Household management

“ With the exception of poor management, poor service is probably the most wasteful factor of all in the household, yet there are conditions in which poor service is certainly less wasteful of the family resources, than none at all. The end of housekeeping is the health, comfort, and serenity of the family. The two main factors in producing this result are the family income and the mother’s strength and energy. Saving, however desirable, is merely an incidental end. ”

“ All these things ought to enter into the consideration of every household manager; and great care should be taken that nothing is thrown away, or suffered to be wasted in the kitchen, which might, by proper management, be turned to a good account. ”

“ If the Household Management teacher takes the work with this class, she should follow the outline of work given in the Course of Study. This outline will make the pupils familiar with the common household materials as to their sources, preparation, and cost, and when, in the next class, they deal with these materials, they will do so with more interest and intelligence. It will also draw attention to the importance of economy in time and energy. The convenience of a kitchen and the use of proper utensils to facilitate labour will impress this fact. ”

“ If they obtain employment, their labour is perhaps repaid by wages barely sufficient to keep them alive; destitute of the means of practising anything like household management, never having known what it is to have a home, worthy to be so called, for a single day, it is scarcely possible for them to obtain that knowledge, simple as it is, which is required to contrive the various modes of making much out of a little. ”

“ Throughout the training given in Household Management, the teacher should emphasize the value of labour-saving devices and aids in the home. How to economize time and energy should be a prominent feature of every practical lesson. If time permit, a lesson may be taken to consider specially such aids as are readily procurable, together with their average cost. In this lesson the fireless cooker is considered. ”

“ The volume treats specifically of foods, their production, sanitation, cost, nutritive value, preparation, and serving, these topics being closely interwoven with the practical aspects of household management, and they are followed by a study of the household budget and accounts, methods of buying, housewifery, and laundering. It includes about 160 carefully selected and tested recipes, together with a large number of cooking exercises of a more experimental nature designed to develop initiative and resourcefulness. ”

“ Above all things, the greatest economy, consistent with excellence, should be practised, and the price of everything which enters the kitchen correctly ascertained. The theory of this part of Household Management may appear trifling ”

“ Household Management teaches us about the home.
2. A home includes two main ideas:
(1) A house, (2) a family.
3. In connection with a house we must consider:
(1) The lot, (2) the plan, (3) the furnishing, (4) the cleaning.
4. In connection with a family we must consider:
(1) Food (buying, cooking, serving) , (2) clothing (buying, sewing, mending) , (3) education, (4) home nursing.
Tell the pupils that a housekeeper should be informed on all of these points, but little girls can expect to study only a few of them, such as questions of food, clothing, and cleaning. ”

“ The subjects included are the principles and processes involved in cookery, laundry-work, and household management, the last comprising such diverse matters as the selection and furnishing of various types of houses, repairing furniture, the choice and care of household linens, simple upholstery, management of income, first-aid, home-nursing, and the care of infants and young children. Many training-schools arrange for their students to gain experience in a crêche or similar institution, and to visit homes of various types. ”

“ There are, however, not a few, who do think that {ix}qualifications of a refined nature render it unbecoming in their possessors to give that personal superintendence to the affairs of the kitchen, of the store-room, and of all the other branches of household arrangement, which is so necessary, that, for the want of it, moderate fortunes often prove inadequate to the support of families in the middle rank. ”

“ The young people of the family should each have some regular piece of work, at least in their own rooms; and the paid helpers should have a definite plan given them, including some hours to themselves, as regular as possible. There are emergencies that upset even the most perfect system, and these must be met as they come, but a fair amount of work at regular times should be the system. ”

“ Labor is an important item in the running of the house. The close connection of selecting and operating a home will be seen. Should the administrator divide the family income in such a way that little is left for operating, the little things of everyday life become a constant source of worry.
The questions of the number of rooms, and their care,326 relative expense of heating by furnace, steam, or hot water, the cost of regular service in wages per week in order to attain one’s ideals, the cost of extra service, the lighting by gas, oil, or electricity are all problems of operating. ”

“ It is most desirable to have Household Management include all home operations and, to make this possible, more than one room should be provided. Many school boards, however, in introducing the work, find that one room is all that can be afforded. ”

“ The home, by consenting to use factory products and by employing outside help, has involved itself in the great labor problem; by educating its daughters to support themselves in occupations unconnected with its management it has complicated its original problem of household administration ”

“ The book of Household Management has not, however, maintained its great reputation solely by the merits of its first issue. It is true that Mrs. Beeton brought to its origin such ability, method, and conscientious care, that with the exception of corrections demanded by changing prices, processes and materials, her work stands practically unaltered to the present day. But if nothing has been taken away, very much has been added. Eight years after the first appearance of the book, an enlarged and revised edition was found necessary. ”

“ Note.—It will be useful for the mistress and housekeeper to know the best seasons for various occupations connected with Household Management; and we, accordingly, subjoin a few hints which we think will prove valuable.
As, in the winter months, servants have much more to do, in consequence of the necessity there is to attend to the number of fires throughout the household, not much more than the ordinary every-day work can be attempted.
In the summer, and when the absence of fires gives the domestics more leisure, then any extra work that is required, can be more easily performed. ”

