MODERN CONVENIENCES.--A LITTLE HISTORY.--PLANS THAT MAKE EXTRA
WORK.--MODERN CONVENIENCES ENUMERATED.
Most of the conveniences of housekeeping are modern. It is only within
the past few years that the demands of the housekeeper for helps or aids
in making her work easier were thought worth considering. Even now we
occasionally meet men who think that anything that was good enough for
their mothers is good enough for their wives. We have in mind a farmer
who, during fifteen years, purchased three large farms. He buried a wife
for every farm. Their death was the result of more than slavish work.
The disposition which leads in this direction often continues after the
time when economy does not demand close living.
The man who moves west to a new country cannot pay for many of the
modern conveniences. The demand for them is not great. Such a man
usually builds a house of two or three rooms. The family cook and eat in
the kitchen; they sit there between meals. The other rooms are for beds.
There is not a great deal of house-work to be done in a house of this
kind. The trouble comes when the pioneer becomes wealthier, and builds a
large house "in town" or on the farm. Possibly his wife or daughters do
the work as they did in the smaller house. If not, it is done by one
servant. The work in this house is a great deal harder. There is a great
deal more of it than there was in the two or three room house, which was
built during their earlier life. In the former house, if they had
coffee, it was poured from the pot in which it was made directly into
the cups which were on the table. The meat was taken from the skillet in
which it was cooked and put into the plates of those who ate it. If they
had pancakes, the wife would sit with her back near the stove, where she
could easily reach the griddle to grease it and turn the cakes while she
was eating her meal. There was no formal dessert. The pie was eaten from
the same plates as the rest of the food. There were no napkins; often,
no tablecloth.
It did not take long to wash the dishes after a meal of this kind--there
were not many of them. In from fifteen to twenty-five minutes after the
meal was over, the wife could be seen sitting by the kitchen stove,
sewing or knitting. The pans and the kettles were out of the way, and
the kitchen was turned into a sitting-room. If the weather was cold, the
door into the bedroom was open; the whole house was warm and
comfortable. Wood was plenty and cheap.
This woman's troubles began when her husband, by dint of hard work and
close economy, found himself in a position to gratify his pride in his
accumulated wealth by building a new house. It was a big white house
with green blinds. The stories were twelve or thirteen feet high; a
large hall ran through the centre; the kitchen had nothing in it but
doors and windows and a stove-hole; there was no sink, no conveniences
of any kind. They now had a separate dining and sitting room, and an
awful parlor with brussels carpet on it, which had red and green flowers
all over it. The bedrooms were upstairs. They were all large; wood-work
painted white. In the winter they were cold. The old habits of economy
which made this house possible had so fixed themselves upon the
occupants that they would not build a fire in the bedrooms. They said
that they "didn't think it healthy to sleep in a warm room."
People go to see Mrs. Green in her new house. They go through and look
at it, and say, "Oh, how nice." But they find a tired woman. She doesn't
sit down to sew or knit in a few minutes after the meal is over, as she
used to. She is at work all the time. The children must have clothes to
fit the house. There is more sweeping and dusting to do; there are more
dishes to wash; there is more of everything to do. Still, she came into
the new house expecting to find things different and easier than they
were before.
The modern conveniences are those arrangements and appliances which make
it possible for people to live comfortably in a larger house, without
seriously increasing the cares which they had in a smaller one. In the
old house of two or three rooms the mother would bathe the children once
a week in a tub by the kitchen fire. The tub would be dragged out the
door, which was not very high above the ground, and the water emptied
into the yard. In the new house it is different. The water is carried
from the pump in the back yard, and from the kitchen stove, upstairs
into one of the rooms. Then it has to be carried down again, emptied
into the alley or the yard. The living habits are all changed without
the compensating conveniences which naturally belong to them. It is
probable that Mrs. Green keeps a "girl," but even then she has
infinitely more work to do than ever belonged to the old home. She
cannot understand it. She has a new house and a girl, and yet she is
always tired.
Most of the houses in the newer cities and towns are, in a measure,
similar to this. Nearly every one attempts to live up to the mark set by
those who have all of the appliances of modern housekeeping. Coal and
water have to be carried all over the house. Slops and ashes have to be
carried downstairs and out of the building.
By attracting attention to the inconveniences of housekeeping, we may
see and understand the full meaning of the term "modern conveniences."
There is a natural call for dish-washing arrangements to take the place
of the square table, with the dish-pan, the tea-kettle, and the
water-bucket. In its place, we have at one side of the kitchen, a sink,
with cocks for hot and cold water immediately over it. The tables and
drain-board are arranged to simplify the operations of dish-washing. The
water, instead of being carried to the yard or alley, finds its way
naturally into the drain through the sink. Modern laundry arrangements
make it unnecessary to carry great tubs of water outside, or to delay
wash-day on account of the weather, or to bring in the frozen clothes
during the cold winter days. The bath-room, with the tub, the
water-closet, and the wash-stand, is on the second floor. This saves a
great deal of work. The water does not have to be carried upstairs nor
the slops down. There is hot and cold water within easy reach of all the
rooms. Often it happens that there are stationary wash-stands in the
various bedrooms, though this is only usual in the most expensive
houses.
The amount of work which a furnace saves is not readily estimated. It
also saves money. Others of the modern conveniences are "places to put
things;" large closets in the bedrooms, well supplied with drawers,
shelves, and hooks; a general closet on the upper floor, which is
accessible from all of the rooms, for bedding and other articles of
common use; a ventilated closet in the bath-room, in which soiled linen
may be put without contaminating the atmosphere. There should be a
closet or place on the second floor for brooms, dust-pans, and dusters.
Where there is no particular place for these articles, the housekeeper
or the servant has to use time in searching, or in going up and down
stairs. Anything which saves labor may be regarded as a modern
convenience.