Household economics; a course of lectures in the School of economics of the University of Wisconsin

Front matter

* an v^

J ^V

^rf 1

Chapter I. The Statics And Dynamics Of Household Economy

The Relation of Household Economics to Life — The Evolution of the Family — Structural and Functional Organization of the Household ; the Essentials of Each and their Interdependence. Arts, Crafts, and Sciences Involved — The Low Popular Opinion of Household Economics, its Cause and Effect — Personality and Generalization — Savage and Child to Scientist — Evolution of Household Economics — Division of Labor on Sex Lines and the Biological Reason for this Division — Ascent of Man Economically.

Chapter II

What is a House ? — Relation of House to Human Life — Value of Human Production in Proportion to Durability and Usability — Organic Structure of the House with its Evolution — The Kitchen and Derivatives — Bedroom and Derivatives — Parlor and Derivatives — Relation of Differentiation and Specialization in Buildvi Contents.

PAGE

ing to the Same Processes in Social Evolution — Hut to Hotel ; Tent to Tenement — The Typical Farin-House — Industries Represented — The Rudimentary Shop — Effect of Habitat — Soil, Location, Foundation, Elevation — Topographical Maps — From Isolation to Aggregation — The City Beautiful.

Chapter III

The Place of Architecture in Household Economics — Relation to other Arts — Primitive Architecture and its Development : Domestic, Civic, and Ecclesiastic — The City and the King — Ancient Architecture, Public and Private — Herculaneum and Pompeii — Character of Oriental Home — Effect of House on its Occupants — The House and the Family — Confusion of Domestic with Industrial Architecture — Rooms and their Relation — Existing Conditions of Domestic Architecture in Europe and America— Built to Live in and Built to Sell — Limitation of the Private Home— Gridiron Topography — Need of Combination and Juxtaposition — Essentiality of the Separate Home— Our Present Trend.

Chapter IV. Organism Op The House 60

Structural Necessities — Vital Processes of the House — Air, Light, Heat, Water, Ventilation — Troglodytes, Ancient and Modern — Proportion of Air to Occupancy — Air and Women— Air and Boys — " Night Air " — Ventilation, Public and Private— Our Schools — Light ; its Influence on the Body and Spirit — Sun-baths — The Artificial Light Habit — Heat, Natural and Artificial — Methods of Application — Plumbing — Water, Clean and Unclean — Drainage, Private and Public ; its Evolution, History, Present Methods, and Tendencies.

Contents. vii

Chapter V. Page

Use and Value of Decoration in Nature and Art ; its Laws and Principles — Relation to Pictorial Art — Evolution and History — Special Development in Races — Associate Conditions in Cause and Effect — Racial Influences — Periods — Our Present Level ; the Highest, the Lowest, the Average— Masculine and Feminine Decoration — " How to Make Home Beautiful " — The Sense of Beauty in Women — " Traces of a Woman's Hand" — Survivals of Savagery — " Home -Made," " Ready-Made," " Born and Not Made "—The Power of the Home-Maker — Educational and Moral Value of Truth in Art — Artistic Sins and their Moral Counterparts — Homes, Schools, and Prisons — Practical Possibilities — " Often in a Wooden House a Golden Room You Find " — Spiritual Laws in Color— A Rest Room — National Importance of Elevation in Art.

Chapter VI. Furnishing Io7

Organic Relation of Furniture to Humanity — Man Manufactures Extensions of his Body while the Animals Grow Them — Laws of Construction — Use and Beauty — Practical Conditions — Destructibility — Relative Value of Materials : Mineral, Vegetable, and Animal — Limitations of Applied Beauty — Essential Principles — Use — Ease and Economy — Evolution of House Furniture : the Seat, the Couch, the Table, the Cupboard, the Vessel— Vessel, Utensil, Tool — History, Distribution, Present Status — Relation to Class, Industry, Wealth, Sex, Age — Children's Furniture — Carpets, Rugs, and Cushions — Upholstery — Specialization and Personality in Furniture — Mobility as a Factor in Evolution— Ideals.

vili Conte7tts.

