Insights from a 1949 Guide for Housewives

‘A lmost every woman sees herself as a good home-maker. Before marriage she pictures herself in a dream house or flat; a charming hostess, clever housewife and adorable sweetheart all in one,” begins an advice manual first published in 1949, How to Run Your Home Without Help, by Kay Smallshaw, who is perhaps best known for her role as an editor of Good Housekeeping magazine. I flipped through the opening pages at one of my favorite bookshops, Persephone Books in Bath, which publishes and reprints seemingly forgotten works (novels, poetry collections, cookbooks, short stories, gardening manuals, and so on), mostly by British women from the mid-20th century. Each book I have purchased there has supplied insightful social commentary about a rapidly changing country devastated by two wars. I wondered, How much do I — an unmarried 25-year-old woman with a full-time job — have in common with a 1950s housewife, and what can I learn from her? So I bought it.

Smallshaw addresses an audience of (mostly married) women adjusting to domestic roles in postwar Britain: “This book is mainly for the newcomer to running a home” at a time when “labour is scarce” and therefore “brains must have full play” for keeping hearth and home. The chapters address virtually every question, even as granular as moth prevention, that might trouble an inexperienced housewife.

Roughly half the pages are devoted to cleaning advice, much of which has been rendered irrelevant. Most of us can ignore the details about maintaining a wood-burning fireplace, while modern laundry machines allow different fabrics and colors to be thrown in together. I reckon that most women my age don’t own any silver that needs polishing, and the daily to-do list now doesn’t include emptying the ashtrays throughout the house. (In the budgeting section, “cigarettes” are on the same list as “rent” and “food.”) Mothers are tossing out disposable diapers, not “boiling nappies.” Other obligations have become much easier. For example, supermarkets have consolidated the individual shopping runs to the butcher, baker, grocer, fishmonger, and dairy supplier into one trip. Today, groceries can even be delivered via ordering online, preventing the need to even step outside. (However, Smallshaw strongly warns against becoming a recluse overwhelmed by chores; grocery shopping, she says, is “an excellent way of getting you out into the air” and enjoying “human contacts.”) Through Smallshaw’s astute observations and detailed instructions we learn how the nature of women’s daily chores has evolved, which allows us to better understand mid-20th-century Britain, even in economic terms: “During the war, when soap was too scarce to allow of it being used in the washing-up bowl, it was certainly harder, but with the coming of the liquid soap substitute, one can luxuriate in nice sudsy water.”

Still, plenty of Smallshaw’s guidance remains helpful. Nifty tips and tricks — what might be called “hacks” today — are sprinkled throughout the book, like her warm mixture for removing ink stains from carpets and instructions for brewing tea without getting that “stewed” taste. The suggestions are handy but also inspiring and might prompt a modern reader to embrace traditional domesticity, since Smallshaw makes previously common tasks seem uncomplicated, even rewarding. I followed her directions under the section titled “jam making in your stride” after being reassured that “even the old hand will seldom produce two batches exactly the same.” (However, I have yet to throw a children’s party, for which she notes, “To-day’s children tend to prefer savouries to sweets, so sandwiches with grated cheese and celery salt or marmite disappear quickly,” while a Victoria sponge cake cut into shapes and with colored icing is “probably the main favorite” cake.) Perhaps the most broadly applicable guidance is her insistence on a lifestyle structured by a detailed schedule. She warns that, without a plan, “you will run the risk of that occupational disease of housewives, which has taken the sweetness out of so many marriages; letting the house own you, instead of the other way about.”

Indeed, roughly half of the book is about being a homemaker — as well as a delightful hostess — rather than housecleaner. “Keeping a home clean and bright is certainly necessary, but seeing that the family gets appetizing and nourishing meals is the very essence of the housewife’s job,” Smallshaw writes, alongside recipes and meal plans. She provides general nutritional guidance to get enough vitamins and also designs sample menus for dinner parties, noting that “the right kind of menu is half the battle” because you don’t want to abandon your guests by staying in the kitchen for too long, and “no one really enjoys being entertained when the preparation has obviously tired out the hostess in advance.” While a homemaker’s tasks today may have changed significantly, perhaps she still must handle the same types of quarrels at home:

A pair of sharp scissors, preferably stainless, will halve the time needed in rinding bacon, taking fins and tails off fish, cutting up certain kinds of meat, and many other jobs, too. Of course, you’ll have to guard these like a dragon! Otherwise they’ll be borrowed for all kinds of unsuitable jobs, and never be in their place. From the start, train the family to regard these kitchen scissors as sacred.

Smallshaw describes her book as enhancing “efficiency,” but its philosophy is undeniably utilitarian — streamlined cleaning is instrumentalized to maintain a stable home: “It’s noticeable that in the happiest families, everyone ‘pitches in’ even if it is, very rightly, Mother who does the lion’s part and keeps the whole machine running sweetly.” And thus a successful housewife in Smallshaw’s eyes is a cunning manager who encourages and supervises family participation in chores. “Don’t differentiate between the boys and girls,” she recommends, and further stating that both should acquire some cooking skills before becoming teenagers.

