The Democratic banner. (Mt. Vernon, Ohio) 1898-192?, 1910-10-04
Dome eStic and
Industrial
Education.
sssssssssssssessssssssssssss
Mt. Vernon, O., Oct. /, 1910.


A more hopeful indication for the |
future happiness and well being of the |
home.makers of the nation would be
assured If the girls who are complet-
erly drilled in the science of domestic
economy and the many other duties
pertaining to home life. If such stud
les could be made part of schoolgirl
curriculum there would not be so
much fear and guessing about the
new woman" and her effect upon the
life duties of women, each In her own
sphere and generation. All would be
better adapted to individual environ
ment. Fewer disappointments would
present fewer divorces.
The public schools of the. land are
annually turning out millions of girl
graduates-for what? Ornaments, or
home-soldiers ! in the battle of lifef
Turning out graduates possessed of
more or less knowledge of the arts,
history and science, but, in the main,
lamentable deficient in all that goes to
make good help-mate-a good house
keeper
If girl life could be inoculated with a
desire and healthy interest in those
things which go to make content and
happiness in the coming home-years
of their lives, if they could be induced
to mingle with their Latin, German,
mathematics and other abstruse stud
les, proper proportion of the infor-
nation necessary for home-making
there would be no danger that her
normal instincts would be diverted or
that she would be led estray from the
functions of home-lfe into the more
dangerous Gf more enticihg) paths
which lead to the so-called broader
spheres of the spheres
which, like those open to man, are sad
ly overfilled.
Girls should be taught to recognize
the fact that home-making is as much
a profession and calls for as much
|
called learned professions. Any wo-
man who can, under conditions pre-
valing at the present time, make a
skillful and efficient house-keeper
with ability to direct the finances ap-
pertaining thereto can, if she choose
to turn her attention to them, to spend
the same amount of energy and pre-
paration, make of herself a successful
busines woman, teacher, lawyer or
physician-but neither of these can
make good housekeeper without
equal preparation, and the openings
for the housekeepers (home-makers)
are as thousand to one of the other
professions.
Our schools, overlooking the fact
that the home-life demand is para
mountly the greatest, are preparing all
for special duties (the supply far ex,
ceeding the demand,) and are leaving
to the uneducated mothers of the land
duty which should be the province
of the state.
The girl, who, looking forward to
the time when she must meet these
home-life responsibilities, would spend
part of her school years preparing for
them, would show far more judgment
than would she who preferred to con
tent herself with the purely intellect
ual and those literary cuttings that
: go to making up the customary Glib
eral education'-thanw would she who
waited until taken from mothers
: home before she had learned to man
age the one to which she was going
her, deceiving herself and companion
in certain misery.
!, Because of the annual output OF
newly prepared girl-specialists, spec
, ing more and more hard to secure, and
less remunerative, to say nothing OF
the needless competition against man
, who, otherwise, might become keep
er of and protector of those who are
fast driving his from the fields of la
Dor.
. There is a continuous growing ir
Y the smallness of the "room-at- at-the-top'
i for both men and women-less mar
riages less homes. Something IL
T radically wrong. Would it not be bes
e to see to it that all boys and girls
i are properly prepared and better fit
n ted and equipped for home-life, ant
to the end that all will the better
e and more surely enjoy the environ
f ment within which each may lin thu
e main must) be destined to pass thei
t several lives-to the end that ther'
J. may be more homes and less com
e petition in the field rightfully belong
O ing to man. Home-building should b.
n tha highest and greatest aim of tn,