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liiil asiEiiiiii .inn iLu u mm & m m WSm±
SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
LIBRARY
THE HOME
ECONOMICS MOVEMENT
PART I
ISABEL BEVIER, Ph.M.
PROFESSOR OF HOUSEHOLD SCIENCE
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
SUSANNAH USHER, S.B. :...
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF HOUSEHOLD SCIENCE
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS *. :
®
WHITCOMB & BARROWS
BOSTON 1906
&W
Copyright 1906
BY
: ISABEL BEVIER and SUSANNAH USHER
• •• • •
10 8 9 2.
COMPOSITION AND ELBCTROTYPING ST
THOMAS TODD
14 MACON STRBBT, BOSTON, MASS.
CONTENTS
PAGB
Introduction 5
Home Economics in Agricultural Colleges and State
Universities 22
Cooking Schools * 44
Home Economics in the Public Schools .... 52
INTRODUCTION
/ TT S HE work incumbent upon the organization and
•*■development of a department of Home Economics
in a state university has sent us again and again to the
histories of education for suggestions, inspiration, and
guiding principles. The difficulty in finding such data,
scattered as it is through the history of education, and
the urgent need for it have impelled us to this attempt to
collect and interpret, as well as we can, the facts bearing
on the origin, development, and present status of Home
Economics.
The authors realize that it is a difficult task to trace
beginnings, to attempt to separate essentials from non-
essentials, or to essay the office of interpreter. Recog-
nizing these difficulties and the imperfection of this work,
this brief survey of the situation is sent out to our fellow-
workers in the same line with the "request that mistakes
and omissions be reported in order that the final effort,
of which this is only a beginning, may more worthily
represent the cause for which it stands.
GENERAL SURVEY
It is evident that the study of any educational move-
ment implies a consideration of the political, social, and
industrial conditions of the same period. So a study of
Home Economics means a survey of education in general,
together with a consideration of the social, industrial, and
5
6 Home Economics
economic changes which the years have wrought and their
effect, particularly upon the status of woman.
A survey of education in the colonies in their beginnings
shows that the colonists were never indifferent to the inter-
ests of education. Naturally other needs had to be con-
sidered first, but some statement is usually found in the
early history which indicates that some kind of provision
had been made for education. As early as 1616 the
king 1 ordered the Bishop of London to collect money
for a college to be founded in Virginia. Two years later
when the money had been secured the following instruc-
tions were given to Governor Yardley:
"Whereas by a special grant and license from His
Majesty, a general contribution hath been made for build-
ing and planting a college for the training up of the
children of those infidels in true religion, moral virtue,
and civility, and for other godliness, we do, therefore,
according to a former grant and order, hereby ratify,
confirm, and ordain that a convenient place be chosen
and set out for the planting of a university at the said
Henrico in time to come, and that in the meantime prep-
aration be made for the building of the said college for
the children of the infidels according to such instructions
as we shall deliver. And we will ordain that ten thousand
acres, partly of the lands they impaled and partly of the
land within the territory of the said Henrico, be allotted
and set out for the endowing of the said university and
college with convenient possessions."
When we remember that these pupils were children
and savages it is easy to understand that the term uni-
versity has long been perverted. The same interest
1 History of Education in the United States, Dexter, p. 2.
Introduction J
regarding education is shown in the history of the Dutch
colonies by the following quotation:
"The patroons and the colonists shall, in particular,
endeavor to find out ways and means whereby they may
support a minister and schoolmaster, 1 that thus the service
of God and zeal for religion may not grow cool and be
neglected among them, and they shall, for the first, procure
a comforter of the sick there."
Dexter says : 2 "Whereas the colonists in Virginia seem
to have been actuated by the missionary spirit in the estab-
lishment of schools principally for Indians and orphans,
and the Puritans in New England recognized at first only
a need for higher education for the maintenance of a
learned clergy, the Dutch began at the bottom, with their
own children. In the matter of popular education they
were leaders/'
The New England colonies have played a most impor-
tant part in the development of education. The New
England colonists came from homes of refinement and
education, and counted among their dearest privileges
those of education and religion. Boston Latin School,
founded in 1635, followed by Harvard College in 1637,
are testimonials of their efforts in behalf of education.
The records of the Connecticut colonies show that they
were not behind Boston in their educational efforts. In-
deed Ezekiel Cheever, whose name is associated with the
Boston Latin School, was the first teacher of the school
founded in New Haven in 1641.
Hinsdale says : 8 "No state has a more honorable edu-
cational record, taken altogether, than Connecticut. No
1 History of Education in the United States, Dexter, p. 13.
*IHd.
»7JiV/.,p. 40.
8 Home Economics
other of the old states can show such a connected series
of public and private transactions relating to schools and
education, extending from the foundation of the common-
wealth down to the opening of the present educational
era, some fifty or sixty years ago. Accordingly, the state
affords the best possible opportunity to study continu-
ously the history of popular education from the feeblest
beginnings/'
The decade from 1639 to I ^49 seems to have been
most fruitful in New England in producing legislation
concerning education. To Dorchester, 1 Massachusetts,
belongs the honor of having the first public school in
America to be supported by direct taxation. It was
organized in May, 1639. The need for industrial training
was recognized and some legal provision made for it in
Massachusetts as early as 1642. Five years later we have
what Professor Dexter 2 calls "the most important school
law of our whole history. ... It contained all the essen-
tials of the purest democracy. The teacher was to be
appointed by the people and paid by the people ' to teach
all such pupils as shall resort to him to write and read/
without a shadow of class distinction. Nor was the law
simply permissive ; it was mandatory as well, required that
schools be established, and that a fine of £$ await those
communities that failed to observe its edicts. There was
to be an elementary school for towns of fifty families and
a grammar school for those of one hundred families."
While these beginnings in education were made in the
seventeenth century, progress was very slow. Lack of
organization, of suitably trained teachers, and the neces-
1 History of Education in the United States, Dexter, p. 28.
Introduction 9
sary compensation left most of the youth unsupplied with
the means of education. Practically there were no schools
south of Virginia until after the beginning of the eight-
eenth century. The curricula of those then existing in
New England were rather limited.
Inadequate as the training afforded by the reading,
* writing, and grammar schools was, we must remember it
\ was provided for boys only. Girls might be taught, but
\ they were not to be admitted to the school. It was nearly
a century later before anything was done for their edu-
cation. The Dames' Schools were the only organized
agency outside the home, and they are said to have
i afforded opportunities to learn needlework, dancing, and
improvement in manners.
It is interesting to note the steps of progress in the
education of girls as evidenced by their admission to
the reading and writing schools for one hour a day;
of their instruction in the summer in arithmetic, geog-
raphy, and composition, by their brothers who were Yale
students; and the various devices by which they were
presented with the crumbs of education.
While New England led in provision for education of
its girls, some attention was given to their instruction
in other parts of the country. The Moravian school
at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, is among the earliest. How-
ever, it was not until the last decade of the century that
they were granted even a part of the privileges of the
grammar schools. The only schools to which girls were
admitted in Boston in 1784 were the writing schools
held between the forenoon and afternoon sessions of the
public school. In 1789 a "great reform" was instituted
by organizing a so-called "double-headed school." In-
10 Home Economics
struction was given in reading and writing. The girls
attended reading school in the morning and the boys the
writing, and vice versa, so separate instruction was main-
tained. The position of girls as regards educational privi-
leges in New England at this time is shown by the action
of the school board of Gloucester, which voted in 1790 1
"that two hours of the eight hours of daily instruction
be devoted to girls, as they are a tender and interesting
branch of the community, but have been much neglected
in the public schools in this town." It appears that they
continued to be "tender and interesting" without much
; opportunity for self -improvement until 1820, the time
! of the organization of Mrs. Willard's Female Seminary.
One year later Catherine Beecher's school was established
at Hartford, and the process by which girls were to be
transformed from females to women was well begun.
The story of the organization of the Boston High
School for Girls is given in the " Report of the Com-
missioner of Education " 2 as follows :
"On September 25, 1825, the city council appro-
priated #2,000 for a high school for girls. The school
was instituted January 13, 1825, and before the end of
the second year had become so popular, the applicants
for admission were so numerous, so many parents were
disappointed that children were not received, the demand
for larger and better accommodations involved such addi-
tional expenditures, that the school committee, under the
lead of the mayor, Josiah Quincy, met the emergency
by abolishing the school and pronouncing it a failure.
For a period of twenty-three years no attempt was made
to revive the subject in either branch of the city council."
1 Education, Vol. 22, p. 535.
9 Report of the Commissioner of Education, 187 1, p. 512.
Introduction 1 1
Meanwhile a new instrument of education had appeared,
viz., academies, of which Phillips Academy at Andover
and Exeter are noted examples. The institution 1 at Med-
ford, Massachusetts, opened in 1789, "dignified by the
title of academy/' is said to have been the first for girls
in New England. Leicester and Westford were coeduca-
tional from the start. Bradford, founded 1803, Adams,
1823, the first incorporated expressly for girls, and Abbot
Academy, 1829, are among the most noted.
This brings us into the Revolutionary period of our
history, with its attendant industrial and social changes
The separation from England made necessary the develop-
ment of the internal resources of our own country, and
in this development each section bore its part. In 1790
the first factory was established in the United States at
Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and New England, with its
abundant water power, led in manufactories. The South
gave its attention to the cotton industry. Abundant fuel
in the West and Southwest and the introduction of steam
caused mechanical industries to thrive and gave wider
range to the arts. Communication and transportation
were aided in the forties by the introduction of the tele-
graph and the cable and the making of canals and railways.
These radical changes of environment brought great social
and economic changes in the home and in the condition
of both men and women, and found expression in changed
ideals of education.
The scientific inventions and discoveries and the con-
sequent industrial development made necessary appropriate
educational instruments. The content of education was
enlarged to include technical training. This demand was
1 History of Education in the United States, Dexter, pp. 428, 429.
12 Home Economics
met in part by the introduction of what were called Man-
ual Labor Seminaries, examples of which are Rensselaer,
New York, 1824, and the Fellenberg Institute of Windsor,
Connecticut. The experiment was tried in a number of
states. Many of the institutions failed or continued under
other names, but they had their part in enlarging the
educational outlook and in dignifying labor.
