Are you interested in saving energy and money by using a solar clothes dryer?

Now, before you say, "sure," realize that by "solar" we don't mean equipping your laundry room with a boffo environmental techno-gadget.

We mean the sun.

Many may have missed it, but on April 19 the country celebrated National Hanging Out Day, declared by Alexander Lee, a clothesline activist in New Hampshire.

Terry Wiggins knew nothing of Hanging Out Day, but she's a clothesline advocate of sorts herself, first empowered to hang out when she saw a neighbor do it.

Before 1960, less than 20 percent of U.S. households had automatic clothes dryers. Now most Americans use one, setting us apart from pretty much the rest of the world. Dryers account for an estimated 6 percent of energy consumption in a typical American home. For the environmentally conscious, that's worth talking about.

Wiggins said she's not a slavish clothesliner, but she figures every time she avoids the dryer, she's helping the environment.

She skips much of the winter and those really unbearable summer days. And her husband's permanent press shirts go in the dryer. But for about half the year, she lets most items blow in the wind, including the unmentionables.

"I hang it all out," she said.

If the jeans or towels seem a bit stiff after air drying, she takes it as a reminder of the greater good she's doing.

The general attitude about clotheslines, however, hasn't been positive for several decades. Many neighborhood associations restrict or even ban them. Some claim they can reduce property values.

This is what Lee doesn't understand. He's the Hanging Out guy, founder and executive director of Project Laundry List (laundrylist.org). He has heard that a clothesline is an "ugly flag of poverty."

He couldn't disagree more.

"It's organic, it's nostalgic and it's colorful. So why is it ugly?" he asked.

In fact, laundrylist.org has a section featuring clothesline art, colorful photos and illustrations explained this way: "Illustrating the beauty and utility of clotheslines is part of our mission."

Jennifer Cain is a clothesliner in western Shawnee, Kan. Her homeowners association has rules against clotheslines, she said, but she has been hanging clothes anyway, hoping for leniency.

"On a day like today," she said when it was sunny and breezy with temperatures in the 60s, "I feel guilty if I don't."

Cain said she loves how the clothes smell after they hang outdoors, and she doesn't mind if the process takes extra time. She said she has gotten more efficient, hanging paired socks next to each other and folding clothes as she takes them down.

"I guess, when it's all said and done, I like knowing that I'm doing something for the environment," she said.

By the numbers

-- Before 1960, less than 20 percent of U.S. households had automatic clothes dryers. Now, 83 percent of Americans say a clothes dryer is a necessity.

-- Estimates say dryers account for about 6 percent of energy consumption in a typical American home and use about $85 a year in energy costs.

-- Energy used for dryers is said to eat up the equivalent of about 30 million tons of coal a year.