Ed Huntress wrote:

"Harold and Susan Vordos" wrote in message
...

By contrast, when I took my class in electricity in high school, the first
thing the teacher taught us was to ground washing machines----obviously at

a

time before the ground wire was an integral part of typical wiring (back

in

'55, it was), and death by electrocution while washing wasn't exactly
unheard of.

First thing I did when I got home was run a ground wire to an overhead

water

pipe and connect it to the washer. My mother went to her grave secure

in

the knowledge that I had tried to kill her by electrocution, and no amount
of explaining what the wire was for changed her mind. She refused to wash
clothes until the wire was removed. Ignorance, and lack of trust in

one's

offspring, can create some very bad memories.


Jeez, she thought you were trying to kill her? I locked my mom in the
basement once, when I was 7 and she was being particularly churlish one day,
but she would have stuck her fingers in a socket if I asked her to give me a
hand with my electricity project. g

--
Ed Huntress


I remember Mom had a Bendix washer. The plug was a 2 wire with a circuit breaker
inside the plug. It would flip a plastic lever and push itself out of the socket.

Insulation shorts in motors and switches were the dangers. Varnishes used for insulation
had yet to be great as it is today. This is how motor repair people can wind more HP
into a frame of old motors since the old varnish is so thick.

Martin

--
Martin Eastburn, Barbara Eastburn
@ home at Lion's Lair with our computer
NRA LOH, NRA Life
NRA Second Amendment Task Force Charter Founder