The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1924-12-18
Like a
Fairy
Tale
BY CYNTHIA GREY


household help but no servant
problem.
That may sound to you like
fairy tale about the Happy Isles.
But it's not. It's only telling
about our own country back in
the early days when it was first
settled.
Then, when Mistress Cabot
needed someone to help her with
the children, she went to her good
neighbor, Deborah Smith, who was
a spinster.
And Debbie came to work for
the Cabots. But she ate with
them at their table and was treated
as one Of the family. The children
called her Mistress Smith," no
doubt.
She might work for the Cabots
but she was just as good as they
were!
OUCH was the social fabric that
~ the first Americans spun. And
it was like the homespun cloth
they wove-simple and decent.
If we had kept that fine old
American ideal we would have no
servant problem today. No one
but very old people, invalids, and
women with children too young
to be left alone in the house would
have household help at all.
But we didn't. We went back
to the fashion of Paris and London,
and put our house-workers into
caps and aprons. We have "house-
maids" but there aren't enough to
go around. The ancient profession
is dying out.
For in these free days of fallen
czars and kaisers, no girl Is par.
ticularly keen about wearing cap
and apron. They smack too much
of serfdom.
There, too, is something very
un-American, to me at least, in
the familiar spectacle of a liveried
chauffeur carrying a large mar.
ket basket and walking a yard or
two behind his mistress as she
shops for food.
HIHEODORE ROOSEVELT. in
Il his lifetime, told of a large
New England family thet adj
dressed its chauffeur as Mr. So
and-So" and it's cook as Mrs.
This-or-That," treated them as
equals, and had perfectly man.
aged household, to boot.
And Veblen, in his Theory OF
the Leisure Glass;" says that the
whole point Of having several
humble servants is to impress our
neighbors with our wealth and
idleness.
A family of two that employs
cook, waitress, and an upstairs
girl is robbing Mrs. Jill, who has
four little children. OF the help that
she needs and they don't. Because
a housemaid is no drug on the
market and can pick her places.
She certainly is not going to
work hard for Mrs. Jill when she
can have a soft" job with Mrs.
Millions.
To say nothing OF the cast-ofr
dresses and hats that Mrs. Mil
lions will be sure to give her every
now and then!
So Mrs. Jill gets along as best
she can, rushing through the
mending basket while the baby
takes his nap and picking pears
at midnight. She certainly should
have a housemaid, but she rarely
is able to keep one.
The childless woman who queens
1t over a four-room-hat-with-m maids
room further tangles the servant
problem. She Is usually the pam.
pered type who has taken her idea
Of what the world owes wife
from the De Mile movies. She
wants maid so that she can keep
her hands from having that daily
in-the-dishpan look, and can have
her breakfast IN bed.
This sort Of woman has no more
need Of a maid than she has Of a
diamond tiara. Yet she probably
thinks she deserves one OF those,
tool
/ know a woman of this type.
Every Thursday night" she
tells me, when Liza has her day
off, Jack and have dinner down
town at the Jazzamine Gardens.