The founding of Oberlin College for both sexes, 1833 ;
the introduction of a school for engineers, 1835, Troy, New
York; the opening of Mount Holyoke Seminary, 1837;
the beginning of normal schools, 1839, Lexington, Massa-
chusetts; the founding of the New England Female
tyfedical College, 1842, are illustrations of the broadening
educational outlook and the recognition of the need of
definite training for special work. The engineer, the
teacher, and the nurse were given opportunity for definite
professional training.
Educational progress was delayed in the sixties and
the energies of the people given to internal dissension
and war, but the decade which followed its close was most
fruitful in developing new instruments of education. The
founding of Vassar College in 1865 was a distinct step
in advance for the education of women. To this period
belongs also the founding of the Land Grant Colleges,
which assured a great advance in the industrial training
of both men and women.
The demand for practical education and industrial
training is shown in the founding of technical schools, of
which the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1865,
Lehigh University, 1866, Worcester Polytechnic School,
1868, are among the best known. The year 1870 seems
remarkable for the number and variety of its experiments
Introduction 13
in education. It was in this year that drawing was made
an integral part of the work in the Boston public schools,
that Michigan and Illinois Industrial Universities were
opened to women, while sewing was introduced into some
of the schools of the Eastern states. The idea of manual
training received a great impetus in the Centennial Expo-
sition of 1876, and led, in the next decade, to the founding
of schools for manual training in most of the large cities,
the first being established in St. Louis in 1879.
By the close of the nineteenth century it was evident
to the student of educational affairs that the industrial
spirit was a mighty factor in education, that courses in
applied science and applied art would have a place in the!
school programs, and that a knowledge of the classics/
was no longer the only measuring unit for educational
standards.
While much is to be said concerning the advantages
of being the first to enter a new field, there are compen-
sations for being behind time. The fact that the educa-
tion of women has lagged behind that of the men has
saved much experimenting on the women. The technical
schools for men practically settled both the technical and
educational value of such training for women.
It is, perhaps, difficult now to appreciate just how
much coeducation and the technical schools have meant
in the development of the education of women, particularly
in work in Home Economics. To be sure, in the early
days of coeducation the women were so interested in
keeping step intellectually with the men that they some-
times gave themselves too strenuously to the joy of that
privilege. Again, applied science for men, as taught in
the technical schools, gave a certain definiteness to their
14 Home Economics
work in science, which was much needed in woman's work
in those lines. It is not, perhaps, too much to say that
much of woman's early work in chemistry was a more or
less indefinite playing with test tubes in which one of
three results was expected — a beautiful color, a bad odor,
or an explosion She was not long in discovering that
her brother took chemistry and bacteriology, not because
some one had told him that it ought to form a part of
a liberal education, but because he expected to use this
knowledge later in his work with soil or in the dairy.
(Women were thus helped to see that there was a field of
applied science for women as well as for men. They
realized later that the laws of heat could be illustrated
! by the kitchen range quite as adequately as by the steam
I engine, that the life history of bacteria could be studied
^y ! in many household processes, and that the chemistry of
1 food was in many cases better suited to their needs than
J that of stones under the title, " determinative mineralogy.' '
Thus there came into being the applied science side of
Home Economics. Applied art was a later development.
A ceitain stigma has always attached to work in Home
Economics, born of its association in the West with the
agricultural colleges (whose standards of scholarships in
the earlier days were not so high as those of the classical
schools), and in the East its association with schools of
cookery and sewing has lessened its educational value
in the eyes of some. The stickler for the classics has
found it exceedingly difficult to believe that an engineer
or an agriculturist was an educated individual, or that
^training in Home Economics, reduced to its lowest terms,
'twas not duly represented by baking and millinery. It
was, perhaps, this spirit which prompted the president
!
Introduction 1$
of Bryn Mawr College to say, 1 M There are, however, not
enough elements of intellectual growth in cooking or
housekeeping to furnish a very serious or profound course
of training for really intelligent women," and the president
of another well-known college for women to make the
statement 2 that "such courses do not find a girl."
There are numerous indications that these statements
do not represent the present status of Home Economics
in the mind of educators. Recent investigations show
that even in our most conservative colleges for women
courses in hygiene, chemistry of food, applied art, and
economics are being added to the curriculum, and archi-
tecture, science, and history are adding their contributions
to the work. The sociologist and physiologist find abun-
dant room for their efforts. Departments of Home Eco-
nomics are being organized in some of the best educational
institutions, and those already organized are finding ways
and means of strengthening their work. To be sure, the
promised land has not yet been reached. Home Eco-
nomics is not yet classified as is the science of medicine ;
the particular part of the work that belongs to the public
school, the trade school, the institute, the college, and
the university is not yet clearly defined.
One explanation of this confusion of ideas and results
is found in that statement of Henderson : 3 "If one does
not know where one wishes to go, there is small chance
of success in devising a process for getting there.' ' Boards
of education and trustees have not been sure where they
wished the teacher of Home Economics to go. She has
1 Educational Review, Vol. 21, pp. 6, 7.
a Forum, Vol. 30, p. 728.
8 Education and the Larger Life, p. 136.
/
16 Home Economics
not always been prepared to go in the right direction.
But on the whole the outlook is very encouraging, and
it seems probable that in the near future Home Economics
will be recognized as the department in which the student
is helped to interpret the facts of science, the theories of
color, the beauty of form in ways that make more efficient
the individual life, and that results of its work shall be
seen in cleaner streets, houses better constructed and
more beautifully decorated, food better selected and pre-
pared, higher aesthetic and ethical standards. In short,
that it shall have its part in the betterment of life.
So much for the school side of the question. It may
be well at this point to consider some agencies outside
the school, to gather what suggestions we may from the
current literature of that earlier day.
Two names stand out with special prominence as
leaders in what they call Domestic Economy, viz., those
of Catherine E. and Harriet Beecher. Reference has
already been made to the girls' school at Hartford founded
by Miss Catherine Beecher. The removal of her family
to the West severed her connection with that school.
Later a similar one was started in Cincinnati, Ohio, of
which Harriet Beecher was principal until her marriage.
About 1840 there appeared "A Treatise on Domestic
Economy/' by Miss Catherine Beecher. The attitude of
this woman toward the subject is perhaps best shown by
a quotation from the preface of that book:
"The author of this work was led to attempt it, by
discovering, in her extensive travels, the deplorable suffer-
ings of multitudes of young wives and mothers, from the
combined influence of poor health, poor domestics, and a
defective domestic education. . . .
Introduction 1?
" The measure which, more than any other, would tend
to remedy this evil, would be to place domestic economy i
on an equality with the other sciences in female schools. J
This should be done because it can be properly and sys-
tematically taught (not practically, but as a science), as
much so as political economy or moral science, or any other
branch of study; because it embraces knowledge, which
h, will be needed by young women at all times and in all *
r ^places; because this science can never be properly taught j v/
L u tfntil it is made a branch of study; and because this '
f* method will secure a dignity and importance in the esti-
mation of young girls, which can never be accorded while
they perceive their teachers and parents practically attach-
ing more value to every other department of science than
this. When young ladies are taught the construction of
their own bodies, and all the causes in domestic life which
tend to weaken the constitution; when they are taught
rightly to appreciate and learn the most convenient and
economical modes of performing all family duties, and of
employing time and money ; and when they perceive the
true estimate accorded to these things by teachers and
friends, the grand cause of this evil will be removed.
Women will be trained to secure, as of first importance, \
a strong and healthy constitution, and all those rules of
thrift and economy that will make domestic duty easy
and pleasant.
"To promote this object, the writer prepared this
volume as a text-book for female schools. It has been
examined by the Massachusetts Board of Education, and
been deemed worthy by them to be admitted as a part
of the Massachusetts School Library.
"It has been adopted as a text-book in some of our
1 8 Home Economics
largest and most popular female schools, both at the
East and West."
The table of contents of this book is most interesting.
It begins with a chapter on the " Peculiar Responsibilities
of American Women " ; this is followed by chapters on
Healthful Food, Clothing, Cleanliness, Domestic Man-
ners, Care of Infants, Construction of Houses. A fitting
climax is reached in the final chapter named, " Miscella-
neous Directions," in which the care of a cow, the comfort
of guests, smoky chimneys, flower baskets, and waterproof
shoes are considered. A glance at this table of contents
leaves little doubt in the mind of any one that the field
of the varying activities of women has been well covered.
This was followed by a Domestic Receipt Book, whose
merits are set forth in its preface as follows :
"First, to furnish an original collection of receipts,
which shall embrace a great variety of simple and well-
cooked dishes, designed for every-day comfort and enjoy-
ment.
" Second, to include in the collection only such receipts
as have been tested by superior housekeepers, and war-
ranted to be the best. It is not a book made up in any
department by copying from other books, but entirely
from the experience of the best practical housekeepers.
u Third, to express every receipt in language which
is short, simple, and perspicuous, and yet to give all
directions so minutely that the book can be kept in
the kitchen, and be used by any domestic who can read,
as a guide in every one of her employments in the kitchen.
" Fourth, to furnish such directions in regard to small
dinner parties and evening company as will enable any
young housekeeper to perform her part, on such occasions,
with ease, comfort, and success.
Introduction 19
"Fifth, to present a good supply of the rich and
elegant dishes demanded at such entertainments, and yet
to set forth so large and tempting a variety of what is
safe, healthful, and good, in connection with such warn-
ings and suggestions as it is hoped may avail to promote
a more healthful fashion in regard both to entertainments
and to daily table supplies. No book of this kind will
sell without an adequate supply of the rich articles which
custom requires, and, in furnishing them, the writer has
aimed to follow the example of Providence, which scatters
profusely both good and ill, and combines therewith the
caution alike of experience, revelation, and conscience,
'choose ye that which is good, that ye and your seed
may live.'
