A COMPARISON—INDOORS AND OUT - "Farmer's Wife" magazine, 1 January 1906, St Paul
To one who has visited many farm homes in different parts of the country it has seemed strange and unexplainable that so many labor saving inventions in field machinery are provided , and so few that are needed in the house . The price of one of the larger farm machines would nearly if not quite cover the cost of all that the farmer should place in the house for the use of his wife . The farmer may say that he cannot afford to buy more than he does , and that in order to raise the crops necessary to provide for his family he must have the help of machinery . But is his work of providing materials any more necessary than that of his wife's in preparing them for use ? The food must be prepared for the table and clothing made and kept clean and whole . Besides this work , which keeps the farmer's wife employed more hours each day than he , she has the additional burden and strain upon her vital forces of child-bearing and care. It is not entirely from selfishness or thoughtlessness that a farmer whose barn and machine shed contain every mechanical invention he needs on the farm , sees his wife performing the greater portion of the work in the house after his grandmother's methods . Were the farmer obliged to carry on his farm work one season as did his grandfather, by hand labor entirely, he might see the need of modernizing the work in the house as well as in the fields .
But it is largely the fault of many women themselves that they still labor so hard . I have heard several declare they would rather have a washboard than all the washing machines they ever saw , and many women , having begun housekeeping on small means by getting along without things that were really needed in the house , have continued to do the same in the later years of prosperity , without suggesting the need of the many modern inventions the progressive farmer's wife finds so necessary to comfortable living . A sewing machine and a clothes wringer are all the mechanical helps to be found in the average farmhouse , though there are many washing machines in use . The farmer's wife should have , besides these , a patent ironing board that can be set up anywhere and folded and put away when not in use , a gasoline or oil stove for summer cooking , a carpet sweeper and a self wringing mop bucket , a kitchen cabinet , where all cooking materials and utensils are ready at her hand and save her innumerable trips daily to the pantry , and a clothes-reel or a wire pulley line , that she may stand in one place , dry-shod , when hanging out the washing , instead of walking the length of a long clothesline in wet grass or deep snow , as the season may be .
The farmer has a wind-wheel , or a gasoline engine , and tank , for pumping water for his stock , but how about the water supply for his family ? An elevated tank should be put up and the water conducted into the house , a wet sink and waste pipe provided , and a bathtub and toilet convenience as soon as possible This would save much hard labor , for only those who have been obliged to pump water for all household purposes for years or for a lifetime can know what a strain this one task is upon the housewife . All these helps to comfortable housekeeping cannot perhaps be provided at once , but may be planned for and purchased one at a time . The farmer's wife needs and should have every mechanical assistance possible in her work , as the farmer has in his .