DON’T DYE HERE. WE’RE NOT RESPONSIBLE. BE AN ANGEL. If you did laundry in an American coin laundromat in the 1960s or 70s, you may have read one of these while your clothes spun: a tall white panel, a big-nosed cartoon man on top, a house rule in capital letters underneath.
They were called Laundesigns. Schorr Sign Service of Glendale, Queens registered sixteen of them with the US Copyright Office in 1960 and 1961 and sold them to laundromat owners by mail. Some are still hanging. None is signed, and nobody has yet said who drew them.
This page is an open file on the signs. Every claim is marked documented, when a record says it, or inferred, when it’s a reading of the evidence. It changes as the search goes; the Change Log says what changed and when.
How this started
A Red Bull ad, a sick weekend, and a laundromat in Bensonhurst. The whole story is in A Grave Situation.
What is known so far
The maker was Schorr Sign Service at 67-15 Myrtle Avenue, Glendale, Queens. In June 1963 it moved down the block to 67-43, a 3,000 square foot plant. Joseph Schorr (1923 to 2006) ran it. He was a show card writer, and his father was a Queens sign painter.
Sixteen designs were registered in March and April 1960 and November 1961. The claimant is Laundesigns and the author of the print is Joseph Schorr. Two more designs turn up on surviving signs and in ads with no registration found.
The 1962 trade ads describe each sign as silk-screened enamel on Marlite, a glossy plastic-faced hardboard, completely framed in stainless steel. A tape measure in a marketplace photo of the blue series puts one sign at about 18 inches wide by 48 inches tall. Most survivors in photographs have no frame.
They sold through ads in American Coin-Op from 1961 to 1963, then through distributors, and were still listed in trade directories into the early 1970s.
Who drew the cartoons is open. The copyright cards name Schorr as author of the print, which settles less than it sounds. The style, with the bulb nose, heavy eyelids and stick legs, shows up all over period clip art and studio greeting cards. No source drawing has been found. The Artist Question has the evidence.
Searching for a vintage laundromat sign?
Most people who own one have never heard the name Schorr or Laundesigns. They search for vintage laundromat signs, 1960s laundry room signs, retro coin laundry rules, or the words printed on the sign. These are the eighteen known titles: DON’T DYE HERE, WE’RE NOT RESPONSIBLE, BE AN ANGEL, THIS COULD BE YOU, HOWDY NEIGHBOR, DID YOU SAY CHANGE?, WE’RE SORRY, CAREFUL NOW!, DON’T BE BASHFUL, THINKING OF YOU ALWAYS, YA BETTER WATCH OUT, SAVE YOUR MONEY, WE NEVER SLEEP, TAKE IT EASY WITH THAT LOAD, EXTRACTING ANYONE?, an Uncle Sam mascot, and two washer and dryer posters, HERE’S HOW and DRY?. A real one has a small maker line in the caption box: Laundesigns, N.Y.C. © 1961.
Schorr Sign Service of Glendale, Queens, New York, sold them under the name Laundesigns starting in 1960.
The designs were registered in 1960 and 1961. Ads ran in the coin laundry trade press from 1961 to 1963, and the line was still listed in directories into the early 1970s.
Unknown. No sign or ad found so far carries a signature. See The Artist Question.
About 18 inches wide by 48 inches tall, going by a tape measure in a marketplace photo. Originals are glossy plastic-faced hardboard with screen-printed flat enamel and a small Laundesigns maker line in the caption area. Paper, card or tin versions are a different product or a reproduction. The Sign Catalog has photos.
Use the sign report form. Photos of the back, the edges and a tape measure help most.
In this file
- Sign Catalog: every title, its registration number, and where it has been seen, with photos.
- Timeline: 1928 to now.
- Joseph Schorr: his life and family, year by year, from the records.
- People and Firms: the Schorr family, the clip art studios, the competition.
- The Artist Question: who drew the figures, and what the evidence supports.
- Open Questions
- Other Vintage Laundry Signs: look-alikes and other makers found along the way.
- Research Archive: every photo, ad, register page, census sheet and property record from the search, labeled by source.
- Sources
- Change Log
- Report a Sign
- Order a Sign: get on the list if these get made again.
Have one of these signs?
Tell me where. A blurry phone photo counts. The sign report form asks the right questions, or leave a comment at the bottom of any page.
Anything else
Questions, corrections, a relative who worked on Myrtle Avenue: write here.
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