For sale is a late 1800s HORSE SHOE BRAND MODEL 350 CLOTHES WRINGER from the American Wringer Company, New York, USA. This amazing wringer features legible text on numerous surfaces and the iconic horse shoe company logo. The roller size measures 10 inches long and 1 3/4 inches diameter. This functional antique primitive measures about 16 inches tall and 13 inches wide (not including the handle). This mechanical clothes wringer uses rubber rollers springs to squeeze the water out of clothes. The rollers are connected by metal gears to a hand crank that fed the clothing through the machine. Mechanical clothes wringers were easy to use and extremely popular in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Even though this wringer is over 100 years past its 3-year warranty, its still going strong. This rare wringer might be the nicest horse shoe brand wring in America.
The text on one wood panel provides the following instructions; “This Wringer has warranted Rubber Rolls – vulcanized to the Shafts – Put a little oil or lard on the bearings before using and loosen top screws when the wringer is not in use”. Another panel has the following text: “Horse Shoe Combination Tub Clamps will hold wringer securely to galvanized iron, fibre or wood tubs”. One of the cross bars has text that reads: “IT’S ALL IN THE RUBBER”.
In 1859, Seldon A. Bailey invented the mechanical clothes wringer in New London, CT. In 1860, he began producing wringers on a small scale in Wrentham, MA. In 1865, Simeon S. Cook persuaded Bailey to move his business to Woonsocket, RI where his device could be mass produced and properly advertised. The company was called the Bailey Wringer Company. By 1870, the Bailey Wringer Company was producing 50,000 wringers per year. Sometime before 1899, the company changed its name to the American Wringer Company. The American Wringer Company’s years of prosperity ended in the 1920’s after the invention of the electric washing machine.