" Sixth, in the work on ' Domestic Economy/ to-
gether with this, to which it is a supplement, the writer
has attempted to secure, in a cheap and popular form, for
American housekeepers, a work similar to an English
work which she has examined, entitled the Encyclopedia
of Domestic Economy, by Thomas Webster and Mrs.
Parkes, containing over twelve hundred octavo pages of
closely printed matter, treating on every department of
domestic economy — a work which will be found much
more useful to English women, who have a plenty of
money and well-trained servants, than to American house-
keepers. It is believed that most in that work which
would be of any practical use to American housekeepers
will be found in this work and the « Domestic Economy.'
"Lastly, the writer has aimed to avoid the defects
complained of by most housekeepers in regard to works
of this description issued in this country or sent from
England, such as that, in some cases, the receipts are so
20 Home Economics
rich as to be both expensive and unhealthful ; in others,
that they are so vaguely expressed as to be very imper-
fect guides ; in others, that the processes are so elaborate
and fussing as to make double the work that is need-
ful; and in others, that the topics are so limited that
some departments are entirely omitted, and all are in-
complete."
Later the two sisters combined their efforts in the
publication of "The American Woman's Home, or Prin-
ciples of Domestic Science," being "a guide to the for-
mation and maintenance of economical, healthful, beautiful
Christian homes." Their attitude and that of the public
at this time, 1869, is shown by the following quotation:
"There is at the present time an increasing agitation
of the public mind, evolving many theories and some
crude speculations as to woman's rights and duties. That
there is a great social and moral power in her keeping,
which is now seeking expression by organization, is mani-
fest, and that resulting plans and efforts will involve some
mistakes, some collisions, and some failures, all must
expect."
Previous to this had appeared "Household Science,"
by E. L. Youmans. It is difficult to find at the present
day a clearer or more comprehensive statement of the
meaning and content of the term than the one given
in the preface to this book, viz. : " Household Science has
to do with the agents, the materials, and the phenomena
of the household." The numerous articles in periodicals of
the period on the " Place of Woman in Education " would
seem to indicate that the task of determining her proper
educational status was a difficult one.
In recent years many organizations outside the schools
Introduction 2 1
have taken part in the development of the subject —
The Association of Collegiate Alumnae, the Federation of
Women's Clubs, The Lake Placid Conference of Home
Economics, and numerous philanthropic and industrial
associations, as well as the investigations of the United
States government along the lines of food and nutrition.
Mrs. Ellen H. Richards, the woman who is generally
considered as the foremost leader in the development of
the subject in these later years, interprets its present
status as follows:
HOME ECONOMICS STANDS FOR 1
"The ideal home life for today unhampered by the
traditions of the past.
si The utilization of all the resources of modern science
to improve the home life.
"The freedom of the home from the dominance of
things and their due subordination to ideals.
"The simplicity in material surroundings which will
most free the spirit for the more important and permanent
interests of the home and of society."
1 Proceedings of the Sixth Annual Lake Placid Conference on Home
Economics, p. 31.
HOME ECONOMICS IN
AGRICULTURAL COLLEGES AND
STATE UNIVERSITIES
REFERENCE has already been made to the number
and variety of educational instruments which had
their beginnings about 1870. Technical schools, Land
Grant Colleges, Boston and New York Cooking Schools,
industrial classes, and art schools all testify to the changed
ideals in education which the social and economic changes
of the previous decade had wrought. One of the sad
results of the war was the removal by death of the head
of the household and the consequent necessity which
devolved upon the women of the family to become its
breadwinners.
These necessary social changes enlarged the sphere
of women's activities and responsibilities. New occupa-
tions were opened to women. There was a demand for
skilled laborers, and this implied an opportunity for train-
ing to obtain the necessary skill. Among the educational
leaders coeducation was a much discussed question. For
purposes of expediency and economy it had been practiced
in the public schools, and it found favor in the West,
which one writer has designated as " the land of the large
and charitable air."
Most of the Western institutions favored coeducation,
but there were many even in those institutions who, while
they believed equal opportunity should be given to men
^nd women, held that the training of each should be dif-
22
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 23
ferentiated. The report of the Commissioner of Education
for 1 87 1 contains the following statement :
"Popular sentiment holds still to separate education,
but educators are much divided. On the same side with
the Oberlin faculty are A. L. Wayland, D.D., President
of Franklin College, Indiana ; Dr. Gregory, of the Illinois
Industrial University; and W. T. Harris, Superintendent
of Public Schools, St. Louis. . . .
"On the other side stands President Raymond, who,
without arguing the question, in his beautiful and forcible
presentation of the promise of higher education for women,
unconsciously sways the mind toward separate education.
4 1 premise/ says President Raymond, ' that a liberal edu-
cation for woman is not in all its details precisely the same
thing with a liberal education for man. There are ineradi-
cable differences between the sexes, which must be taken
into account in determining the conditions of a proper
culture for each.' "
The report for 1873, pages 505 to 508, contains an
account of the training afforded girls in Germany in
domestic economy, and closes with this statement :
"In view of these facts, so common that they must
have come under the observation of all, it is to be hoped
that these features of special female education will receive
full and fair discussion, so that these new studies, with
such modifications as experience shall suggest, may be
introduced into our high schools and academies for
advanced female pupils. ,,
Again, the feelings of others are expressed in this
same report in these words, "Care also must be taken
that in the ardor for scholastic training domestic education
does not decline "
24 Home Economics
It is probably as a result of these conflicting senti-
ments that departments of household science were opened
in the agricultural colleges of the West, and cooking and
sewing were introduced in the schools of the East.
PIONEER DEPARTMENTS
Three state institutions are pioneers in this work in
the West, viz., Iowa, Kansas, and Illinois. Some con-
fusion exists regarding the dates at which work was
begun in these lines. An attempt has been made, in
so far as possible, to let those who did the first work
tell the story of its beginnings.
Iowa
Iowa seems to have been the first to enter this field.
A personal letter from Miss Georgetta Witter, now Pro-
fessor of Domestic Economy in Iowa State College, gives
the following information :
"Iowa State College was opened in March 17, 1869.
The real beginning of domestic science in the institution
dates back to that time, when the matron, in connection
with her work as steward of the boarding department,
adopted the so-called Mount Holyoke plan, requiring each
young woman to work for two hours per day, under
careful supervision, in the dining room, kitchen, or pantry.
"In 1875 Mrs. Mary B. Welsh induced the trustees
to open a department of cookery and household arts."
Mrs. Welsh makes the following statement in "A
Special Report on Industrial Education in the United
States, 1883 "i 1
"The first instruction in this department was given
1 United States Bureau of Education, 1883, p. 278.
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 25
in 1872 by a course of lectures to the junior girls on
matters connected with housekeeping. In 1877 the
trustees added a course in cooking, and provided and
furnished a kitchen for the use of the class. For the
last four years, therefore, lessons in cooking have been
given to the junior class, in connection with lectures on
such subjects as house furnishing, care of the sick, care
of children, management of help, dress, etc. Physiology
and domestic chemistry are carefully taught as a part
of the course in domestic economy.
"In 1879 the course was further extended by the
addition of sewing and laundry work. These have been
taught with fair success for two years. Many of our
students, however, have been able to pass them by exam-
ination, and it was found difficult to arouse the same
degree of interest in either as in cooking. There has
been a steadily increasing demand for instruction in the
latter, and the course has been reorganized for this year
so as to give the cooking lessons to a larger number of
students. These lessons were formerly confined to the
juniors, on account partly of want of room in the small
kitchen provided by the board, and partly on account
of lack of drill in chemistry in the preceding years. At
the last session of the legislature larger rooms were
assigned to the department, and the present plan arranges
for progressive lessons to the freshman, sophomore, and
junior classes.
"The young women of the freshman class prepare,
under my instruction, the noonday meal for one table
in the main dining hall, where two hundred students are
boarded. The housekeeper furnishes the bill of fare for
the day, and sends to the practice kitchen sufficient
26 Home Economics
material for a dinner for ten persons, which is cooked
and served by the teacher and her class. Not more than
five work at once, and thus each receives careful super-
vision and can get actual practice at every lesson. In
this way the class is taught plain cooking — how to pre-
pare meats, vegetables, and simple desserts. The dinner
cooked at the last lesson is a fair sample of the daily
work. It consisted of roast beef, mashed potatoes, stewed
tomatoes, and apple dumplings. While the work was
going on the teacher explained not only the culinary
processes, but told the class also something about the
value of beef as a food, the best cuts, how to tell good
beef from poor, the marks of disease, something also
about the history and food value of the potato and apple,
the tests for good flour, and the composition and action
of baking powder.
"In order to get time for this minute instruction to
so large a number the laundry work and sewing were
necessarily abolished, and the sophomores are given the
lectures, which have been extended to embrace not only
those matters which relate strictly to housekeeping, but
more comprehensive information on hygiene, the laws of
good breeding, and those things which go to make a home
beautiful as well as clean and convenient. The class is
required to take notes, and in connection with the lectures
do a good deal of careful reading, and write several essays
each on the topics treated of.
"Finally, to the juniors is given a more elaborate
course in cooking. Great pains is taken in that year
to explain as carefully as may be the nutritive value of
different foods, tests for adulterations, the combination
of the several classes of fpod in bills of fare so ^s to be
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 27
most valuable, etc. Together with the theory is given
thorough practice in both plain and ornamental cookery.
Bread and soups are made the subjects of special drill,
while salads, side dishes, pastry and cake, carving, boning,
and garnishing are also most thoroughly taught. A few
lessons are given in the preparation of food for the sick,
and these are dwelt on with special emphasis.
"The interest of the students in the department of
domestic economy has been constant and lively, while the
board of trustees, the college faculty, and the patrons of
the school have united in encouraging its development.