The archetypal husband is portrayed as ignorant, so when you have to adapt your routine after childbirth, Smallshaw writes, “even if you have always pressed your husband’s underwear, try putting it through the wringer only” because “ten to one he won’t even notice.” Still, he can be recruited for domestic service, and he’s potentially necessary for lifting heavy things. The “master of the house” might be willing to assist during spring cleaning “if approached diplomatically.” He is susceptible to flattery, with Smallshaw proclaiming that “a clever wife induces her husband to regard [cleaning] the boiler as his special province!” And while the authoritative “breadwinner” enjoys some privileges, such as receiving an alternative “grilled fillet with a little parsley butter” if he dislikes “steamed fish,” he occasionally deserves a bit of scolding, too. When discussing ways to save time cleaning the bathroom after a baby arrives, Smallshaw writes,

A little more thoughtfulness about sloshing water about will cut down cleaning-up time, too. Men are the worst offenders here, and while we’re on the subject, has your husband got slack about leaving his old razor blades on the shelf? It may only take a minute for you to clear them away, but minutes mount up!

Despite the mildly mocking criticisms interspersed throughout the pages, such as “a man of the house usually makes more work than he performs,” Smallshaw understands that your husband is ultimately someone whose company you (should) enjoy, and thus she further advises adhering to a careful plan so that you can maximize time together: “Saturday morning you want to be as free as possible, so that you are clear by lunch-time when your husband comes home.”

What about a family-free working woman? Smallshaw frames the “part-time housewife” as blissfully ignorant because she can “shut the door on one part of her life each morning” and therefore is not “constantly reproached by seeing what wants doing.” By contrast, the full-time housewife has all the domestic responsibilities staring her in the face. (An irony worth noting is that Smallshaw, by virtue of being an editor and author, was also a working woman. Surprisingly little is known about her, and it isn’t clear whether she ever married and had children.) The suggestions for a career woman aren’t all that different, except there’s less to do for others, since she’s assumed to be single. Smallshaw — once again — recommends a plan “pared down to the bone,” writing, “You think you ought to be able to care for [your flat] on your own, if you use your brains as you do in the office. Right!” If you’re efficient, you should even have time occasionally for a “care-free evening with sewing and the radio” or a “home beauty treatment night.”

Thanks to her striking lack of condescension and noticeable chirpiness throughout, Smallshaw comes across as not only an exacting coach but also an enthusiastic cheerleader. She understands that the repetitive and mundane nature of housekeeping can be dispiriting, so she sympathetically acknowledges that “the disheartening part is that almost as soon as one has finished, it’s time to start again.” But housework, she cautions, is no more monotonous than “pounding a typewriter or modeling dresses or lots of other jobs that have a more glamorous reputation.” She offers lively insights that attempt to infuse cheerfulness into the daily routine, such as, “Bedmaking can be a quite pleasant interlude from the dusting and sweeping. It also has the advantage of stretching the muscles without undue exertion.” The pages are peppered with messages of encouragement for the woman who feels bored, unappreciated, or unproductive. When describing the plan for spring cleaning, she advises, “If you haven’t already had a break, stop and have a quick lunch.” Moreover, she offers praise, affirming that “you have already accomplished a lot of work.”

That is how Smallshaw understands homemaking: “work.” Out of admiration for the demanding role of a housewife, she repeatedly refers to it as a “job.” Like any job, it requires relief in the form of “time for talk, for outside interests, and for plain fun.” Without leisure, she notes, you can be a good maid but hardly a successful homemaker. And although being a housewife is difficult, it can be rewarding. She concludes by reminding us that “running a home may seem unspectacular and ordinary, but making a success of it, so that the home is a happy one for all who live in it, is creative work to rank with the best.”

Writing in the 1960s of the American suburban housewife, Betty Friedan said the following: “As she made the beds, shopped for groceries, matched slipcover material, ate peanut butter sandwiches with her children, chauffeured Cub Scouts and Brownies, lay beside her husband at night — she was afraid to ask even of herself the silent question — ‘Is this all?’” Smallshaw, by contrast, sees domestic labor as “exhausting” yet “creative work” that “enriches the personality.” And unlike the feminists famous in the 20th century for their bitter rejection of a woman’s traditional domestic role, Smallshaw believes that homemaking does earn “compensations” in the form of valuable “freedoms,” including the ability “to do things one’s own way, even to the mistakes, and to have only one time-table to consider.” When Friedan writes, “We can no longer ignore that voice within women that says: ‘I want something more than my husband and my children and my home,’” we can imagine that Smallshaw would respond by asking, “What more could you want?”