Managing danger in the home environment, 1900-1940

A growing awareness in the first decades of the twentieth century of the prevalence of home accidents threatened the concept of the home-as-haven and gave rise to the home safety movement. Organizationally, home safety began as part of the National Safety Council, but it never achieved the recognition accorded to industrial nor traffic safety. Increasingly, safety experts as well as society at large designated women as "home safety managers," responsible for creating a risk-free environment. The rise of home economics as a professional science for women encouraged a complementary thrust towards providing the home with the efficiency and managerial values of the factory. The development of accident statistics and the entrance of the insurance industry into the home arena helped set priorities in terms of reducing accidents. The Red Cross and the General Federation of Women's Clubs both launched campaigns against home accidents, based largely on education and admonitions of proper actions, but with only limited results. Throughout these years, women remained the socially designated responsible party, given authority roles in the home that they were often denied in the outside world. Home accident rates, however, remained high, pointing to the limitations of the strategies of the various safety organizations.
"Since the dawn of history, woman has been in charge of the home and has been responsible for it. This work of home safety is peculiarly woman's work." Arvilla Miller, […]