Chapter VII. Page

Structure and Function — Functional Development of Society and Domestic Industries — Order of Appearance of Domestic Industries and Progress toward Higher Specialization — Relation of Work to Worker — Effect of Special Industries on Body and Mind — Exercise more Important than Environment ; Action than Reaction — The Division of Labor — Sex in Industry — Distinction one of Degree, not of Kind — Jane-of-all-Trades — Arrested Development and Suppressed Specialization — Effect of Racial Growth — Present Condition of Domestic Industries in Relation to Social Economy and Personal Development — The Two Remaining Functions, Nutritive and Excretory.

Chapter VIII

Nutritive Function of the Household in Relation to the Individual ; in Relation to Society — Processes of Nutrition in Organ ; Organism and Organization — Importance of Nutrition to Life and of its Secondary Processes to Development — The Struggle for Existence — Man's Victor}- — No Longer a Struggle but a Growth — Household Nutrition Merely a Stage in the Process — The Kitchen, the Stomach of the House — Primitive Nutrition Simple and Private — Increase of Complexity and Co-ordination — From Bone to Banquet — Physiological Needs — Waste and Supply — Age and Occupation — Racial Dietetics — Theories and Facts — Some of Our Errors— Control of Nutrition and its Consequences.

Chapter IX

Chemical Properties of Foods — Animal and Vegetable Foods ; Mineral Constituents — Nutritive Values — Our

Contents. ix

PAGS

Food Supply "From the Ground Up" — Preparatory Processes, General and Special — Diets — Vegetarianism — The Cooking Animal — Cooking as an Art, a Science, a Handicraft, a Profession— Apparatus and Methods ; Primitive, Ancient, Modern, Local — Our Advance in this Art as Compared with Others — Dietaries for Infancy, Childhood, Youth, Maturity, Age, and for the Sick — Markets and Marketing — Adulteration — Supervision of Foods — Civilized Living.

Chapter X

Cleaning the Essential and Permanent Household Industry — The Excretory System of the Household Organism— Friction, Exposure, and Decay — Essential and Necessary Waste — The Grave and the Garret — Fuel and Flies — The Dirt we Make— Cleaning, Mechanical and Chemical — Primitive Household without Excretory System — Semi- Annual Attacks on Dirt — Elements of Cleaning Processes ; Sweeping, Dusting, and Washing — Development and Excesses — The New England Housewife and her Dutch Prototype — Fluff — Dust and its Dangers — Bacteria and Microbes — Antiseptic Cleaning — Light and Cleanliness, Physical, Mental, and Moral — What it is to be Clean, and the Results.

Chapter XI

The Servant Question — Total Inadequacy of Existing Treatment — Failure to Grasp Essential Distinction between Service and Labor— Service a Condition Peculiar to Humanity — Philosophy of Service — Division of Labor and Co-ordination — Primitive Co-ordination Compulsory — The Army of Xerxes as Illustration of x Contents.

PAGE]

its Inferiority— Evolution of Service — Effect of Service on Character — Status of Domestic Service in Social Economy — Present Condition — Some Secondary Conditions of Domestic Service — The Stranger within our Gates — Reports of Bureaus of Labor — Philadelphia Special Inquiry in this Connection — Syracuse, N. Y. and its Work — Household Employees in Australia — The Training School and its Results — Matters of Life and Death — Diploma and License — Servant, Employee, Artist, and Professor.

Chapter XII

Law of Organization in Individual and Species — Organic Evolution, Racial, National, Civic, Domestic — Primitive Conditions of Household Economy — The "Woman's World and the Man's — How to " Keep the Boys at Home " — Survivals and Rudiments — Effects on the Brain — Strain of Contending Eras — Relation to Progress — Home Influence, The Matrix of Civilization — How We Really Live—Flat, Club, Hotel, and Boarding-House — Reaction and Compromise — Lines of Development — Scientific Prophecy — Asa Gray and his Unknown Butterfly — Our Possibilities — The Higher Education and the Higher Life.

fc-^flu.

INTRODUCTION.

IF the title of the present volume read ' ' Household Economies," it might be received with more favor, economies being the housewife's usual conception of economics.

Yet economics it is, its prefix a wonder and a question ; to the Greek foolishness, to the Jew a stumbling block, to political economists a misnomer. It is hoped that the present word will show clearly not only the reason of its adoption, but the absolute necessity for holding strenuously to it, as the keynote to the new movement.