It is acknowledged to have met a long-existing want, and
to have done real service to the young women of the
state. It has not only given them manual skill, but it
has also increased their respect for all branches of such
labor, and added dignity to that part of their life work
hitherto considered as menial drudgery. The promise
for the future is most encouraging. Stimulated by the
enthusiasm of her pupils, strengthened by the good will
of her fellow-teachers, and aided by the generous appre-
ciation and liberal policy of the board of trustees, the
teacher of domestic economy looks forward with sure faith
to the fullest development of her department."
Kansas
Kansas comes next in order of time. Mrs. Nellie
Kedzie Jones, for many years the inspiring head of the
department in that institution, gives the following data
concerning the beginnings of the work there:
"In 1873-74 sewing was first taught in Kansas Agri-
I cultural College by Mrs. Cheseldine. In 1875-76 a course
of lectures was given by Prof. W. K. Kedzie (chemist)
28 Home Economics
on such subjects as bread, its composition, changes in
baking ; meat, changes in cooking ; vegetables, composition
and food value, etc. Also a course of lectures by E. M.
Shelton, Professor of Agriculture, on milk, butter, cheese,
etc. Mrs. Cripps, who was in charge of sewing, gave
lectures and lessons in cooking food, and a kitchen was
fitted up in 1877."
This continued until 1882, when Mrs. Nellie Kedzie
took charge of the department and did much towards its
fuller development.
Illinois
As stated before, women were admitted to the Illinois
Industrial University in 1870. Steps seem to have been
taken at once to introduce lines of work of particular
interest to them. The catalog of 1871-72 announces a
School of Domestic Science and Art, and adds : " Instruc-
tion in this school will be begun with the next college year
and will be developed as fast as practicable."
The catalog for the following year repeats this an-
nouncement, and adds: "Drawing is taught by a skilled
instructor, music can be had as an 'extra/ and painting
will be provided for. The full course will very nearly
correspond with the course in English and the modern
languages. Young ladies have free access to all the
schools in the university, and several are already pursuing
studies in the schools of chemistry, horticulture, archi-
tecture, and commerce." The report 1 of the meeting of
the Board of Trustees, March n, 1874, contains the fol-
lowing recommendation by Dr. J. M. Gregory, Regent of
the University:
" I also recommend the employment of a lady instructor
1 Report of Meeting of Board of Trustees, March 11, 1874, p. 92.
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 29
of the highest attainments and of large experience, who
may in some sense stand as a preceptress to the female
students. The number of these students has steadily-
increased till over eighty appear on our roll. They are
from all parts of the state, and are admitted to all the
classes of the university. But their best interests demand
that there shall be in the faculty a woman of high char-
acter and culture, who shall be specially charged with their
oversight. If a lady can be found who can properly open
and direct the studies in the School of Domestic Economy,
her employment will be of double use and value.
"In this connection I wish to repeat the recommen-
dation that at the earliest day practicable you provide fully
for a School of Domestic Economy and such other schools
as the wants of our female students demand."
In accordance with this recommendation the minutes 1
of the meeting of June 10, 1874, contain the following
statement : " It was resolved that Miss Lou C. Allen be
appointed an instructor in the university for the year
beginning September 1, 1874."
The following data supplied by Mrs. J. C. Llewellyn,
a student of those days, is of interest :
"Dr. John M. Gregory, the first President of the
University of Illinois, was instrumental in having girls
admitted to the university. The first girls entered about
two years after the opening of the university. As soon
as coeducation was established, Dr. Gregory began to
make known his thoughts for special instruction for girls.
These ideas along the line of domestic or household
science, as subsequent events have proved, were far in
advance of his time.
1 Minutes of the Meeting of the Trustees of the University of Illinois,
June 10, 1874, p. 117.
V
30 Home Economics
" Dr. Gregory was so convincing in his arguments that
the state should show the same wisdom in providing a
special course of study for the future homekeepers as it
had in teaching the business principles which would allow
the establishment of the home itself, that the trustees
decided to arrange for the special work.
" One of the first things to do was to find a woman
who would undertake this work. At the suggestion of
one of the trustees, Miss Lou C. Allen, preceptress of the
Peoria County Normal School, was appealed to. After
a conference with some of the university people, Miss
Allen decided to prepare for and undertake the work.
Accordingly she spent some time in the East looking up
the matter and in taking instruction along certain lines.
" She appeared at the university in 1874 at the open-
ing to the students of the main building, or University
Hall, as it is now called. From the start she virtually
held the position that is now held by the dean of women,
and also taught the household science classes as fast as
they were established. She had charge of and taught
all the first gymnastic classes for girls.
" Her work as a teacher was very thorough, and showed
her training in the State Normal School at Bloomington,
where she graduated. Her first title at the university
was 'Instructor in Domestic Science.' Later she was
made 'Professor of Domestic Science.' In 1892, long
after she had left, the university conferred on her the
degree of M.S.
"When Dr. Gregory gave up his work as President
of the university, the position of Professor of Domestic
Science was also made vacant because Miss Allen had
become Mrs. Gregory. A new professor for the depart-
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 3 1
ment was not secured at once, possibly because there
was no one at hand who was so untiring in his efforts
for and so farseeing in the need of such a course as
Dr. Gregory had been."
The following statement 1 by Mrs. Gregory tells some-
thing of her hopes, plans, and difficulties in organizing
such a department:
"This school was formally opened in Urbana, 1874,
being the first college course of high grade in domestic
science organized in the United States, if not in the
world. With no precedent to guide, few or no text-
books on the subject to furnish material aid, with an
incredulous public opinion to contend against, and oppo-
sition in most unexpected quarters to meet, the under-
taking at the outset seemed formidable enough. But
the six years that have intervened have sufficed to over-
come many obstacles and demonstrate the practical value
of the work.
"The school was the outgrowth of a conviction that
a rational system for the higher and better education of
women must recognize their distinctive duties as women —
the mothers, housekeepers, and health keepers of the world
— and furnish instruction which shall fit them to meet
these duties.
" As set forth in the catalogue, it was the aim of the
school to give to earnest and capable young women a
liberal and practical education, which should fit them for
their great duties and trusts, making them the equals
of their educated husbands and associates, and enabling
them to bring the aids of science and culture to the all-
important labors and vocations of womanhood.
1 Special Report of Bureau of Education, 1883, p. 279.
32 Home Economics
" This school proceeded upon the assumption that the
housekeeper needs education as much as the house builder,
the nurse as well as the physician, the leaders of society
as surely as the leaders of senates, the mother as much
as the father, the woman as well as the man. We dis-
carded the old and absurd notion that education is a
necessity to man, but only an ornament to woman. If
ignorance is a weakness and a disaster in the places of
business where the income is won, it is equally so in the
places of living where the income is expended. If science
can aid agriculture and the mechanic arts to use more
successfully nature's forces and to increase the amount
and value of their products, it can equally aid the house-
keeper in the finer and more complicated use of those
forces and agencies in the home, where winter is to be
changed into genial summer by artificial fires, and dark-
ness into day by costly illumination; where the raw
products of the field are to be transformed into sweet
and wholesome food by a chemistry finer than that of
soils, and the products of a hundred manufactories are
to be put to their final uses for the health and happiness
of life.
" The purpose was to provide a full course of instruc-
tion in the arts of the household and the sciences relating
thereto. No industry is more important to human happi-
ness and well-being than that which makes the home.
And this industry involves principles of science as many
and as profound as those which control any other human
employment.
"In the fall of 1874 the writer of this article was called
to take charge of this school, which then existed only in
name. During the first year she gave much time to
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 33
mapping out and preparing a course of study, which was
presented for the first time in the catalogue of 1875-76,
substantially as follows : "
Course of Domestic Science as Given in Catalogue
of Industrial University of Illinois for
the Year 1875-76
course of domestic science
Required for degree of B.S. in school of domestic science.
First Year
1. Chemistry; trigonometry; drawing (full term);
British authors.
2. Chemistry; designing and drawing; American
authors.
3. Chemistry; designing and drawing; rhetoric.
Second Year
1. Botany; physiology; German or English classics.
2. Food and dietetics (simple aliments) ; botany and
greenhouse ; . German or English classics.
3. Food and dietetics (compound aliments and prin-
ciples of cooking, etc.) ; zoology ; German or English
classics.
Third Year
1. Domestic hygiene; ancient history; German or
French.
2. Physics ; mediaeval history ; German or French.
3. Physics or landscape gardening; modern history;
German or French.
34 Home Ecoftomics
Fourth Year
i. Household aesthetics; mental science; history of
civilization.
2. Household science ; constitutional history ; logic.
3. Domestic economy ; usages of society, etc. ; polit-
ical economy ; home architecture ; graduating thesis or
oration or essay.
A glance at the course of study outlined by Miss Allen
shows that her conception of the scope of household sci-
ence was far in advance of her time, and makes one regret
deeply that the work so well inaugurated should not have
been continued.
It is difficult to give accurate statistics concerning the
beginning of these departments in all the Land Grant Col-
leges. The following data have been compiled from the
" Organization Lists of Colleges and Experiment Stations/'
which begin with the year 1 890 :
DATA FROM ORGANIZATION LISTS 189O-I905
Published in O. E. S. Bulletins
There were departments of household science in :
Kansas, Manhattan. Agricultural College.
Iowa, Ames. Agricultural College.
Oregon, Corvallis. Agricultural College.
South Dakota, Brookings. Agricultural College.
There were added :
North Dakota, Fargo. Agricultural College.
Kentucky, Frankfort. Normal and Industrial In-
1890.
1
2
3
4
1892
5
6
stitute. 1
7. Washington, Pullman. State College. 3
1 Colored.
a Dropped in 1895. Reorganized in 1903.
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 35
8. Utah, Logan. Agricultural College.
1893. None was added.
1894. There were added :
9. Florida, Tallahassee. State Normal and Industrial
School. 1
10. Montana, Bozeman. State College of Agriculture
and Mechanic Arts.
