Featured White Papers
- Oct. 14th: Simplified IT with Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) (ZDNet)
- PCI DSS therapy for the smaller retailer (McAfee)
- The rise of Web commuting (Citrix Online)
Content provided in partnership with
Domestic sciences at Bradley Polytechnic Institute and The University of Chicago
Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, Autumn 2002 by Collins, Nina
She became an expert in sanitary chemistry and served as assistant to chemistry professors at the institute. As part of her work with oils, she became acquainted with Edward Atkinson who invented the Aladdin Oven, an important part of the model kitchens, which were an integral part of the famous New England Kitchen of Boston. (One important event leading to this was a five hundred dollar prize for the best essay on "sanitary and economic cooking adapted to persons of moderate and small means" sponsored by Henry Lomb of Bausch and Lomb Optical Company in 1888. The winning essay was submitted by Mary H. Abel, another important player of the history of home economics who was put in charge of The New England Kitchen when it opened in 1890.)40 One of the primary purposes of these kitchens was to persuade the poor of the advantage of low-priced and nourishing food. The Rumford Kitchen at the World's Fair in Chicago was a natural outgrowth of this New England Kitchen. At that same fair was an exhibit that represented all Land Grant Colleges, which was organized by Nellie Kedzie, then at Kansas Agricultural College.
Ellen Richards worked without salary at the Institute for seven years in the Woman's Laboratory as an assistant, bought many of the supplies herself, and even cleaned the laboratory for a time. Richards was described by her former students as alert and enthusiastic and kind and friendly. She was, by all accounts, an excellent and much sought-after speaker. In September of 1898, she was invited to the Lake Placid Club to speak about the domestic science problem. Out of that discussion came the plans for the series of Lake Placid Conferences, which began almost one year later.41
According to most authors, harmony among participants was not an integral part of the early Lake Placid Conferences. Very basic elements were discussed concerning views of human beings, of family, and of society. Neither did they agree, according to Marjorie Brown, on the ends to be served through education in home economics, the view of knowledge for home economics, or the organization of the discipline. Marjorie Brown places Ellen Richards with Melvil Dewey and Alice Norton on one side and Alice Chown, Marion Talbot, and Benjamin Andrews on the other.42 Perhaps there is at least a third view or even more than we have yet discovered. At least the third view would have been those who were not represented at Lake Placid or who only attended once or twice before going on to other endeavors. Nellie Kedzie would be in this latter category, as she was invited to go but attended only the first Lake Placid Conference.
The Lake Placid Conference took place during the Victorian period of American History when Americans were very class conscious. Brown suggests that one way of climbing upward in society was to become a professional-even making homemaking a profession would provide upward mobility. Brown suggests another method was to "manage things," which could be interpreted as making the household more efficient. The Victorian period embraced the idea that empirical science would help "cure all evils."43
Find Research Guides for:
Find Featured Titles for: Home & Garden
Most Popular Articles in Reference
- The importance of understanding organizational culture
- Credit card attitudes and behaviors of college students
- What factors attract foreign direct investment?
- Libraries Need Relationship Marketing - mutual interest marketing concept, ...
- How to set performance goals: employee reviews are more than annual critiques
- More »