'The Sphinx in the Household': A New Look at the History of Household Workers

Abstract

This paper focusses on household service work during the so-called "servant crisis," 1890 to 1920. Contemporaries, under the leadership of Professor Salmon, declared that the servant shortage was due to the "social stigma" attached to service. In this paper we find their basic service study, Domestic Service, to be (deliberately?) biased and false, and counterpose their findings with a servant's view. This is then tied into the general history of housework's development.