the back
door. Hidden behind our 1920’s house, the old line was invisible from the
street. The washing line was, however, very visible from my workroom. As
indicated by the partly working bell panel, this was once the servant’s room so
whenever rain dotted the window-pane, she could nip out, rescue the washing and
pop back in again to speed on with her other duties.
My renewed interest in
washing lines must have alerted me to a BBC news item about the recent washing
line rebellion on the Millbank Estate in Pimlico, London. The residents
discovered workmen about to remove the washing lines that had been a feature of
their yard for seventy years. As the workmen arrived with chainsaws, the women
grabbed hold of the washing line posts and halted the official vandalism.
The estate managers
claimed the lines were “health and safety hazards” but the women said that they
were needed: the kitchens in the flats were too small for tumble-dryers. The
posts were left standing and - just in case the workmen returned - the bold
residents hung out their protest message. Painted letter by letter, the row of
old shirts spelled Save Our Lines.
Are washing lines always
seen as an eyesore, except when you are a tourist taking photographs? In 2010,
residents on Will Crooks Estate complained when their washing lines were
removed.
It seemed the area was being tidied up and those unsightly lines were
visible from the prestigious Canary Wharf opposite.
Meawhile, across in
America, where local housing committees have traditionally banned
washing lines, the national “Right To Dry” movement won its first washing line battle in
Colorado, in 2008.
Has laundry always been a
source of power and conflict? Originally women gathered to wash clothes on the
rocks and stones by streams or riverside - and still do in some parts of the
world. Then came the communal
wash-houses where women could pass on news and family secrets. Was the power of
gossip what tainted clean linen?
Or does the display of
washing – including those awkward personal garments, not always in good repair
– lower the status of the home-owner and surrounding community? (Might someone
be secretly “taking in” washing?)
Or was it the worry that -
being so intimate with “unmentionables” and the rhythms of the household - a laundress or servant might know too
much?
Certainly the home laundry
routine, regardless of the British weather, was evidence of a woman’s
character:
They
that wash on Monday have all the week to dry;
They
that wash on Tuesday are not much awry;
They
that wash on Wednesday are not so much to blame.
But
they that wash on Thursday wash for shame.
They
that wash on Friday wash in need
And
they that wash on Saturday are sluts indeed.
(Anon)
Oh. And ahem!
The lazy display of
washing seems somehow linked to hints of easy virtue, loose morals and loose clothing.
Dylan Thomas’s Polly
Garter, in his play Under Milkwood, was no better than she should be:
“Nothing
grows in my garden but washing and babies.”
I recall an earlier
History Girls post describing how young gentlemen gathered to watch
laundresses hoist their skirts above their ankles as they trampled the washing.
And surely there are songs suggesting maidens risked their virtue by going to
spread linen on bushes to dry?
Even Tentergate, with all
its frames, then lay outside the town, Perhaps that was known as a risky place for a
young girl to go to alone too?
Penny Dolan
