Missouri Housekeepers' Conference Association. 429 



Article IV. Amendments to this Constitution shall be made 

 only by a two-thirds majority vote of the members present, ten 

 days' notice, in writing-, having previously been given to all mem- 

 bers. 



The following is a condensed report of the meetings : 



OUR CONFERENCE. 



(Dr. Edna D. Day, in charge of Department of Home Economies, University of Missouri.) 



Housekeeping has been called a "belated industry." That this 

 accusation is true, is due largely to the fact that until recently 

 each woman has been content to do her house work as her mother 

 did, with but little but her own ingenuity to suggest how to modify 

 her methods to suit the new conditions that she had had to meet. 

 She has been content to find out by her self the value or worthless- 

 ness of the many new foods and household appliances advertised in 

 papers and displayed in stores or to leave them alone as probably 

 not worth the trouble of the experiment. She has not stopped to 

 think of the thousands of other women in the State confronted with 

 the same problems with whom she might well co-operate in these 

 experiments. 



Some years ago each farmer worked alone in much the same 

 way, and farming was then a belated industry. In the meantime, 

 the Agricultural Experiment Station, the Agricultural College, 

 the farmers' journals, institutes and conferences have done much 

 to find out the best methods of agriculture, and to make them 

 known to every farmer in the State, thus making possible the 

 efficient scientific farming of today. 



It is not surprising that housekeepers also are awaking to the 

 value of using scientific methods in their work. Life has too many 

 interests for women long to be willing to use slow, poor methods, 

 when better ones are available. Signs of interest are visible on 

 all sides. The women's clubs are pushing the movement. Largely 

 as a result of their activity there has been established here at the 

 State University, a department of home economics. However, 

 many of the women most interested are already burdened with 

 household cares, and consequently, can not come regularly to the 

 University. Hence it has seemed fitting that we should follow the 

 example of the farmers and have for a few days here in Columbia, 

 a housekeepers' conference, in which to compare notes as to ideals 

 and methods, and to gain inspiration by talking things over to- 

 gether. 



