Make it New: 1960's Lakewood Windsor P-23 Fan

I love vintage items for so many reasons. Not only is it environmentally-friendly to keep using older items that work perfectly well instead of filling up landfills and generating demand for wasteful products, I also just think they look cool. Mid-century modern aesthetic is just really pretty to me, so when I was thifting at a new shop called Savers during #buffalostaycation2014, I couldn't pass up this beauty.     
Disclaimer: I'm not claiming this is as energy efficient as modern fans. I really don't know much about the subject. I was moreso referring to clothes and homegoods being good environmental decisions.

It was very dirty, but I knew it had potential. After some research online, I found that this fan is a Windsor P-23 from the manufacturer, Lakewood, and it was produced i the late 60's to early 70's.

Here's a close up of the inside. It is clearly quite gross. There's a lot of build up around the actual fan, so much so that the blades were not running as fast as they should be able to.

My supplies for this adventure included a washcloth, microfiber cloth, screwdriver, and Dr. Bronner's Sal Suds that I diluted and put in a spray bottle. I also used a glass cleaner from Method for the fans and soaked the screws in a little bowl of Sal Suds with water.

I unscrewed the front side of the fan and worked on the blades. Luckily, the build up came off fairly easily. In this picture you can see just how much were on the fan blades. Gross!  
I took off the other side of the fan cover using my screwdriver, and cleaned that side in the same way. Honestly, soaking the screws in soapy water did not do much. I will probably replace these screws with new, shiny ones because the rust and dirt is too built up.

It look about an hour, but I was able to clean the inside and outside so that the blue looked much more vibrant. I also had to give the covers a bath to loosen up the dirt. Once that was all clean, the white looked so much brighter.

I am very happy with how this turned out, with just a little bit of elbow grease and household cleaning supplies. I probably wouldn't have been able to find a fan that I like as much aesthetically, and as good quality (it's been running for about 45 years old already!) for only $5.