Tag Archives: home economics

I came upon an article of January of this year.  Since we discussed home economics in class, I thought this might apply.  Unlike the Amy Sue Bix article, whose focus was on the equipment program under home economics, this relates more to the branch of child development.  This article came from ABC news and it is called “Practice Babies’: 1 Orphan Raised by 8 Mothers”.  In the time when home economics was becoming quite popular and many women were attending colleges who offered degrees in this field, Cornell University was one of them.  Surprisingly enough Ivy League Cornell offered the Home Economics degree, tuition free for these women.  In 1919 as the final project for graduation for these women they initiated a program called the “practice baby program”.   This required 8 women, up to 12, to care for a baby in an apartment.  Then after 6 weeks the baby would be passed on two another set of women for up to 2 years, when finally they would be adopted.  For those 6 weeks they care for the child 24 hours a day/ 7 days a week, along with other household chores part of their curriculum.  They mention that one of these women might put the baby down for a nap to be later picked up by another woman.  These babies were offered by the welfare program (loaned by orphanages) for the benefit of “science”.

The babies were anonymous since they were infants, but they were all branded with the name Denny Domecon (surname: domestic economy).  After  leaving the child would have no contact with the multiple caregivers or vice versa.  According to Keating, an archivist at Cornell:

“The program was an early testing-ground for consumer research, a “gateway for early education for a different group of women who were so well educated”

The program was later dropped in 1969 when new research pushed society into the benefits of having a primary caregiver.  But that wasn’t before Life magazine ran an article in 1952 glorifying the program.  The apartments were later used as day care center.  I’ve included a video of one of these women caregivers who got their degree in Home Economics from Cornell in 1925.  Also a picture of the article from Life (“The Making of a Home: Cornell Girls Study for Their Big Job.”) Both of these women are the same person.