1895. There were added :
11. Connecticut, Storrs. Agricultural College.
12. North Carolina, Greensboro. Agricultural and
Mechanical College. 2
13. Louisiana, New Orleans. Southern University and
Agricultural and Mechanical College. 1
1896. There were added :
14. Virginia, Hampton. Normal and Agricultural
Institute.
15. Colorado, Fort Collins. Agricultural College
16. Ohio, Columbus. State University.
1897. There were added :
17. Idaho, Moscow. State University. 3
18. Michigan, Agricultural College. Agricultural
College.
1898. There were added :
19. Nebraska, Lincoln. State University.
20. Alabama, Normal. Agricultural and Mechanical
College. 1
21. South Carolina, Orangeburg. Normal and In-
dustrial. 1
1 Colored.
2 Colored. Dropped in 1902.
8 Dropped in 1899. Two-year course established in 1903.
36 Home Economics
1899. There were added :
22. Delaware, Dover. State College for Colored
Students.
23. West Virginia, Morgantown. State University.
24. Minnesota, St. Anthony Park. Agricultural College.
1900. There were added :
25. Illinois, Urbana. State University.
26. Indiana, Lafayette. Purdue University. 1
27. Oklahoma, Stillwater. Agricultural and Mechan-
ical College.
28. Arizona, Tucson. State University.
29. Missouri, Jefferson City. Lincoln Institute. 2
30. New Mexico, Mesilla Park. Agricultural College.
1 90 1. There were added :
31. Nevada, Reno. State University.
32. Missouri, Columbia. State University. 3
1902. There were added :
33. Oklahoma, Langston. Agricultural and Normal
University. 2
34. West Virginia, Institute. 2
1903. There were added :
35. Tennessee, Knoxville. State University. 4
36. Wisconsin, Madison. State University.
1904. None was added.
1905. Indiana, Lafayette. Purdue University. 1
From these data it appears that departments existed
in 1890 in Kansas, Iowa, Oregon, and South Dakota.
1 Dropped in 1903. Reorganized in 1905.
2 Colored.
8 Dropped in 1904. Reorganized in 1906.
* Had a tentative course in 1897 and 1898.
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 37
The data concerning Kansas and Iowa have already been
given. From private sources it was learned that the last
named department in connection with the Agricultural
College at Brookings was organized in 1887. By 1895
the number of such departments had increased to ten.
At the close of 1900 the list includes the names of thirty
departments, among them one at the University of Illinois.
By 1905 the list had increased to thirty-six. And as we
go to press, word comes of the reorganization of this
department in the University of Missouri. This means
that practically every one of the Land Grant Colleges in
the North and West has such departments. As coedu-
cation is not popular in the East, Home Economics is not
included in the curricula of the Land Grant Colleges of
that region. But Home Economics has been developed
and carried on there by other agencies. 1
How widespread and universal is the interest in the
work may perhaps be indicated in part by the attention
given to it by the Secretary of Agriculture in his report
of June 30, 1 897, in which he says : 2
"Among the educational movements which in recent
years have engaged the attention of the public none has
been received with greater favor than the attempt to
introduce into schools for girls and women some sys-
tematic teaching of the arts which are practiced in the
home. Many of the colleges of agriculture and mechanic
arts, together with scientific, technical, and industrial
schools, now maintain a department of domestic science.
Cooking and sewing are quite commonly taught in the
public schools, and cooking schools for women have been
1 See pp. 44 and 52.
2 Year-Book, Department of Agriculture, June 30, 1897.
38 Home Economics
organized in numerous places. While useful instruction
in these lines is imparted, it is generally recognized that
much remains to be done before the teaching of domestic
science can assume its most effective form.
"In this, as in other branches of instruction which
have a vital relation to the arts and industries, the student
should learn not only the best methods of doing the things
required by the daily needs of home life, but also the
reasons why certain things are to be done and others
avoided. In other words, this teaching needs a scientific
basis if it is to be thoroughly useful. In this respect
domestic science is in the same category with medicine,
engineering, and agriculture. It is not so very long ago
that medicine and engineering were very largely empirical
arts, and the schools of medicine and engineering were
principally engaged in teaching men the things they were
to do when they became doctors or engineers. To-day
no doctor or engineer is considered fitted to pursue his
profession until he has drunk deep at the fountains of
science and knows well the principles on which successful
practice must be based. In agriculture it is coming to
be clearly seen that teaching the boy how to plow or
to perform any other farm operation is not the most
important service which the school can render. There
must be added to this definite and careful instruction in
the principles on which agricultural practice is based.
The farmer must be taught to think in the lines where
science has shed light upon his art if his practice is to
be most thoroughly successful. Fortunately science has
already much to tell the farmer which is most useful
to him, and every year sees an increase in the great
store from which the agricultural student can safely draw.
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 39
"Now, what has been done for the boy in agriculture
and engineering needs to be done for the girl in domestic
art and science. And already the beginnings of a far-
reaching effort in this direction have been made. The
teachers of domestic science are not content to follow a
dull routine of household drudgery in their teaching. They
are appealing to the scientist and specialist in lines which
touch the home life to explain the principles on which home
practices should rest, and to show them how intelligent
taste and skill can make the home a pleasant place to
live in, and how scientific knowledge can enable the home
keeper to maintain the health and generally promote the
physical well-being of those committed to her charge.
Some progress has been made in formulating the replies
which science is now able to give to inquiries relating to
domestic science and in undertaking investigations with
a view to greatly broadening our knowledge of these
matters in the days to come.
" In the great work of helping the women of our land,
nearly half of whom are toiling in the homes upon our
farms, this department, it is believed, has a large duty
to perform. For whatever will be effective in raising
the grade of the home life on the farm, in securing the
better nourishment of the farmer's family, and in sur-
rounding them with the refinements and attractions of
a well-ordered home will powerfully contribute alike to
the material prosperity of the country and the general
welfare of the farmers. The investigations which the
department has undertaken on the food and nutrition of
man have already been of much service to the teachers
and students of domestic science, and it is hoped that
these investigations will hereafter be still more helpful
40 Home Economics
in establishing a scientific basis for the teaching and
practice of human nutrition. Through its close relations
with the agricultural colleges and other institutions for
industrial training of the youth, the department may in-
cidentally aid the movement to educate women in the
rational practice of the arts of the home."
It is easy to see from this report that the need of
a scientific basis for the work is appreciated. Institutions
supported by public funds must show to their supporters
that lines of work undertaken by them have a sure founda-
tion in some educational principles. Courses in applied
science and applied art must have their foundation in the
principles of pure science and follow the guidance of pure
art. A still further evidence of government interest and
influence in behalf of the work comes from the last report
of Director A. C. True, of the Office of Experiment
Stations :
"It is very important that the Department, interested
as it is in agricultural education, should make a closer
study of the courses of instruction in home economics
or domestic science as taught in schools and colleges,
especially the colleges of agriculture and mechanic arts,
throughout the country with a view to aiding teachers in
their work to a greater degree than at present. Satis-
factory text-books on food and nutrition (important branches
of home economics) are not available, and at present a
large proportion of the teachers depend on Department
publications to supply their place. There is a demand for
more nutrition publications, both technical and popular,
like those now issued, and also for new series on some-
what different lines. Thus simple leaflets are needed for
instruction in primary grades, and charts showing in
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 41
graphic form results of nutrition investigations are very
often requested, as well as directions for preparing speci-
mens and other material illustrating the composition of
food in a concrete way, as was done by the office at the
St. Louis Exposition. It is also very important to gather
together and place in pedagogical form the widely scat-
tered facts relating to food principles which ynderlie
cookery, proper food combinations, body requirements,
digestibility and hygiene of food and living, and related
questions. In the teaching of animal production, agron-
omy, and other agricultural topics, pedagogical work
similar to that proposed has resulted in the formulation
of very satisfactory courses of instruction."
It will thus be seen that while many agencies have
contributed to the development of Home Economics, no
one agency has been more effective than the Land Grant
Colleges. No one agency has seen the possibilities of the
subject so clearly or laid for it such broad and deep
foundations. As they were among the first to recognize
the need for a scientific basis, they have been most in-
sistent that this standard should be maintained, and the
department has soon realized the necessity of maintaining
college ideals in its work if it would have the respect of
the college community.
Agriculture and Home Economics have had much in
common in their development. Both are among the
newer subjects of the college curricula, so they have had
to bear the questioning that is certain to be bestowed
upon any new idea, the indifference of those who feel
that "the old way is the best way," the scorn of the
student of the classics for " bread and butter education."
Even well-intentioned friends have feared that profession-
42 Home Economics
alism or the trade school idea was to dominate the college
curricula.
Yet in spite of these obstacles both Agriculture and
Home Economics have steadily made perceptible progress
toward better educational standards. Both have dealt at
first hand with the primal necessities of human beings.
This practical age recognizes the necessity of a sound
material and physical media for the expression of economic
and esthetic ideas, and so is willing to give part of its
best energies to the consideration of this earth upon which
we tread, the air we breathe, the water we drink, the
food we eat, the houses we live in, and the clothes we
wear. The old idea that anybody can farm and that any-
body can cook has well-nigh disappeared, and with it the
idea that farming means plowing only and that the activi-
ties of the home are fully represented by the making of
hot biscuits.
It has been well for both Agriculture and Home Eco-
nomics that their origin and their materials have kept
them closely in touch with the people. The spirit which
animated the founding of the Land Grant Colleges was the
spirit of the development of the individual that he might
yield better service to the nation, that so the nation's
interests might be advanced. So' the final outcome of
either line of work has always meant better homes, better
citizens. One great factor in the development of both
subjects has been the generous support afforded it and the
consequent freedom to try experiments that required time
and money that few private enterprises could command.
It is evident, then, that in the varying lines of work
included in the term Home Economics there is room for
a great variety of agencies and very diverse methods of
Agricultural Colleges and State Universities 43
procedure. It would also appear that there yet remains
to the Land Grant Colleges and the State Universities the
task which was theirs in the beginning, viz., the strength-
ening and deepening of the scientific basis. It is theirs
to determine the principles which underlie processes with
which the world has long been familiar, and to elucidate
and interpret the newer phenomena in their relations. It
is their privilege to dignify labor by sending forth from
their halls, not farmers merely and cooks, but educated
men and women, who, because of their knowledge and
skill in the practices and principles of the arts of the
home, shall be able to use them as a means of expression
for their best endeavors.