For women and their thought about it what shall we say ? From that day in which all industries and arts were in her hand, one by one they have slipped away. Of the ten noted by Professor O. K. Mason in his notable little book, Woman's Share in Primitive Culture, in the conclusions of which he had already been seconded by Taylor, Lubbock, and other anthropologists, all but two have passed into the hands of men. These two, cooking and cleaning, save when men occasionally engage in them, remain in nearly as incoherent primitiveness as in that remote day in which she — mother and conserver of the race — first demonstrated her power to handle them.

How has the change come and why ? The answer

XI xii Introduction,

is plain. Habit, tradition, conservatism, all forces that make for the conservation of the race, have united in one enormous, all-comprehending inertia. The sense of duty, the compulsion of old forms, the iron | limits of the past interpretation of woman's sphere — ] all this and more has made the mind of woman on this side inaccessible. Man saw a better way, used and perfected it. Woman saw only the day's work. Atrophy had set in and remains, and it is this atrophy we encounter in seeking to put the science of household economics on a level with the A B C of the sciences. That it is something reducible to forms, and to be studied as science — not as a series of duties, vague, indefinable, all-pervading and encompassing, summing up at last like the Scotchman's creed: ''You'll be damned if you do, you'll be damned if you don't, " — only a few here and there have admitted.

So it is that the work has gone on. The " sanctity of the home ' ' has centred chiefly about the kitchen stove ; the boys have fled from it with a speed that does credit to their intelligence, nor can they by any present means be lured back again. This and a thousand other things have resulted from the system to which women cling, clamoring objections at any attempt to set their feet on more solid ground. Not till the ' ' domestic service ' ' question became so desperate a complication that wise women opened their eyes and foolish ones protested louder than ever did the real nature of the problem begin to dawn.

On every side of woman's life save this has been an advance marvellous in its nature, full of high promise for the future of mankind. And on this at last there are tokens of life. A gasp, a little shudder and quiver, in that body we know amiably as "the eternal

Introduction. xiii

womanly," but is there anything so tangible as a "movement" for women, much less for universities, and if so, how may its existence be demonstrated ? This will be answered farther on, the opening chapter defining its status or the want of it and the popular attitude toward it ; all this constituting the first three divisions of the subject and bringing us to the fourth, the university movement, its statistics, trend, and possibilities.

The college-bred woman, a product not much more than a generation old, numbers now for this country about three thousand. As pioneer in the new field, she has found both rewards and penalties, but as a whole has gone her way with enlarged view of life, and a capacity for practical thought and action which it has sometimes been affirmed the college-bred man does not possess. She has shared the fate of most students in having her mental processes a little encumbered and hampered by bookishness. Added to this she has borne the additional burden not only of tradition and custom, but of the weighty discourses of eminent men, who while volubly announcing their views as to her brain, her moral and physical status, how she would marry and whether she would marry at all, her voting or not voting, etc., etc., have not expounded their thought as to ' ' that centre and source of political economy, the kitchen," with the home at large and the appurtenances thereof, the servant question and her relation to it, and all the depending facts and theories.

Naturally a large percentage of these women in the beginning chose literary and scholastic forms of activity, but the remainder have gradually discovered that a work lay before them including every art and xiv Introduction.

science still marked on the map of the past and of to-day "unknown." The American mechanic, they had learned, owed his position as leader of the world to the fact of " his readiness to change old ways for new and better devices. ' ' Had not the time then come for the American housewife to follow in his steps ?

With the feeling out in these lines came the knowledge that the bogie known as the ' * servant question ' ' was no bogie, but a natural process of evolution, the matter having been admirably stated by Mrs. Helen B. Starrett :

"Ina large part the insubordination of servants arises from the growing sense of unwillingness to be directed and governed by the individual. It is the spirit of the age which rebels against the dictates of the individual, but submits freely to the despotism of an organization."

College women meditated on these things ; college women demonstrated in their own homes, many of them, full capacity to meet and master the daily problems of living, and speculated as to why the initial scheme of Vassar College which had planned for a course of domestic economy had fallen through ; why Wellesley found it hard to live up to her plan for work from each student, and Holyoke no less, Smith and Bryn Mawr calmly turning their backs on the whole question.

