2 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



been left almost entirelj^ to commercial exploitation, and progress has 

 admittedly lagged far behind achievements in the factory and on the 

 farm. Yet if there are to be reliable comparisons of the merits of 

 different foods or textiles, or of different labor-saving or sanitary de- 

 vices, there must be scientific tests by those familiar with the house- 

 keeper's needs and competent to work out her problems. 



The need of these studies is becoming the more imperative because 

 of the increasing complexities of modern life. It is even more im- 

 portant now than it was a few years ago that there should be a scien- 

 tific basis for instruction on how food materials can be best utilized 

 in family diets, how houses should be constructed, furnished, and 

 managed, and what materials are most suited for clothing, because of 

 late years there has been less and less opportunity to acquire expe- 

 rience in such matters in the home itself. Two or three generations 

 ago each home, and especially each rural home, was practically self- 

 sufficient, producing not only its own food supply, but, to a certain 

 extent, its own clothing, and constructing its buildings in such a sim- 

 ple way that any intelligent and experienced laborer could understand 

 the principles im^olved. Now, however, a great many branches of 

 work which were formerly hom.e industries have been taken over by 

 factories or by specialized workers, and there is no longer the oppor- 

 tunity to learn about them by practical trials in the home. In many 

 cases such knowledge as is available is still, to a certain extent, 

 handed down in an empirical way from mother to daughter, but in 

 many others it would soon die out entirely did not schools or other 

 educational' agencies supply it, and these must acquire exact knowl- 

 edge before they can transmit it. 



It is true that many of the problems encountered are more or less 

 isolated in application, and that much can be accomplished by indi- 

 vidual initiatiA'e within the home. But it is as unreasonable to look 

 to the farmer's wife for progress along technical lines, as to rely on 

 the farmer, to work out the fimdamental principles of his art. As 

 is pointed out by a recent writer on the subject, such knowledge as 

 the housekeeper has " is in reality a by-product of a vast number of 

 unrecorded and half-observed events. For the more exact and vastly 

 more economical gathering of knowledge, by methods known to the 

 laboratory, the housewife lacks the training and the outfit, especially 

 the instruments of precision. Above all, she presides not over a 

 laboratory, products of which are considered of no value except for 

 teaching purposes, but over a factory the output of which — good 

 food, clean and attractive rooms, suitable clothing, and all the rest — 

 must not fail. By any methods known to her, usually those she has 

 inherited, she must bring some semblance of these results to pass, 

 and that daily." 