COOKING SCHOOLS
AMONG the agencies which have contributed to the
development of the Home Economics movement,
private and public cooking schools hold an important
place. They have been in no small degree the makers
of public sentiment. They have demonstrated beyond
the shadow of a doubt the desirability and possibility of
having good food well served at small expense, and so
ministered to a universal need. It has been their privi-
lege to touch at first hand the homes of all classes and
conditions of people, and so to create a demand for instruc-
tion in the arts of the home in the public school. The
records show that again and again cooking has been in-
troduced into the public schools only after some public-
spirited citizen had demonstrated its benefits in a private
school. It has seemed desirable in this connection to
give something of the beginnings of cooking schools in
the United States by brief histories of some of the earlier
ones.
The early work in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia
is given because it seems to be typical of the movement
throughout the country.
NEW YORK COOKING SCHOOL 1
The New York Cooking School in New York City
claims to be the starting point in the movement for
improving cookery in this country. It had its beginning
1 Circular of Information of the Bureau of Education, No. 4, 1879.
44
Cooking Schools 45
in 1874 in connection with the free Training School for
Women, with Miss Juliet Corson as Superintendent of
this department. The first year 200 persons attended
the classes.
In 1875 Miss Corson organized the Ladies' Cooking
Class, and in November, 1876, she opened the New York
Cooking School in her home in St. Mark's Place. The
plain cook's class of the New York Cooking School was
incorporated in 1878, and had for its objects "the in-
struction in the principles of plain family cooking for
young housekeepers in moderate circumstances, young
women employed as domestics, and the wives and daugh-
ters of working men." These lessons proved so popular
that Miss Corson thoroughly studied this part of the
problem, and as a result published and distributed 50,000
copies of the pamphlet called " Fifteen Cent Dinners for
Workmen's Families." She gave public lessons to work-
ing people, and found the result so satisfactory that she
established cooking classes for working men's children as a
part of the regular work of the school. The interest and
enthusiasm manifested by the public in the work of the
school are shown by the fact that from January to April,
1879, Miss Corson had taught 6,560 persons in public
and private lectures and lessons. Miss Corson believed
in graded schools of cookery, which should include the
following branches of instruction : 1
"(1) A class of schools for the training of children of
working people in that kind of cookery most suitable for
use in their own homes, the instruction to be varied in
accordance with local requirements.
1 Circular of Information of the Bureau of Education, No. 4, 1879,
p. 22.
46 Home Economics
"(2) A class of schools for the instruction of plain
cooks in the principles of moderately expensive cookery
adapted to the needs of families in comfortable circum-
stances ; also the appropriate and economical combination
of the remains of food which has already appeared on the
table into appetizing dishes. This course includes some
instruction bearing on the choice of food for its economic
and sanitary value.
" (3) A class of schools for high-class cookery, in which
suitable persons, both male and female, may receive in-
struction in the more difficult branches of the culinary
art, so as to be fitted to fill the positions of head cooks
in large private establishments, clubs, and hotels. A de-
partment can be devoted to alimentary experiments with
new food products in direct relation to their nutritive
and economic value.
" (4) Normal schools of cookery, where ladies can be
taught the theory and practice of domestic economy, both
in reference to its practice in their own homes and in
training others in this accomplishment. Proficient house-
keepers and ladies who have already assumed the direc-
tion of their own households can attend this department
with advantage, with the following objects in view: the
use of different articles of food in relation to varying
physical needs ; the alteration and improvement of the
dietaries of individuals following certain pursuits, in ac-
cordance with their special requirements ; and the detection
of the adulteration or deterioration of different foods."
miss parloa's work
Miss Parloa's first public lecture on cooking was given
in New London, Connecticut, in 1 876. Her first lectures
\
Cooking Schools 4?
in Boston were given in Tremont Temple, beginning
May 23, 1877, and in October Miss Parloa opened her
school on Tremont Street, Boston. In the spring of 1 878
she gave lectures to the pupils of Miss Morgan's school
at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and at Lasell Seminary,
Auburndale, Massachusetts. In the summer of 1878 she
went to Europe and visited schools in England and France.
In 1879 she gave lectures in the cooking school started
by the Woman's Educational Association at Boston. In
August, 1879, a school was conducted by Miss Parloa in
connection with the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific
Circle and National Sunday School Assembly, held at
Chautauqua, New York. Miss Parloa gives an account
of the beginning of her work as follows:
"The beginning of my work was accidental and did
not have the commercial side in view. I was teaching
in a little country school in Florida, and interested in all
the people there. There seemed to be need of bringing
all the people, children and parents, together at least once
a week, and we tried to do it in the Sunday school in the
sparsely settled part of the town. We felt the need of
some sort of a musical instrument, and I tried to raise
the money by asking various friends and acquaintances
for it, and got quite a little that way; finally I gave a
talk on cookery, prepared a paper carefully describing the
processes of digestion, etc., and then with a little gas
stove illustrated some things. The talk was given in the
vestry of a church, and with what I had already collected
and the money received from this lecture I had nearly
enough money to buy a small cabinet organ. Two of my
friends gave the amount lacking, which was $10, and we
bought the organ for the little Sunday school. After
48 Home Economics
this lecture, so many of my friends urged me to do this
thing that I thought seriously of it, and the next spring,
at the end of the school year, when all teachers were
asked to make their applications for the next year, I
asked the school board to hold the school for me a few
months until I was sure as to whether I would return;
they kindly did it. Then, to test whether there was inter-
est in the work and if I had the proper qualifications for
it, I arranged for a series of lectures in Boston in one of
the lecture rooms in Tremont Temple.
" The interest seemed to warrant my undertaking the
work, and I decided to open a school in the fall, 1877,
which I did on Tremont Street. The interest was very
great, and all the time I had my school in Boston I had
more than I possibly could do ; but naturally the expenses
were great, and the first year, although I worked so very
hard, my expenses were $ 5 00 over my income from my
work. Afterwards my expenses were not so great and
the income was more than the outgo. Personally I do
not think that the commercial side appealed to me very
greatly, but naturally if I spend money for a work I must
earn enough to pay my debts. The work to me has been,
and still is, most interesting ; and I feel that it is one of
the largest and broadest works a woman can do, and if
I had the time, strength, and means I would devote
myself to it still. I feel that while a great deal has been
done along these lines that it is only the beginning. It
is a magnificent work for any young woman to take up.
"Among my pupils during my first school year (1877)
in Boston I had a Miss Lizzie Devereux, a cultured girl,
who was an excellent pupil. She at that % time was house-
keeper for a lady in Brookline. A club, either the New
Century or the Philadelphia, I do not remember which,
Cooking Schools 49
wrote asking me if I could send them a teacher if they
started a cooking school, and I suggested Miss Devereux
if they could get her. She went to Philadelphia and took
charge of the school for a year, after which Mrs. Rorer
assumed control."
THE BOSTON COOKING SCHOOL 1
In 1872 an interesting association was formed in
Boston known as the Woman's Education Association.
"The formation of standing committees on industrial,
intellectual, esthetic, moral, and physical education ex-
pressed the desire of the founders that the better edu-
cation of women should be understood in the broadest
sense."
As a result of the work of the Committee on Indus-
trial Education a cooking school was started March, 1879,
which in four years was incorporated as the Boston Cook-
ing School, with Mrs. Sarah E. Hooper as president.
Mrs. Hooper was a member of the Woman's Education
Association, and chairman of the Industrial Committee,
and it is largely due to her work and enthusiasm that
the first incorporated cooking school in America owes
its origin.
The primary object of the school was to give instruc-
tion in cooking to a class of women who would make it
practically useful. But after the first season it was found
difficult to create the interest among that class, so it was
decided to open the school to all who wished to attend.
The result was a large increase of attendance. The first
teacher was Miss Johanna Sweeney, who had been con-
1 Report of Woman's Education Association, 1893. Data furnished
by Mrs. Sarah £. Hooper. Report of Annual Meeting of Boston Cooking
School, 1883.
$0 Home Economics
ducting private classes in cooking. She had taken few
lessons, but "was a born cook." Miss Parloa, who was
giving public demonstrations at Tremont Temple, was also
engaged to give weekly demonstrations in addition to
Miss Sweeney's work.
In December, 1879, Mrs. D. A. Lincoln became
principal of the school, and from that time until now
her name has been prominent in the work. Other people
connected with the school as principals are Miss Ida
Maynard, Mrs. C. M. Dearborn, Miss Fannie M. Farmer,
and Miss M. W. Howard.
Soon after the establishment of the Boston Cooking
School it was found necessary to have a normal class
to supply teachers for other cooking schools, and for
many of the public schools. A service was rendered
to the public schools by Mrs. Lincoln, who prepared a
course of lessons in cookery for the pupils in the Boston
public school.
The Boston Cooking School existed as a separate
institution until it was made a part of Simmons College
in 1902.
MRS. RORER's WORK
Mrs. Rorer gives the following account of her work :
"The New Century Club had opened a school of
cookery (1878) under the care of a Miss Devereux, a
pupil of Miss Parloa, and a Miss Sweeney, a pastry cook
in Boston. A cousin, who was chairman of the Commit-
tee of Household Science in the New Century Club, called
upon me and urged me to join the first class for the good
of my family, which I did. I, at that time, was studying
chemistry, or pharmacy, with the idea of occupying the
first position of this kind given to a woman in Philadelphia.
Cooking Schools 51
I was also doing some preparatory work for the medical
course in the Woman's College. I had not matriculated.