As it then stood these last were in the right. It was a trade school that was wanted ; a place "where," as| Mrs. Ellen H. Richards puts it, "the apprentice has to go through all the steps day by day mechanically until he cannot help doing them right." Every effort to teach domestic economy had been on this plan and by divine appointment it has failed. The foundation

Introduction. . xv

aws of matter and form, the principles of trades, with just enough practice to illustrate them, can be taught n a few mouths.

While these things moved slowly toward the foreground, facts had at last become perceptible to the university mind, not as a whole, but in isolated cases. Agricultural colleges, notably Illinois and Iowa, had tried the trade-school theory and failed, each attempt, however, being of inestimable advantage in the way of reconstruction of thought. The Collegiate Alumnae in the meantime formed a Sanitary Science Club and issued a little manual on House Sanitation, the first suggestion of the large work in the same lines now going on under Dean Marion Talbot in Chicago University.

At this point we may begin to number the universities in which such work has actually been done. That of Chicago, with its large endowment and ample facilities for laboratory work, leads, so far as this phase is concerned. But the University of Wisconsin in its School of Economics may fairly claim to have shared the same thought at the same time and struggled to give it more material form. Mrs. Adams, the cultivated and large-minded wife of the President, urged on the movement, and Dr. Richard T. Ely, wise and far-seeing as is his wont, includes in his plan a course of ^welve lectures on household economics, given under [his direction in the spring of 1895, atl( i urges the adding of suitable buildings with funds enough to fully equip a working department.

The course given at the University of Wisconsin was made as closely condensed as possible, twelve lectures being all that the spring term could carry. No building for technical work is yet planned, and the xvi Introduction.

lecturer is compelled to give the results of practice only, and, as far as possible, an outline of a subject which means, at its fullest, three years of university work.

The University of Illinois had a tentative course fifteen years ago on the trade-school basis and dropped it for lack of both funds and interest. Now with a fresh and more vital sense of need, it has secured a repetition of eight of the lectures given at the University of Wisconsin, and hopes presently to organize a fully equipped department. Lake Forest, Illinois, has a lecturer and a limited but excellant plan of work, the Northwestern University, at Kvanston, is questioning as to action in the same direction, and Mrs. Kedzie, of the Kansas State Agricultural College, has had distinct success in work there. Inquiries have also come in from manjr co-educational colleges and from many of the larger seminaries which prepare for them. From the remote West, as Washington and California, to the middle West, the question appears to be under active discussion, and a recent letter from Winnipeg begs for all possible information on the general subject. Many of the agricultural colleges are organizing departments, with admirably trained heads, and all are discussing the special needs of women in this direction.

In Vassar College, Professor Lucy Salmon has de-| voted much time and energy to a study of domestic service, having prepared and sent out thousands of blanks with inquiries to be filled in, the result being/ embodied under the title " A Statistical Inquiry Con-^ cerning Domestic Service," in the papers of the American Statistical Society, June, 1892. Others in the same line will be found in The Cosmopolitan, July, 1893, and } the New England Magazi?ie, April, 1894. Vassar itself

Introduction. x vi i

does not yet see the necessity for sharing in the new

movement, nor singularly enough do any of the

colleges exclusively for women ; though many of them

have alumnae who are active workers in this field, and

plan the preparation of various hand-books in addition

to the one on Household Sanitation already in use.

iMrs. Ellen H. Richards, of the Boston Institute of

i Technology, has been an active worker in organization

,and stands as a high authority in the chemistry of

foods, their adulterations, etc., Mrs. Mary Hinman

Abel being equally well known, and both being fitted

for every phase of university work in Household

Economics as a whole.

I have before me a series of letters from college presidents, all inquiring as to possibilities and expressing a keen interest in the matter. Cornell is one of these ; but the feeling is much stronger in the West than in the East, Nebraska, Iowa State University and Iowa College at Grinnell, with many others, expressing not only interest, but full intention to get to work themj selves as soon as money can be appropriated to this jend.

j In California, though hampered by the same difficulty of lack of money, Stanford University has been (doing admirable work under the guidance of Mrs. I Mary Roberts Smith, a graduate of Cornell, for some i 'years professor of history at Wellesley College, and 'later at Iceland Stanford, who is bending all the energies of her fine mind and personality to these new lines pf work. I give the outline followed by her, as illustrative of what can be done without laboratory or other l Working appliances.

xvni Introduction.