“ If the quarterly cards are then filed in order, they afford a most valuable record of household management in a small and easily handled form.
When deciding on the amount of money to be allotted to the separate items, the first thing to be kept in mind is the necessity of preserving efficiency; and brain-workers ought to remember that thorough mental alertness and competency can only be secured by well-chosen, well-cooked, and daintily served food, by sufficiency of sleep, by frequent intervals of rest and recreation, and by thoroughly invigorating holidays. ”

“ An intelligent housekeeper will, by this means, too, be better able to judge of the average consumption of each article by the household; and if that quantity be, at any time, exceeded, the cause may be discovered and rectified, if it proceed from waste or carelessness. ”

“ The parts of household management correspond to the persons who compose the household, and a complete household consists of slaves and freemen. Now we should begin by examining everything in its fewest possible elements; and the first and fewest possible parts of a family are master and slave, husband and wife, father and children. ”

“ Is it the fault of the home-maker of today if weakness instead of strength is the inheritance of her children, and will it be the fault of the home-maker of tomorrow if she bears and rears a weak race? If household administration is to take its place in the front rank with the other professions of the day, educators as well as women must wake up and realize that the whole housekeeping question is dependent upon scientific management, efficiency, skilled labor, and effective tools. ”

“ Indeed, the daily press is full of signs that the food problem is an acute one, for the current joke about food prices, the accounts of boycotts by housekeepers, popular articles on nutrition and pure foods, and the records of state and national legislation, all show that as a nation we are awake and seeking a way out of our present difficulties.
Doubtless, the housekeeper has always found the task of supplying food to her family one of the most perplexing, but modern conditions have made the difficulties manifold when contrasted with olden times. ”

“ AS SECOND IN COMMAND IN THE HOUSE, except in large establishments, where there is a house steward, the housekeeper must consider herself as the immediate representative of her mistress, and bring, to the management of the household, all those qualities of honesty, industry, and vigilance, in the same degree as if she were at the head of her own family. ”

“ CLEANLINESS IS ALSO INDISPENSABLE TO HEALTH, and must be studied both in regard to the person and the house, and all that it contains. Cold or tepid baths should be employed every morning, unless, on account of illness or other circumstances, they should be deemed objectionable. The bathing of children will be treated of under the head of "MANAGEMENT OF CHILDREN."
5. FRUGALITY AND ECONOMY ARE HOME VIRTUES, without which no household can prosper. ”

“ Many business men go through much such drudgery to attain their goals, why should not the housewife be willing to make a similar sacrifice in her home for the sake of the service she is rendering the members of her household? ”

“ We may perhaps hope too that the principles of household management may in turn react on economic science, and may show to its professors that value in use, though more difficult to detect and estimate than value in exchange, has been unduly neglected both in theory and practice. ”

“ If the pupils would always practise in their own homes the tidiness and cleanliness they are taught in the schools, they would be less frequently regarded as a nuisance by the cook. Novices should make a rule not to use unnecessary utensils, to wait on oneself as much as possible, and to clear away all materials and utensils when they have finished.
The Daily Duties of a Housekeeper are regulated, in a great measure, by the size of the establishment she superintends. ”

“ The general servant's duties depend entirely upon the size of the household of which she is a member and upon the number of other domestics employed. Speaking generally her duties comprise those that are already treated of in the articles on the housemaid and the parlour maid. Often indeed she is expected to do the cooking as well. The routine of a general servant's duties depends upon the kind of situation she occupies; but a systematic servant should so contrive to divide her work, that every day in the week may have its proper share. ”

“ What moved me, in the first instance, to attempt a work like this, was the discomfort and suffering which I had seen brought upon men and women by household mismanagement. I have always thought that there is no more fruitful source of family discontent than a housewife's badly-cooked dinners and untidy ways. ”

“ Should there be a baby besides several other children in such a household, it is not expected that the nursery governess will do more for it than to take it occasionally in her charge and do a little needlework for it when necessary, the mother washing, dressing and looking after the infant herself. The governess's work chiefly lies with the other children. ”

“ There might always, in a country-house, be one or more young girls, according to the size of the establishment; to be placed under older servants, or be instructed by the mistress herself, in all household occupations, from {xiii}the hardest work and most simple offices, to the more delicate arts of housekeeping, including needle-work. This practice would not only insure more good servants than there now are ”

“ In large establishments there are several house-maids. and according to the number kept the actual work of the head housemaid may be determined being practically little if there be many, while her responsibilities are in inverse ratio. She has not so much to do the work as to see that it is done, reserving the lighter and more important tasks for her own share. ”

“ When the home is first started the husband and wife should discuss frankly the problems322 of division and should agree on the methods of expenditure. This common understanding between members of a family forms a bond of union, and each feels a greater pleasure and pride in doing his part. The fact that there is a budget and a system brings orderliness in methods of work and freedom from worry and anxiety as well as a saving of money. And this saving of money and strength is the same as an increase in income. ”

“ Every advance in the management of the household contributes to the general welfare: it sets new ideas under way.
If the farming business must in general be reorganized, so also must the householding part of it be reorganized. ”