Sumida: Collected Works of Ellen H. Swallow Richards

This is a collection of writings by the American chemist and home economist, Ellen Henrietta Swallow Richards.

From the Preface by Kazuko Sumida:

Ellen H. Swallow Richards (1842–1911) was the first woman graduate and staff member at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and the first woman professional chemist in the U.S. She was known mainly as a founder of the American home economics movement and, to a lesser extent, as the mother of American public health. Her contribution included not only the establishment of the standards for water analysis, but also the provision of school lunches, food and environmental education, and the consumer movement. Through such activities, Richards showed people a new direction to follow for modernized home and urban life. She is deserving of special attention as a woman who was active both academically and socially from the late 19th century to the early 20th century when the foundation of modern society in the U.S. was laid.

This collection provides primary sources which will enable the reader to have a proper understanding of the thoughts of Richards who advocated a science of environment as early as the 19th century. She considered environment to be a total whole, and was active in pursuit of what science, human possibility or development should be. For her, environmental education was strongly linked to social and ethical issues, and the key to the solution for these was the very human activities in daily life affecting their environment. Richards, whose cooperative belief that ‘man is a part of organic nature, subject to laws of development and growth’ (Euthenics) was a basis of daily life, cannot be called merely a material feminist―(which a certain scholar classified her as). What she had in mind means ‘the man in the community environment’.

These materials are essential for interdisciplinary research that includes multiple fields such as the history of science, of education, of ideas, social history of the U.S., sociology, and feminism as well as home economics and public health. The thoughts and lifelong activities of Richards will show us a direction at which we ought to aim in current everyday life.

Volume 1

First Lessons in Minerals (Boston: Press of Rockwell and Churchill, 1882 [1st ed. 1880]), 32pp.

The Chemistry of Cooking and Cleaning (Boston: Whitcomb and Barrows, 1897 [1st ed. 1882]), 166pp.

Food Materials and their Adulterations (Boston: Estes and Lauriat, 1886), 183pp.

Home Sanitation: A Manual for Housekeepers (Boston: Ticknor and Co., 1887), 80pp.

‘The Relation of College Women to Progress in Domestic Science’, PACA Series II, No. 27, 1890, 10pp.

‘Domestic Science, What it is and How to Study it at Home’, The Outlook, Vol. 55, No. 17, 27 Apr. 1897, 3pp.

Volume 2

The Cost of Living as Modified by Sanitary Science, 2nd enlarged ed. (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1901), 133pp.

Plain Words about Food: The Rumford Kitchen Leaflets (Boston: Press of Rockwell and Churchill, 1899), 186pp.

Air, Water, and Food: From a Sanitary Standpoint (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1900), 226pp.

Volume 3

The Cost of Food: A Study in Dietaries, 3rd ed. (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1917), 160pp.

The Dietary Computer (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1902), 54pp.

The Art of Right Living (Boston: Whitcomb and Barrows, 1904), 50pp.

The First Lessons in Food and Diet (Boston: Whitcomb and Barrows, 1904), 56pp.

‘Ten Years of The Lake Placid Conference on Home Economics; Its History and Aim’, Tenth Lake Placid Conference on Home Economics, 1908, 7pp.

Volume 4

The Cost of Shelter (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1905), 142pp.

Sanitation in Daily Life (Boston: Whitcomb & Barrows, 1907), 93pp.

Laboratory Notes on Industrial Water Analysis: A Survey Course for Engineers (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1908), 52pp.

The Cost of Cleanness (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1908), 114pp.

Influence of Industrial Arts and Science upon Rural and City Home Life (National Education Association [Manual Training Department], 1909), 4pp.

Volume 5

Euthenics: The Science of Controllable Environment: A Plea for Better Living Conditions as a First Step Toward Higher Human Efficiency, 2nd enlarged ed. (Boston: Whitcomb & Barrows, 1912), 182pp.

Conservation by Sanitation: Air and Water Supply Disposal of Waste (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1911), 317pp.

‘The Elevation of Applied Science to an Equal Rank with the So-Called Learned Professions’, extract from Technology and Industrial Efficiency (McGraw-Hill, 1911), 6pp.

‘Social Significance of Home Economics Movement’, The Journal of Home Economics, Apr. 1911, 9pp.