Keeping House For Credit


Today's Family and Consumer Sciences students get a taste of 
the real world by using the latest computer technology to 
design their own lines of apparel, studying international 
trends in consumer credit or analyzing the genetic background 
of pork to assess its quality.

Yesterday's FCS students got a taste of the real world too, 
but it was a different world then. A world so different that 
female students in the curriculum, then known as home 
economics, had to spend six weeks cooking, cleaning and 
changing diapers.

Home management homes were a part of home economics programs 
in colleges nationwide. They were proposed at Iowa State by 
home economics Dean Catherine MacKay, who felt female 
students should experience firsthand the problems encountered 
by the average homemaker. 

The first ISU home man-agement practice house was established 
in 1917. By the early 1920s, the home man-agement residence 
program was in full swing. Several houses on campus were 
purchased and remodeled 
to suit the program's needs. Female home economics students 
lived in the houses while "practicing" their homemaking 
skills.

Beginning in 1952, the homes were replaced with six duplexes 
designed specifically for the home management program. The 
duplexes still are in use as part of the ISU Child 
Development Center.

In addition to regular classes, a typical day for home 
management students involved planning menus, making a 
shopping list, general cleaning, cooking and setting an 
elaborate table for dinner. A resident house adviser, usually 
a graduate student, made sure tasks were completed.

Mary Lueder Nye ('49) learned innova-tion as she struggled to 
manage the house-hold budget on 70 cents a day per person. 

"A nickel would stretch much farther in those days, but 
budgeting for food was difficult regardless," Nye said. "We 
had to make use of every last bit of the food we purchased. I 
remember baking an angel food cake one evening for dessert. 
There was some left over. The next evening's dessert featured 
angel food cake torn into pieces with chocolate sauce over 
it. You learned to get creative."

Creative was the word for LaVohn Larsen Isvik's ('38) chili. 
Operating on a budget of only 42 cents a day, she made a pot 
of chili without a recipe, basing her efforts only on what 
she thought chili should taste like. More than 50 years 
later, Isvik still makes chili the same way.
     Nye and housemate Pat Howell Hutchins ('49) devised a 
method of dusting the wooden floors that kept their cleaning 
time to a minimum. Attaching the heads of dust mops to their 
feet, the twosome "skated" their way to a nice shine.
     "It wasn't the cooking or cleaning that presented the 
biggest challenge," said Anita Ohlsen Wald-Tuttle ('48). "It 
was caring for the baby -- being completely responsible for 
another human being. Now that was tough." 
     Beginning in 1924, orphans were temporarily placed in 
the homes by the Iowa Department of Children's Services and 
other child welfare agencies.

"It is my recollection that, at that time, state law 
prohibited children under six months of age from being 
adopted," said Beverly Madden, director of career planning 
and placement, who, during the 1960-61 school year,  served 
as a teaching assistant in the Nickells Home Management Home. 
"By caring for several of these children in the home 
management homes, ISU was doing the state a great service."

Students spent a week caring for the baby, facing all of the 
typical challenges of child care -- feeding, changing and 
even finding babysitters for the children while they attended 
their regular classes.

"The layout of our house was such that my bedroom was nowhere 
close to the nursery, which, in the middle of the night, 
wasn't so bad," one home management resident said. "I used to 
comment on how good the baby had been during the night.  Ms. 
Irland, the house adviser (whose room neighbored the nursery) 
was usually quick to correct me." 

In 1967, the home management residence program became a part 
of Iowa State's history when it was merged into the new 
department of family environment.

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contact:  Michelle Johnson, News Service, (515) 294-8986
updated:  9-29-95