The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1891-11-14
Ideal Housekeeping.

Ideal Housekeeping.
Miss Frances E. Willard has a
pleasant, cosy house in Evanston,
near Chicago. Not long ago she
talked with a writer for the Chicago
News on "Ideal Housekeeping.
"Oh, certainly, l believe we are
going to have wonderful improve
ments in housekeeping in the fu-
ture," said Miss Willard, as she
settled herself comfortably in her
rocking-chair, and peered over her
glasses with a ready-to-be-inter-
viewed air. "When some man with
a brain, like a George M. Pullman
or Thomas Edison, takes hold of
the problem, | expect we shall be
able to order our dinner by tele-
phone, and have it delivered ready
cooked and hot through pneu-
matte tube. Then we shall have it
served by a deft young man, and
eaten from delicately shaven wood
en- dishes that will be burned after
using, thus saving all the trouble
and labor of dishwashing"
"Do you believe in cooperative
housekeeping?"
"No, 1 do not. At least not in
that kind of cooperation which
provides great public dining-room
where people 60 in crowds to eat.
do not like the idea of herding
together in boarding houses and
hotels. 1 believe the privacy of
home life must be kept sacred. But
I do not see why we cannot have a
common, great kitchen from which
all may order their food ready
cooked.
II DO not think that women will
be the cooks Of the future. The
work is too hard for them. Their
delicate compilations are not fitted
to stand the heat of the stove over
which they must bend when they
cook. 1t is naturally mans work.
Vanderbilt's cook in New York city
gets $4,000 a year, which is the
same salary as that given to two
noted college Presidents. Why
should not men do all the cooking
and make a great business of it!
In the pioneer days of the world
when man got his living by hewing
down the forests, it was natural that
woman should prepare food fol
him when he came home tired al
night. But times have changed
and why should not the cooking Of
food become a great business inter.
est now like so many other house.
hold industries.
''Then there's the heating of oul
houses. What a nuisance the fur
mace and coal-bin is to the tidy
housewife. Why not have street
full of houses, or at least whole
block, heated by steam, sent out
from a common boiler? I'm sure
such plan is practical, and l think
there is one in use now in Lockport,
N. Y. There is also such scheme
in use in Winona, Mimi, where a
whole block of private residences
is heated with steam conveyed by
pipes running underground from
a neighboring factory.
Although we shall always do
business in the cities, l think the
homes of the people are going to
gravitate more and more to the
country. We shall then use less
and less of meat and other stim-
ulating foods and drinks, and
more and more of fruits and veg
etables. Why, last year the supply
Of fruit for food increased 10 per
cent over that of meat. And I
think the increase is going on until
all the poor people will eat fruit
largely instead of meat, and will
find it more cooling and healthful.
Cali these wonderful inventions
can and will be perfected" and here
the speakers bright face took on a
look of tender earnestness and her
playful voice dropped to tone Of
deep seriousness as she added,
"When mans brain has become
freed from the whitening blight of
alcohol and the Supplying fumes
Of tobacco and woman is emanci-
pated from trailing skirts and tight
corsets. then, hand in hand, higher
manhood and sweeter womanhood
will make their home in the coun-
try with easy access to the city, and
all the world will live near to ma
ture's heart"