What Do Home Economics and Sanitary Chemistry Have in Common?

I promised you STEM-tastic stories about women in science and, today, I plan to deliver.

Let me introduce a renowned chemist, legendary sanitation engineer, creator of home economics, and trail-blazing women's advocate:

Ellen Henrietta Swallow Richards

(1842-1911)

With how much Ellen Swallow Richards contributed to the advancement of women in science, it is only fitting that she kicks off our Wednesday feature.

A Legend of Firsts

Ellen Swallow Richards holds the titles of first...

• Female to enter a scientific school in the U.S.
• Professional female chemist​
• Scientist of any gender to conduct water surveys in the U.S.
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology female faculty member (though they never granted her a Ph.D.)

She also directly contributed to the creation of the first...

• ​Water quality standards in the U.S.
• Modern municipal sewage treatment plant

And we can't forget she (co-)founded...

• Women's Laboratory at M.I.T.
• American Association of University Women
• American Home Economics Association

Transforming Sanitation Science

In the late nineteenth century, sewage treatment plants and drinking water quality standards were nonexistent. Taking a sip of water nearly guaranteed the ingestion some sort of pollutant. Possibly sewage. Possibly industrial waste.

As an instructor at M.I.T., Ellen Swallow Richards conducted a revolutionary study of water in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She oversaw the collection and analysis of over twenty thousand water samples!

She had already transformed global water standards, but Ellen felt the need to do more. She needed to go to the root of the problem and use science to solve the problems of daily life.

The "Science of Right Living"

When you think of home economics, what comes to mind? Cooking, cleaning, deciding which deal is the best in the grocery store? What about science? After all, that is what the discipline is founded on.

In fact, the establishment of home economics as a discipline paved a major path for women to enter into science at the university level.

Ellen cited "faith in science as a cure-all" as the foundation for her developments in domestic life.

She began her crusade against bleak home conditions and ill health by writing to home-makers about the importance of eating a balanced diet of healthy foods, exercising regularly, and replacing the corsets--the fashion of the time--with more comfortable clothing.

Perhaps it is because Ellen Swallow Richards did such a phenomenal job infusing household tasks with science, that we often dismiss home economics as a less serious discipline. 

A Lasting Legacy

Throughout her life, Ellen Henrietta Swallow Richards wrote over a dozen books with titles such as The Chemistry of Cooking and Cleaning, Food Materials and Their Adulteration, and Air, Water, and Food From a Sanitary Standpoint.

In 1993, she was welcomed into the National Women's Hall of Fame.

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If you or your little ones want to learn more about Ellen (or 51 other STEM-tacular women), I highly recommend checking out Headstrong: 52 Women Who Changed Science--and the World by Rachel Swaby.

You can also read more about her here:

​MIT

Vassar

ACS

Biography.com

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Before you go...

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