Modern" Appliances in the Home 1859 



littling women when ho said that " women did not, or need not, 

 know how to talk of anything except children, cooking, and 

 church," he was mightily mistaken, for the woman who knows 

 even a part of what there is to be known about children, cooking, 

 and chnrch, has incidentally laid a pretty good foundation for 

 knowledge of every kind. Instead of appreciating this fact, 

 women have accepted sayings like the German Emperor's as proof 

 that home-making was an occupation in which one person could 

 do about as well as another, and that the mere home-maker owed 

 the world an apology for not being engaged in more brilliant 

 pursuits. 



A woman I once knew, who had suddenly lost her income, was 

 fortunate enough to be a supremely good cake-maker, so that she 

 was able, by means of this, to earn a comfortable living. But so 

 ashamed was she of her occupation, that if anyone came to call 

 when she had cake in the oven, she would let the cake burn and 

 pretend that the smell came from the neighbor's, rather than ad- 

 mit that she was making an honorable living in an honorable way. 



And how was it when the census man came around, and after 

 asking us all the seaching questions at his command about our 

 ancestry, fixed us with an eagle eye and made the final query: 

 " WTiat is your occupation ?" Did we not hang our heads and 

 say : " Well, to tell you the truth, I haven't any. I don't do any- 

 thing. I am only a housekeeper ? " Thanks to our changed atti- 

 tude toward the profession of home-making, I venture to say that 

 when the census man comes around again, those of us who have 

 the right will say proudly in answer to his question : " I am en- 

 gaged in the most important occupation in the world: I am 

 a home-maker." 



Two things are needed to insure the census man's getting this 

 answer wherever he goes : Better appliances, to make work easier, 

 and better-trained housewives to use to better advantage such 

 appliances as they have at hand. Both these conditions will be 

 sooner fulfilled if men give us their cooperation and help. It is 

 to the farm homes that we may look for the solution of the house- 

 hold problem, for where is there a closer partnership between man 

 and wife than on the farm ? And to whom can women look with 

 more assurance for the needed cooperation than to the fanner, 