I entered the cooking class, and I became so interested,
and I saw so many possibilities coming from a school of
this kind, that I immediately gave up my other work and
went into this heart and soul. In less than a year I had
given a course of cooking lectures, pure and simple, to
the fourth year students at the Woman's Medical College,
and I had the honor of illustrating the first course of lec-
tures given by a woman in the Franklin Institute of Phila-
delphia. Dean Bodley was asked to give a scientific
course on household science, and I illustrated these for
her. From that time to this, as you know, I have never
wanted for an audience. I have never been out of the
work ; I have never had any hindrances ; on the contrary,
it seemed to me that everybody welcomed any knowledge
that they could get along practical lines. At the end of
my first year Miss Devereux retired — her health broke
down during the winter — and I was elected by the New
Century Club to take her place. I taught for the Club
for two years. A number of physicians in Philadelphia,
realizing the importance of the work, asked me to with-
draw from the Club and start an independent school.
I did, and the first year I enrolled seventy-four practice
pupils; I gave four demonstration lectures during the
week, with audiences ranging from 1,000 to 5,000. There
never was any drawback to any of the work after that.
I named the school the Philadelphia School. It continued
for twenty-five years."
HOME ECONOMICS IN THE PUBLIC
SCHOOLS
UNDER this heading no attempt is made to give more
than the merest beginnings of some forms of hand
work which are found in the public schools.
Sewing seems to be the first form in which manual
training for girls was introduced into the public school
system. 1 The early records of Boston, Massachusetts,
indicate that after the public schools were opened to girls
in 1798 they had instruction in needlework from their
regular teachers. In 1835 it was taught to the girls in
the second and third grammar grades, and in 1854 it was
extended to the fourth grammar grade by permission of
the Board of Education.
In 1872 2 the legislature of Massachusetts passed an
act legalizing sewing and other industrial education. By
this act Massachusetts claims the leadership in public
industrial education in this country.
In 1873 8 Mr. Robert Swan, of the Winthrop School
of Boston, was instrumental in having a regular teacher of
sewing appointed for his school.
From this beginning the teaching of sewing in the
public schools has gradually spread.
1 Report of Massachusetts Commission on Manual Training and Indus-
trial Education, 1893, PP- 5 1 * S 2,
3 Report of the Commissioner of Education, 1873, p. 169.
8 Ibid. y pp. cxxxix, cxl.
5 2
Public Schools 53
DRAWING
In 1 8 70 1 the Massachusetts legislature passed an act
which made drawing obligatory in the public schools of
the state. This was the beginning of a vigorous move-
ment toward its introduction throughout the country.
Drawing paved the way for other industrial training, and
aside from sewing was the first form in which it was
introduced.
KINDERGARTEN
In 1855 Mrs. Carl Schurz 2 opened a kindergarten
in Watertown, Wisconsin. As a result of this under-
taking Miss Elizabeth Peabody started a kindergarten in
Boston in i860.
In 1867 Miss Elizabeth Peabody, 8 Mrs. George R.
Russel, and Mrs. Hemenway and others petitioned the
school board of Boston for a kindergarten, and in 1870
an experimental one was established in connection with
the public school, but was given up in 1879.
In 1878 Mrs. Pauline Shaw 4 began her work of found-
ing kindergartens in Boston, and in 1887 sixteen kinder-
gartens that had been supported by her were handed
over to the public school system.
Boston, 6 St. Louis, San Francisco, Philadelphia, and
New York City were the centers of the early kindergarten
work.
1 Report of the Commissioner of Education, 1873, PP- I 7°» I 7 I » ci-cv;
History of Education in the United States, N. M. Butler, p. 712.
a Boone's History of Education in the United States, p. 333.
8 Report of the Commissioner of Education, 1877-88, p. 840.
* Ibid., p. 820.
h IHd. % p. 840.
5 6 Home Economics
school were eagerly asked for and taken, of which 796
were presented; and those who understand the peculiar
difficulties and discouragements of vacation work will
probably consider the result a successful one on learning
that a general attendance of 340 was obtained. A con-
tribution of $755 towards the expense of the vacation
school was gratefully received, through Mrs. James T.
Fields, from some friends especially interested in the work
of the Associated Charities in Ward 7, with the condition
that not more than $400 should be spent for the summer
of 1887, leaving #355 for 1888.
"The regular school year began here, as usual, early
in September, with classes in carpentry (two departments),
printing, shoemaking, modeling, and cooking. The num-
ber enrolled from public schools during this year is 1,112,
a gain of 234 over last year. There are also evening
classes, numbering 208. Dressmaking is taught on five
evenings of the week, with an increasing demand for
places in the already full classes. There are evening
classes in carpentry, printing, and shoemaking; an adult
evening class in cooking; and a normal class in the use
of woodworking tools has lately been started on one
evening of the week. We have, thus, a showing of 1,320
pupils in some form of manual training weekly, as compared
with 972 last year.
" A new department of elementary carpentry has been
added this year, with tools and problems adapted to the
powers of boys under fourteen years of age. This meets
a long-felt want, the need being greatest where children
have not had the benefit of the kindergarten, wherein
all manual training has its natural beginning, and even
for those who have had this start there has been an
Public Schools 57
injurious break between the ages of six and fourteen.
Here the department of clay modeling also does an im-
portant work in preparing the way for the use of tools
and for the handling of less plastic material. It is worthy
of note that the manual work, in these departments, of
boys from the ungraded classes — those exceptionally
backward with books — compares favorably with that of
pupils standing far above them in school.
" But this institution is not merely a manual training
school. The commodious building makes it possible that
other work of a most interesting character should be
undertaken, and the evening brings large numbers here
who come for gymnastics and military drill, with special
instructors, for sewing, recreation, reading, and social inter-
course. Much valuable volunteer assistance is given in
connection with this part of the work, and the whole
number enrolled for these evening recreations is 660.
"It is impossible to give an adequate idea of the
far-reaching influence of this part of the work. The visi-
ble effects of military drill have been such as to astonish
even its warmest advocates. Boys who entered a year
ago, rough in manner and careless in appearance, have
been transformed into, apparently, quiet, self-respecting
youths, quick to obey and eager to learn, filling positions
as drillmasters of raw recruits from time to time with
pride and self-possession.
" It is needless to dwell upon the advantages of gym-
nastic work for both boys and girls. The gymnasium
for girls has been under the charge of a medical director,
who has made it her special aim to give such exercises
as would counteract the evil effects of confining work
in close rooms and factories.
58 Home Economics
*' The game clubs are in charge of a number of ladies,
who are giving most untiring, faithful, and loving service
to them. The quiet, elevating influence of this work
upon boys is shown by their quick response to any sug-
gestion from their * teachers/ as they like to call these
ladies, and by the eager almost chivalrous way in which
they try to be of use. Some of the boys are undoubtedly
making an honest effort to overcome the excessive use
of tobacco, and profanity is now never heard in the club.
"There are also social clubs for girls, where sewing,
making of buttonholes, embroidery, knitting, and crochet-
ing are taught. A simple course in botany, given by a
young lady who has come from Cambridge every week
for this purpose, has proved most interesting to some of
the older girls, who have also enjoyed some delightful
imaginary trips to Rome, Venice, Algeria, and other dis-
tant lands, by means of photographs and vivid descrip-
tions ; while reading aloud, games, music, and dancing are
always a welcome rest and recreation to those who have
been shut up all day in workshops.
"During Christmas week the young ladies in charge
of the Thursday night game club gave a concert and
Christmas tree, not only to their own special boys, but
to all the clubs that met in the building on other even-
ings, and a happy throng of over two hundred received
some remembrance from the gay, sparkling, well-filled
tree.
" Encouragement for the hope that out of our experi-
mental work the cause of public education may reap
permanent benefit is found in the fact that as a result
of such efforts the teaching of cooking has this year been
partially established in the public schools of Boston, the
Public Schools 59
initial steps in this movement having been taken in this
school. It is interesting to notice how rapidly this leaven
has worked. In 'School Document No. 3, 1885/ which
contains a report of the * Committee on a Manual Training
School/ one may read that on the 27th day of February,
1885, a hearing was given by this committee to those
supposed to be interested in the subject of manual train-
ing, and that the matter immediately under consideration
at that time was whether pupils from public schools might
be allowed to accept the offer of Mrs. Quincy A. Shaw to
receive manual training in the North Bennet Street Indus-
trial School. Cooking, housekeeping, and laundry work
were offered to girls, and printing, carpentry, and shoe-
making to boys. The same document shows that within
a month, March, 1885, an order was passed giving per-
mission to pupils to accept this offer, provided that parents
should 'so request/ etc. Mrs. Richards of the Institute
of Technology was then, as always, using her valuable
influence to further this cause, as was also Miss Crocker ;
and in May, 1885, a * ew small classes in cookery were
started in the North Bennet Street Industrial School,
under the able instruction of Miss Amy Barnes. The
pupils were from the Hancock School. This was the
entering wedge. In the following July classes in cookery
were formed in a vacation school in Tennyson Street, sup-
ported by Mrs. Hemenway and under the efficient direc-
tion of Miss Homans, with Miss Amy Barnes as teacher.
This school was much visited, and made a strong impres-
sion on the public mind ; and in October of the same year,
1885, two schools of cookery were simultaneously estab-
lished, drawing their classes from the public schools, and
each giving instruction to 150 pupils weekly as part of
60 Home Economics
the regular school work. One of these, in Tennyson
Street, was supported by Mrs. Hemenway, and the other
was carried on by the North Bennet Street Industrial
School. It should here be said that the department of
cookery in this school has always been largely indebted
to the generosity of Miss Sarah B. Fay, who has this year
assumed its entire support. In the next year, 1886, a
school of cookery was established, by private enterprise,
in Jamaica Plain, and the School Board of Boston started
one in South Boston, so that 484 girls were then receiving
lessons in cookery. In 1887 we had all learned how to
double our numbers, with a very small increase of expense.
The city had established another < school kitchen ' in Rox-
bury, one was under way in Chariest own, and 1,800 girls
of the public schools of Boston were having, or had had,
a course of twenty lessons in cookery during the school
year.
