Home Life 50 Years Ago

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30831, 17 August 1965, Page 2

Home Life 50 Years Ago

Those good old days are best forgotten, in the opinion of Miss Mary Huck, home economics director of the refrigerating division if an American firm. While the company celebrates its manufacturing record of 50 million products in 50 years. Miss Huck casts a glance at home life half a century ago and has a quick glimpse of the future. The so-called simple life in 1915 was really quite complex,” she says. “Although electricity and inside plumbing had appeared, the homemaker in most homes still pumped water—at the kitchen sink, if she were lucky—still fed wood or coal into the kitchen stove to get the meals and heat the wash water, and still made daily trips to the garbage can in the alley. And in a corner of the kitchen, the ice box silently filled its drain pan and spilled over on to the floor.” Miss Huck cites the 1915 homemaker's laundering methods. “She checked her soap sup-

ply (some women still were making their own then), checked the firewood supply before heating the oldfashioned stove, pumped water, heated it, stirred the boiling clothes, scrubbed them on the washboard, pumped cold water for rinsing, wrung out the clothes by hand, and toted them to the outdoor clothes-line. Usually, the stove was kept warm to heat the hand iron after a second trip outside to take down the clothes.”

By contrast, time and lab-our-saving laundry appliances available to today's homemaker include washers that are automatic and dryers with electronic controls as sensitive as a homemaker’s hand. “There are fond memories surrounding grandma’s woodburning stone and the ice box,” says Miss Huck. But she points out the constant attention required of the cook, the lack of conveniences, beauty or styling, and the sheer drudgery of cleaning old appliances. Three chores as bothersome today as they were years ago are defrosting, oven-cleaning, and washing dishes and pots and pans. Yet, says Miss

Huck, the appliance industry has progressively lightened the homemaker’s load to a point where such chores have been virtually eliminated. Frost-proof freezing systems, for example, pioneered by her firm in 1958, have eliminated defrosting. The company lifted the homemaker off her knees with its introduction of the first ovens that pull out for easy cleaning.

Advanced dishwashers, some with pots and pans cycles, have even eliminated pre-rinsing and much of the dish preparation to which women—and men—have been accustomed.

“The exciting element about 50 million products in 50 years,” to Miss Huck, “is that the record sets a pattern for even more remarkable advancements in future appliances—designed with the homemaker in mind.” Tomorrow’s home, according to Miss Huck, may have walls which can change colour as desired and even provide “instant” windows. The time and care given to meal preparation may be greatly reduced by pre-prepared foods and special utensils, creating new requirements for refrigeration and cooking equipment. The cleaning of dishes and utensils, and the kitchen in general, will be made easier by specialised appliances.

“Houses probably will not have rooms dedicated solely to home utilities,” she says. “Appliances will be positioned for point of need and use throughout the interior and the surroundings. This will give rise to completely new concepts in appliances, many beyond the imagination of today’s homemaker.”