Whitening Woollies

New Zealand Listener, Volume 19, Issue 472, 9 July 1948, Page 23

Whitening Woollies

Dear Aunt Daisy. Here is a good way of making white again those yellowed baby-clothes and shawls which every mother knows about. No matter how carefully white babyelothes are washed (with borax in the water) and carefully dried away from strong sunlight, still the woollies do lose at least some of their whiteness, and often get really yellow. This method of bleaching with sulphur is good-try it first with one or two garments, as one finds out little "dodges" by experience. Suspend the garment in a big box or an airtight cupboard, or something convenient, and burn about a tablespoon of sulphur in a little tin underneath, on the same principle as sulphuring apples and pears. The tin should be stood upon a piece of brick, or a stone, and some live coals or wood (not smoking) put in; then about a tablespoon of sulphur sprinkled over. Cover the box immediately, or close the cupboard, to keep in the fumes. Leave in for 15 minutes to half an hour. Do not have the garment too close to|

the tin.

F.

C.

Thank you for the hint. Our good old method of whitening woollies by soaking and kneading them in a thin paste made with warm water and powdered chalk is at present unusable, because the type of powdered chalk available is of unsuitable quality. A few people who had become accustomed to that method have told me that the chalk now makes the garments hard, and is impossible to wash out thoroughly. A chemist advised me that the chalk available at present is different from our usual kind; and suggested that ‘those who had found the garments hard might. try soaking them in a weak solution of acetic acid-a dessertspoon to a quart of water.