"The subject of cooking schools must not be dismissed
without allusion to the great need of thoroughly educated
teachers, and to the important service which Mrs. Hemen-
way and Miss Homans are at this moment rendering in
establishing a normal class, with Mrs. Lincoln as teacher.
The value of this is fully appreciated only by those who
have seen how easily the whole subject may be degraded
or exalted by the standard of the teacher.
"In the hurried preparation of a form in invitation
to this meeting, it was stated that about 1,400 persons
were in attendance here, weekly ; this was based on esti-
mates made in 1887, and was known to be within the
facts. An accurate estimate now made to March, 1888,
shows an attendance in all departments, exclusive of kin-
dergarten and nursery, of 2,321, as compared with 1,500
last year, and this with a very small increase of expense.
Public Schools 6 1
" It is believed that private experimental work in this
field will only make itself practically felt when it can
point out good methods of dealing with large classes
without too great cost. Showy and expensive methods
will always cripple and retard the cause. The free kin-
dergartens of Boston, the late offer of which to the city
has met with such a sympathetic reception, perfected as
they are after years of careful work, furnish another
striking illustration of the kind of service this school
means to render.
" We ask for more manual training, because we agree
with Professor Woodward when he says, that 'in most
of our schools there is too much sameness and monotony,
too much intellectual weariness and torpor.' * Did you
ever see a child/ he asks, 'whose mind was nauseated
with spelling books, lexicons, and grammars, and an end-
less hash of the two doctors, Johann Pestalozzi and Fried-
rich Froebel? And did you watch the magic influence
of a diet of Things prescribed by the former, in place of
Words, and a little vigorous Doing in place of Talking
under the direction of the latter?'
"It is because we have profited by such hints as this
that this school stands, here, a perpetual plea for the
broader and more rational education of all our children.
'AH our children!' And yet one is tempted to say a
special word for those mnlucky boys, with good perceptive
powers, but whose strength 'lies not in the direction of
memory'; the boys who, General Walker tells us, are
'plowed under, in our schools, as not worth harvesting.'
' And yet,' he says, ' it not infrequently happens that the
boy who is regarded as dull, because he cannot master
an artificial system of grammatical analysis, isn't worth
62 Home Economics
a cent for giving a list of the kings of England, doesn't
know and doesn't care what are the principal productions
of Borneo, has a better pair of eyes, a better pair of
hands, a better judgment, and, even by the standards
of the merchant, the manufacturer, and the railroad presi-
dent, a better head than his master. Now the manual
training school proposes to cultivate and harvest both
kinds of boys.' Finally, we are reminded by another
enthusiastic educator, that * the universe has two spheres :
one of matter, the other of mind. To be prepared for
one's work in both, one must be trained in both. Per-
ception, memory, and judgment are to be developed, culti-
vated, trained. These mental faculties, however divided
and subdivided, are to be treated in a rational manner,
that the mind may possess what we call POWER. This
is the choicest fruit of education.'"
Tennyson Street School^
" In the summer of 1883 an Industrial Vacation School
was opened in the Starr King Schoolhouse, Boston, not
for the purpose of keeping girls out of the streets, nor of
pleasantly entertaining them indoors, but of finding out,
if possible, by practical experiment, if there were any kind
of manual training important for every girl to have regard-
less of her social status. And finding this out, to ask
the privilege of trying the experiment in connection with
the public schools, with a hope that ultimately it should
be made a part of the curriculum upon the ground that
for any instruction of general utility public money might
be legitimately expended.
" This vacation school was continued during the sum-
1 Material furnished by Miss Amy M. Homans.
Public Schools 63
mers of 1883 and 1884. In June, 1885, it was determined
to ask not ofily for the use of a schoolhouse, but for the
privilege of fitting up one of its brick basement rooms
for a kitchen. It was thought that if instruction in prac-
tical cooking could be given successfully to large classes in
a public schoolhouse, even at private expense, the privilege
would be granted to the girls of the grammar schools, in
the section wherein this kitchen was, of receiving instruc-
tion in cooking during the school year. After consider-
ation, the superintendent of buildings permitted two-thirds
only of the room asked for to be converted into a kitchen,
stipulating that there should be no expense to the city,
and however great the outlay required to do this, the room
should be restored to its original condition before the
opening of the school in September, if so ordered. To
this cheerful assent was given.
" The experiment was tried. Among the 300 visitors
to this school, in which cooking was but one of the many
branches of manual training taught, were the superin-
tendent of schools and several members of the school
board. Notably, two of the manual training school com-
mittee, who by chance chose the day upon which a dinner
— a most savory meal — was served, for their visit.
"These gentlemen dined, and it has been hinted that
that dinner had a mighty influence upon the decision
that that same committee had to make in September, at
which time a hearing was given to persons interested in
industrial training. At this meeting the management of
the school in Tennyson Street appeared, and asked leave
to enlarge the kitchen in the Starr King Schoolhouse to
full size of basement room and to maintain a cooking
school therein, which should be attended by 150 girls
64 Home Economics
from the South End grammar schools, and which should
be known as Boston School Kitchen No. 1, as it would
be the first school kitchen in Boston and the first in any
public schoolhouse in the United States.
"Accordingly in school committee, October 26, 1885,
it was voted to permit girls of the Everett, Franklin,
Horace Mann (a school for deaf mutes), Hyde, and Win-
throp Schools to attend Boston School Kitchen No. 1,
provided that the parents or guardians of the pupils so
requested in writing, the pupils to attend on probation
under the direction of the manual training committee,
who presented at the same meeting rules and regulations
governing the schools of cooking (School Document
No. 15, October 27, 1885).
"Just. here I would say a word concerning the cost
of this first kitchen. The exact amount is not necessary
to know. It will be sufficient to tell you that the money
expended for School Kitchen No. 1 would, with expe-
rience gained, equip six kitchens quite as satisfactorily,
and in some respects more so. This is an evidence of
the great value of private cooperation in experimental
work. It is safe to say that no city would feel justified
in experimenting to this extent with public money. The
great danger, and perhaps the only one, to any city in
accepting private help is that when the time is ripe for
the city to take entire charge of the work the individuals
who have given the help may find it difficult to withdraw
all support, not only financial, but moral.
"In Boston School Kitchen No. 1 there were employed
two teachers, who alternated in their teaching, as did the
classes, thus keeping the same children.
"The school grew in popularity with pupils, parents,
Public Schools 65
masters, and assistants. Of four masters and twenty-
seven assistants represented in School Kitchen No. 1,
not one withheld his or her hearty cooperation, notwith-
standing the fact that as no place has been made for
instruction for cooking in the course of study prescribed,
there was at first great interruption and doubtless annoy-
ance occasioned. These masters and teachers regarded
the work as coordinate with their own, and so sent their
girls, stimulated by their own enthusiasm, to do their best
to prove what the pioneers in this work claimed — that
its underlying principle is true development of woman-
hood, that its outgrowth is responsibility and industry,
which cheers and gladdens every moment that it occu-
pies, and keeps off the evil one by repelling him at
the outposts instead of admitting him into a struggle
in the citadel.
" The school kitchen during the first year was visited
by about seven hundred persons, many of whom were
educators from various parts of the country. All were
enthusiastic, all pronounced the work successful ; but they
who bore the responsibility knew that its real success, its
ultimate acceptance by the school board, would never be
gained until it was placed upon that basis of economy
that should recommend and make it possible, not only
for Boston, but for every city in the United States.
"Much earnest, anxious thought was given the sub-
ject, and it was decided that it needed no more physical
strength for a teacher of cooking than for a general
teacher, therefore but one teacher instead of two should
be employed and a simpler plan of work devised. In
December, 1885, the chairman of the manual training
school committee recommended in his report that the
66 Home Economics
expense and management of School Kitchen No. I be
assumed by the school board ; but, owing to the reduc-
tion by the city council of the school appropriation, pri-
vate support was again offered in order that the amount
appropriated for cooking schools might be devoted to the
establishment and maintenance of the school in South
Boston, where it was greatly desired. This continued
support was the more gladly offered, as it afforded the
management an opportunity to work out the more econom-
ical plan. Therefore in October School Kitchen No. i
was reopened with classes of the same number of girls
from the same schools as the previous year. School
Kitchen No. 2, maintained and managed by the city,
was established a little later, and the Eliot School Asso-
ciation established a school in a public schoolhouse in
Jamaica Plain. Today, after thirteen years, there are
nineteen central school kitchens in Boston, attended by
every girl in the seventh and eighth grades.
"Asa result of this private experiment, at the end of
two years there were four central school kitchens, giving
to 1,400 girls a course of twenty lessons each in the
school year of forty weeks, at the minimum cost of
28 J cents for twenty lessons, or about if cents per head
per lesson plus the teacher's salary. Every family was
visited. Four mothers gave unfavorable opinions of the
school. One hundred forty-six most favorable. Several
made pertinent suggestions and gave just criticisms, which
were gratefully received. The second winter 170 visits
were made upon the mothers of the children in the schools.
Of these two had no opinion to give, four were unfavor-
able, and 164 heartily in favor and most desirous that it
should be made compulsory.
Public Schools 67
"It is interesting to note that as an outgrowth of
the work in Boston cooking has been introduced into the
majority of the large cities in the country, and that Pratt
and Drexel Institutes have established training schools
for teachers, not larger nor more thorough than that of
the Mary Hemenway Department of Household Arts in
the Framingham Normal School. It is fitting and inter-
esting, and ought to be encouraging to women who are
about to enter upon life work, to know that every effort
of Mrs. Hemenway for the public good has been recog-
nized, notably the introduction of sewing, of cooking,
and of gymnastics into the Boston schools. The schools
established and maintained so many years by her in North
Carolina and Virginia have been accepted by state or city,
and are now controlled and carried on by them.
"The circumstances of our lives will not make it
possible for us to do what she has done, but the results
of her life work may, and ought to be, an inspiration to
every one of us."
To avoid fine, this book should be returned on
or before the date last stamped below
flgf/>3) 1954
JAN 3 1999
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