William L. Clements Library
Housekeeping Manuals and Household Cyclopedias
Works that discuss housekeeping are a rich source of information about everyday life. These include manuals on housework in its narrowest sense, and also “Cyclopedias” that cover the broader area of the work of the entire homestead. In these volumes can be found advice to housewives on cooking, cleaning and making cleaning products, caring for the sick and practicing popular medicine, raising and educating children, and overseeing domestic servants. The broader works also cover a wide range of home handicrafts such as making carpets, furniture, and other household articles, as well as keeping bees and poultry, making and mending tack and other needs of rural, semi-rural, and even urban life.
Searches to try:
Keywords for “Subject”
“Home economics”
“Home economics Dictionaries"
Keywords for “Titles” or “All fields”
Domestic Economy
Household Economy
Homemaker
Homemaking
The family receipt-book, or, Universal repository of useful knowledge and experience in all the various branches of domestic oeconomy : including scarce, curious and valuable... (1810)
The domestic encyclopedia, or, A dictionary of facts and useful knowledge chiefly applicable to rural & domestic economy : with an appendix containing additions in domestic... (1821)
Domestic economy, by Michael Donovan (1830)
Mackenzie's five thousand receipts in all the useful and domestic arts : constituting a complete practical library relative to agriculture, bees, bleaching, brewing, calico...(1831)
Farmers' directory and housekeepers' assistant : containing recipes and axioms highly useful to all persons (1851)
Our family book, or, Household prize : a work adapted to the wants of every trade and profession, from the humblest mechanic to the gentleman of fortune, such as the farmer and ...(1856)
Family directory, or, Forty years' experience of a practical housekeeper : with many valuable hints on health, farming, gardening, fruits, and flowers / selected from the best...(1867)
Home and health and home economics : a cyclopedia of facts and hints for all departments of home life, health, and domestic economy, by C.H. Fowler and W.H. De Puy (1880)
The successful housekeeper : a manual of universal application, especially adapted to the every day wants of American housewives : embracing several thousand thoroughly tested...(1883)
Encyclopedia of practical receipts and processes : containing over 6400 receipts embracing thorough information, in plain language, applicable to almost every possible...(1884)
Goodholme's domestic cyclopaedia of practical information, principally written or revised by the following authorities, George E. Waring ... [et al.] ; edited by Todd S....(1889)
The home manual : everybody's guide in social, domestic, and business life : a treasury of useful information for the million : embracing etiquette, hygiene, household economy, ...(1889)
The American domestic cyclopaedia, a volume of universal ready reference for American women in American homes ... (1890)
A dictionary of every-day wants : containing twenty-thousand receipts in nearly every department of human effort, by A.E. Youman, M.D. (1891)
The household. A cyclopaedia of practical hints for modern homes. Containing new ideas upon hundreds of ... home subjects. With a full and complete treatise on cookery (1891)
Blakelee's industrial cyclopedia. A simple, practical guide for the mechanic, farmer, housewife and children of every thrift household in town or country ... (1892)
The household guide, or, Domestic cyclopedia : a practical family physician, home remedies, and home treatment on all diseases : an instructor on nursing, housekeeping, and home...(1898)