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PREFACE
THE housekeeper has two
tasks that together absorb the greater part of her time, her energy, and
her income the provision of food for her household and the keeping clean
of the house and its contents, including the wearing-apparel of all the
family. An earlier volume of this series,
How to Cook and Why, offers aid in the first problem, and the
present volume offers aid in the second.
Those who follow the Questions and Answers columns for housewives that
appear in newspapers and magazines know that a large majority of the
questions asked and the answers furnished deal with some aspect of the
cleaning question. One person prefers one method, another a second
method, another a third method, and so on to many and various methods.
But few of those who make recommendation have tried all the methods and
know which is really best. Many times a method is adopted that produces
one good result but another and important bad one, as, for example, the
method of covering ice. As is explained in the chapter on
"Refrigerators," the gain in a reduced ice bill is offset by the loss in
the preservation of food.
It must be frankly confessed that even in the laboratories where
experiments in the applications of science to household problems are
made, not all has been learned that we ought to know. But many tests
have been made, some things are pretty well proved, and many more have
been established as probabilities.
This book contains the results of such testing, in both laboratory and
home. It deals with the numerous aspects of cleaning that come within
the housekeeper's range. Each housekeeper must do her own testing, for
her immediate problems, but this little volume is a sort of laboratory
guide for her to save her time and energy as she goes forth in the daily
battle against dirt.
ISABEL ELY LORD.
PRATT INSTITUTE, January, 1915.
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