I think of Lux soap as a bar soap, not a dishwashing soap. Based upon this 1923 advertisement, it appears that a hundred years ago, Lux came in small pieces in boxes. The advertisement is about using Lux to wash dishes, though the box in the picture says that it is “for all fine laundering.” Apparently back then, the same soap was used both laundry and dishwashing.
Ivory soap flakes always were around our house; apparently my mother preferred them to Lux. We used them for hand laundry, particularly. The Lux flakes still are available under a different brand name.
My family also apparently preferred Ivory soap. I can’t remember ever seeing Lux. It’s interesting that Lux flakes are still around.
When I was in 5th grade art class, I carved a squirrel from a bar of Ivory soap. It carved better than any other brand.
What fun! It sounds so much easier to carve than wood.
I also remember Ivory flakes. We made sculptures out of it.
Now that you mention it I have, vague memories of making sculptures out of Ivory flakes at Vacation Bible School when I was a child. I’d totally forgotten about that.
Soap is soap! We’ve fallen for the advertising trap that we need eight different soaps for everything from our shampoo to our laundry detergent. I remember Ivory flakes as well. I still remember their scent. Captain Kangaroo always had us make sculptures out of them!
I think you’re right about us falling into the advertising trap. Products that are basically the same are differentiated by packaging and ads.
My mother was a first grade teacher and she always had her students make soap sculptures as Mother’s Day Gifts – it was a end of the school year project! We never used the flakes for anything other than her art project…
🙂 My sense is that Ivory Flakes didn’t get clothes as clean as some of the laundry detergents.
I remember Lux soap flakes from my childhood. My mother used them for washing wool, I seem to think. But not for dishwashing. It was marketed as a superior product for clothes here, I’m almost certain.
It’s interesting that Lux was marketed as a specialty, superior product for washing things like woolen goods.
Tide and Duz soap powder were the ones I remember my grandmother and mother using. I don’t recall when anyone starting using “dish soap” in a liquid form. While I definitely remember watching Captain Kangaroo, I don’t remember soap sculptures!
I think that my mother generally used Fab laundry powder. I’m pretty sure that even when I was a small child that my mother used liquid dish soaps.
Then you are obviously way younger than I am!
hmmm. . . not sure about that.