Phoenix resident Michael Thomas works for Northern Arizona University's admissions department. His home office has all the usual fixtures of a home office: a computer, framed photos, awards.
But most of the room is taken up by Thomas’s massive vintage vacuum cleaner collection. Rows and rows of vacuums occupy much of the floorspace, and shelves against the wall as high as the ceiling display even more.
MICHAEL THOMAS: Believe it or not, I work in this mess.
There are times when I just swivel around and sit and check out my vacuum cleaners. I like looking at ‘em. I really, I just do. And I’m like, God, you got a lot of really cool stuff here.
My name is Michael Thomas. I’m 67 years old … and I have probably 150 to 160 vacuum cleaners in my collection. …
My discovery of my love of vacuum cleaners started when I was just a kid … as a 4-year-old, 5-year-old, I’d play with my mother’s vacuum cleaner. …
When my parents would visit people I’d sneak around and look in their closets to see what kind of vacuum cleaner they had. I knew ‘em all by name, I began to know ‘em by models, I didn’t actually start collecting however until I got my own home, no roommates or anything like that.
Then I started — I got the wild hair that I should start looking in thrift stores, so I did, and I found all these cool old vacuum cleaners that simply needed a home. ...
I had told myself once upon a time, “No vacuums outside the vacuum room.” Well, you know. There’s a couple out there, and I have some in the bedroom. The Eureka uprights are all in the bedroom because there’s no room in here for them.
This is a tank. The bag goes in the front and the motor’s in the back, and Electrolux made them exclusively for decades, many many decades, they were like the tank vacuum… OK. …
And now, let’s try a Kirby. Sanitronic 7, from 1965.
When it comes to quiet, Kirbys don’t know what that means.
This one’s called a slim line. The problem with these is that they’re square, bulky, and in this little house they get caught on walls and stuff. These are much better. They’re sleek, you know, the Constellations, these are awesome because as I said, they float, but they follow you.
Here is an Electrolux Model 30, just like that, in original collection. It came in this carrier, in this storage, a storage hassock… It’s oval. It’s tufted in green vinyl … and the vacuum, it’s got little compartments on the inside for the attachments. … People would like put their feet on it or whatever. … But this is virtually brand new and it was made in 1948. …
I vacuum every day … but I like it. I like to take a break from work, like on my lunch hour and I’ll vacuum — not always the whole house because she hates it. My cat, Callie, she hates it.
But it gives me the chance to use one vacuum in here and another vacuum in there and another vacuum in the bedroom.
I don’t know what it is about them that intrigues me so much, but, they do. They just do.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Due to an editing error, this headline has been changed to correct Michael Thomas' job title.
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