EELAND STANFORD JUNIOR UNIVERSITY.

ECONOMICS AND SOCIAL SCIENCE.

A. Economic function of the housewife.

B. Domestic architecture.

i. Location, foundation, exterior plans (elevation).

2. Interiors : drawing simple house plans.

3. Visiting houses criticising plans.

4. Relations of rooms.

C. Plumbing and drainage.

1. Bacteria.

2. Principles of plumbing : pipes, closets, lavatories, baths, sinks.

3. Disinfection and pests.

D. Ventilation.

B. Heating : principles of combustion.

1. Stoves, fireplaces, steam, hot water.

2. Varieties and value of fuels.

F. Lighting : lamps, gas, electricity.

G. Artistic and economic furnishing. H. Food.

1. Chemistry of food.

2. Composition of food materials.

3. Chemistry of cookery.

4. Diet of students and children.

5. Adulteration.

6. Vegetarianism.

7. Beverages.

8. Cooking apparatus : range, gas, gasoline, aladdin oven, electricity.

9. Marketing and supplies.

I. Domestic labor.

1. Statistical, economic and sociological basis of domestic

service. »

2. Co-operative living. \

3. Time work and piece work.

4. Doing one's own work.

J. Household Finance.

1. Accounts, bills, receipts.

During the course the students made frequent visits to the

Introduction. • xix

house of some of the ladies of the faculty, criticising and receiving instruction, especially in household apparatus and plans. 'Although we have no household laboratory, several demonstrations were performed before the class, illustrating points in themistry, microscopy and bacteriology as applied to the household. The course was further elaborated by some excellent lectures, by

; Prof. A. B. Clark on Household Architecture, Convenience find Economy.

I Prof. B. C. Brown on the Principles of Artistic Decoration. [j Dr. T. B. Wood on Bacteriology and Domestic Hygiene.

This is the summary of the university movement as it stands to-day, widespread as the thought seems to be, still lacking the strong grip that insures immediate adoption of an organized system of work. The human [animal, its ways, needs, rights, is still only indirectly studied. Men and women leave college in possession of full knowledge as to the interior structure of the clam, what food it demands, what habitat best develops him, but their own is a sealed book. Dyspepsia rules with professor and student alike ; air of absolute fouliiess is peacefully consumed by the most intelligent, jnd how to clothe the human body is still apparently an '■nsolvable problem. Blank ignorance on all these points k accepted without the faintest thought of its disgrace or | ts danger. The human animal feminine trusts that in- I ,tinct will teach her how to rule a house and guide her ! joung. The human animal masculine believes that Province arranges these things, and that scientific cookery, sanitation, and all that are the fad of a small school f cranks. In the meantime social problems of every ;der, born of this gross ignorance and indifference, j ress upon us and clamor for a solution the untrained lind can never give, while legislators for state univerxx Introduction.

sities and boards for private ones are not yet awake to these facts or the lesson time holds for all.

We come now to another form of the movement, tha ! embodied in the great Institutes, Pratt, Drexel, thjj College for the Training of Teachers, and Armour, J portion of the general University Extension movement all of them doing admirable work. But the director/ of the ' ' Domestic Science ' ' department in each seera all to unite in the conclusion that a larger handling i, 1 essential and that the relation of home to state must b\ taught as it never has been taught before. Side by sids with this conclusion and the search for better method* goes the work of the National Household Economic Association, formed in 1893, having branches in manj of our cities, state presidents in all the states, and e definite plan for work as follows :

The object of this association shall be : — 1. To awaken the pub lie mind to the importance of establishing bureaus of informa-j tion where there can be an exchange of wants and needs between employer and employed, in every department of home and sociaj life. 2. To promote among members of the association a mor e scientific knowledge of the economic value of various foods ar<j fuels ; a more intelligent understanding of correct plumbinp and drainage in our homes, as well as need for pure water atjd good light in a sanitarily built house. 3, To secure skilld^ labor in every department in our homes, and to organize schocfi s of household science and service. I

