by Susan Zehnder, Education Director
This curious headline from the Elmira Star-Gazette was published on April 27, 1920. Today it conjures up images of late-night comedy sketches, but at the time, its meaning was clear to everyone. It is a good reminder that context is important to understanding history.
The context behind this headline is not a joke but involves a new
group hosting a lunch. The group, calling themselves “Mark Twain,” was the local
chapter of the New York Home Bureau. The bureau, formed in 1919 by educators
from Cornell University, was a state-wide system that provided the latest
information to the community on household economics and farm management. It was
geared for rural women interested in improving their lives. While much of the country’s
economy and day-to-day living still revolved around agriculture, advances in technology were shaping 20th century farm life to look very different than earlier.
The Cornell educators, mostly women scholars, saw a public interest and need for
reliable, scientific information and wanted to help.
That an organization like this came from Cornell University
was a natural. Cornell is a land-grant institution, and like other land-grant
colleges and universities was created as a result of the first Morrill Act signed
in 1862 by President Abraham Lincoln. The original 69 institutions were financed
by the sales of federally owned land, often land the government had seized or acquired
through treaty or cession from Native American tribes.
Land-grant institutions used a new approach to educating
students. Earlier, American universities relied on a European
model that required students to study the classics, often in Greek or Latin.
Topics like classical archeology, art history, history, literature, philosophy,
and religion were thought to provide students with what they needed to succeed
in life.
The new American model of education offered
students practical courses in agriculture, science, military science, and
engineering. Also
in their mission, the new institutions offered university knowledge to the
wider community. With this in mind, Cornell educators reached out to rural
farmers. Through organizations like the Home Bureau, Farm Bureau and later
Cornell Cooperative Extension, they shared the latest information. Today there
are 106 land grant institutions throughout the country.
During World War I, a group of Chemung
women who were interested in learning about better ways to preserve food formed the Mark Twain chapter of the Home Bureau. By May of 1920, the chapter had over 400 members.Canning jar from CCHS collection
It was an active chapter which undertook all sorts of
projects. Notable among them, with help from Steel Memorial trustees, was the
establishment of the Chemung County Library system. This was the first
county-wide library system in New York State. Other projects they pursued
were improvements in school nutrition, including hot lunches in schools, food preservation, clothing, and crafts.
By 1923, Chemung County had 31 Home Bureau chapters.
The Home Bureau doesn’t exist anymore, but Cornell Cooperative Extension continues to have a presence in all 62 New York counties.
So why, in 1920, was the Home Bureau chapter holding a
luncheon in a rest room?
The Rest Room in question was not a washroom, but a room where rural women visiting Elmira could rest. It was
maintained by the city and county, and located on the 2nd floor of
120 Lake Street. Designed to be “a comfortable place where farm women could
wait until all members of the family were ready to go home,” it was relocated
to the Federal Building in 1930.
Just goes to show that curiosity can lead to some odd
discoveries.