The western sentinel. [volume] (Winston-Salem, N.C.) 1887-1926, 1893-12-14
THE SERVANT QUESTION.

The SERF ANT QUESTION.
The domestic service problem has
led to all sorts of experiments on the
part OF housekeepers, and theories
without number have been advanced
for the relief of state OF affairs
which threatens to break up the
home, and drive families into COM
munities where the minimum of eX-
/ pense and freedom from worry about
details, will compensate the house
keeper for the less pleasant features,
the lack of privacy and seclusion and
the home atmosphere.
1t is common remark among
women who live in boarding houses
and hotels: 81 would gladly keep
house If Icould havegood servants"
In Bellamy's Looking Backward"
the ideal mode of living pictured is
the cooperative kitchen and dining
hall where the families of a neighbour
hood combine to overcome the diff
culties of the culinary department.
Cooperative kitchens are by no
means uncommon. In a western
city, a block of dwellings, has recent
ly been completed in the center of
which is an open court where a COM
mon kitchen and dining room under
the supervision of competent cook
and corps of assistants does away
with the process of meal getting in
the separate establishments.
AS the business of planning and
preparing meals is the most irksome
part of housekeeping and the part
least satisfactorily performed by
servants the advantage of plan like
the above, provided it can be har-
moniously carried out, is obvious.
Another method of evading the
tyrrany of the cuisine is that adopt
ed by many in the large cities, a
light breakfast and luncheon is pre-
pared at home, while dinner, the
principal meal, is taken out at some
convenient restaurant or boarding
house.
The growing popularity Of the
apartment house as evidenced in
New York and other great cities IS
mother outgrowth of the prevalence
OF an inferior serving class, and as
long as ignorance and incompetence
are the rule among those who choose
domestic service as an occupation,
the desire on the part of individuals
to shirk the responsibilities and trials
connected with imperfect housekeep-
ing will continue to increase.
Let us consider some of the causes
which have produced these condi-
tions. OF what elements is our serv
ing class composed? How have they
been fitted for their work? What
encouragement, if any, have they for
self Improvement? In the answers
to these questions lie the chief reasons
for the present state of affairs. In
the first place, our servant class is a
migratory army composed of nearly
every nationality on the face of the
globe. From the Emerald Isle to the
Flowery Kingdom and from the
Scandinavian Peninsula to Cape
Town: they come a never ending
stream of raw recruits who expect US
to teach and train them to do our
work, and at the SINE time pay
them the wages which experience
alone should command. AS soon as
they are fairly well taught, they
leave us for little more money or
an easier place, and SO we have no
real interest in them or they in u.s.
The result is We can not become
attached to and trust them and they
on their part grow distrustful and
suspicious, regard all employers in
the light of tyrants, aud the main
object finally becomes to obtain the
most wages Tor the least amount OF
labor.
Since we have no old family serv-
ants, trained and trusted through a
generation or two, our only method
of procedure is the systematic
training of such material as We
have. For this purpose, Cooking
and Training Schools should be es-
tablished in every community, where
all branches of domestic work could |
be thoroughly taught and learned.
This is our only salvation, and is
being recognized as such. The Yonng
Women's Christian Associations in |
some cities are doing good work in |
this line, most of them having free |
classes in cooking. In other places
clubs for working girls are being es-
tablished where housework in all it's
branches is scientifically taught.
May the movement flourish, and as
1 result we shall expect better ser
wants, less friction in the domestic
and above all the preser-
7ation of Home Sweet Home.
Raid Made on a Smoke-House.
of the Sentinel.
RURAL HALL, Dec. l1-Luther
Niger is still very low with typhoid
ever