The Federation of Woman's Clubs has accepted th/is form as a basis for a section in every woman's club fj^j the study of household economics, and programmes m x this work have been prepared by Dr. Mary Green, Miy«3. Kate Watson, and Mrs. Helen Campbell. Chicago i\.$ discussing earnestly the possibilities of a great trainin school for mistresses and maids, the organization oi

Introduction, xxi

household service on a new basis, the forming of a genuine employment bureau, with graded rates of payment, and great central offices — another Bourse de Travail, with even larger scope than that most admirable bureau. Philadelphia, in its Civic League, has formed a branch for this study and the investigations connected with it, and has been preparing what is likely to prove a valuable report of their work in the line of domestic service. Syracuse is also doing admirable work. New York, in a branch of its Civic League under the direction of Mrs. Robert Abbe and other women as well known, is planning for investigation in these lines, and Boston is making practical tests of some of the new theories. In short the new-comer knocks at every door, and in this swift-moving generation it must, from the very nature of things, find speedy entrance — and a recognized footing — wherever thinking men and women work together for that future which is theirs in common.

I wish to give here my very hearty thanks to Mrs. Charlotte P. Stetson, whose deep interest has at various points taken the form of co-operation, to Dr. Richard T. Kly, for his constant faith in the work to be done, and to Mr. Paul Tyner, for efficient help both as critic and in technical lines.

Boston, October, 1896.

Chapter I. The Statics And Dynamics Of Household

ECONONY.

The Relation of Household Economics to Life — The Evolution of the Family — Structural and Functional Organization of the Household ; the Essentials of Each and their Interdependence. Arts, Crafts, and Sciences Involved — The Low Popular Opinion of Household Economics, its Cause and Effect — Personality and Generalization — Savage and Child to Scientist — Evolution of Household Economics — Division of Labor on Sex Lines and the Biological Reason for this Division — Ascent of Man Economically.

IT is a study hitherto unknown, upon which we are about to enter ; a study the ground of which has existed from the beginning of human history and behind even that beginning, yet the science of which has not yet, in any real sense, been given to the world. As for a long time we lived and died, fought, loved, worked, suffered, and enjoyed without any knowledge of the anatomy and physiology of the human body ; and as for a long time nations rose and fell, flourishing and rouggling as conditions varied, without any knowledge hi social economics : so have households increased and multiplied on the face of the earth, carrying the life of man within them, and undergoing the most vivid extremes of success and failure, pain and difficulty, ease and pleasure, without any knowledge of Household Economics, or indeed that such a thing existed or could exist. A definition is then the first thing needed. Let us see if we can compass one.

The statics and dynamics of Household Economy are to the household organism precisely what anatomy and physiology are to the physical organism. In the individual, in the household, in the state, is organic life ; and until that organic life is understood, — its essential structure and functions, — we cannot know how to maintain its health or promote its development.

Household Economics is the connecting link between the physical economics of the individual and the social economics of the state. Its relation to human life is of the most intimate and vital nature.

To the individual, the condition of Household Economics means the health and happiness of his life. So vital a process as the nutrition of humanity lies in its most important stages — those of selection, preparation, and consumption, — almost entirely within the range of this science.

The life of the family, with all that it means to the life of the race, is absolutely dependent on the household life. Whether we live or die, and how we live or die, are largely determined by our household condition. The household and its healthy action is to the fanily what our own body and its healthy action is to our own soul. The family without the household is bivt 2 disembodied spirit. And the family in a disorde. household is but a sick and sorry spirit at best.

One might almost say of the relation of Household Economics to life that it is life ; for life, beyond that of the solitary savage, could not exist without it.

On the other hand, the relation of this great science to social life is equally close, equally important. The household, in its evolution of related industries, is the parent of the state. Aristotle is right in his far-seeing statement that the state comes first ; but that precedence is the precedence of the artist, who tells you that you must rightly draw the whole before you can rightly draw the part ; — the greater includes the less.

But to the evolutionist, the family comes first in order of development ; as it was through the development of the family instincts, primarily the maternal, that any combination of men became possible. The evolution of a home was as strenuous and tremendous i :1 a ishiess as the evolution of a mother and to under- S jd either one or the other some very serious study j n iology is necessary. Mothers had to come first, an Drummond gives the process in that wonderful e jgh chapter in his Ascent of Man, " The Evolution f ,1 other."