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Coming of Age — Part 2
All this began in 1903, when UW-Madison received $7,500 from the
Wisconsin legislature to develop a domestic science department.
Part of the College of Letters and Science, the new Department of
Home Economics offered its first classes the following spring. Courses
included house sanitation, house decoration, selection and preparation
of foods, dietetics, and household economy. All thirty-four students
were women.
While they would learn about domestic activities, such as decorating
and cooking roast beef at the proper temperature, the students were
required to complete one year of college chemistry before admission
to the program. They were accepted under the same conditions as
students applying to other programs. And, to graduate, the home
economics majors had to take at least forty-seven credits in the
sciences, including biology, physiology, and organic chemistry.
These rigorous requirements established by Caroline Hunt, the department's
founding director and first faculty member, set the school up as
a training ground for not just wives and mothers, but also for scientists,
researchers, and other professionals.
Hunt had trained in chemistry at the graduate level and conducted
original research published by government agencies. Perhaps because
of her experiences, she stressed the importance of grounding the
home economics program in academics - not domesticity.
"Hunt set high standards for the curriculum. She and the other
early women faculty members were scientists trained in economics,
biology, and chemistry," says Douthitt. "They had a view
of how important it was to open up opportunities for women in higher
education. They themselves had worked so hard to get there."
From the very beginning, faculty and their students conducted research.
The earliest project dates back to 1908, when Ellen Alden Huntington,
assistant to Hunt, evaluated the "fireless cooker" - a
precursor of today's electric slow cooker. Huntington, along with
students in the department, performed a number of experiments to
test the ability of foods to hold heat. They also determined the
advantages of cooking food below the boiling point. And, just like
students in departments across campus, those in domestic science
wrote theses, often based on original research.
In some instances, the students carried out this research in one
of the school's practice cottages, the first of which was purchased
in 1911. Working laboratories complete with modern kitchens and
living quarters, these cottages provided students with a simulated
environment where they could apply and practice theories learned
in their classes. For short periods, dietetics students lived in
the cottage, where they planned, purchased, prepared, and served
meals for themselves and two instructors. The kitchen, though, usually
dished up more than dinner; it served as a chemistry laboratory
for class experiments on food preparation, nutrition, and sanitation.
Looking inside the windows of the first practice cottage, which
was originally located at the corner of Randall Avenue and Linden
Drive, an observer might have spied a woman standing by the stove,
setting the table, or washing dishes. Seeing her dressed in an apron
- not a lab coat - the onlooker might have assumed the cottage was
not a working laboratory, but a playhouse.
1, 2, 3, 4,
5
On Wisconsin Home
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Coming of Age
- Parents of newborns and toddlers can access Professor David
Riley's research-based advice by reading his instructional
newsletters.
- In 2003, the School of Human Ecology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
will mark its 100th
anniversary. Learn about the people and events that made the
school the vibrant educational and research institution it is
today
- Trace the history
of human ecology through archival material from one of SoHE's
competitors for students, Cornell University.
Fall 2003 Features
Alumni News
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