Girls Room: Fluting Iron, Laundry, & Water

What is that iron on the portable stove in the Girls Room and what is it for?

This is a a fluting or goffering iron, also called a rocker fluter; if heated up it can be used to crimp and accentuate the collars and cuffs of dresses or shirts. This would have been a sustainable way that the Wylie family could alter their clothing without purchasing new fabric or fully made clothes. This also highlights the removable collars and cuffs that many garments featured, and the practice of washing these portions of the garment more frequently, ultimately saving water. This specific fluting iron was donated by one of Theophilus & Rebecca Wylie's great-grandchildren Laura Margaret Mellette! The National Museum of American History has a fluting iron made by the same manufacturer as ours: the W.H. Howell Co. of Geneva, Illinois. The patent for these "Geneva hand fluters" was approved August 21st, 1866 and accredited to A. Sterling of New York, NY but some sources from the 1870s credit Walter D. Turner, a former employee of the W.H. Howell Company. 

How would the Wylie family have used water? 

Plumbing wasn't standard in common homes until around the 1840s so Theophilus Wylie & family would be the most likely to have had plumbing out of the two families, especially after the large cholera outbreak in Chicago from 1849-1854 (attributed to a lack of sewer systems in larger cities). Andrew Wylie & family have an inventory that lists a shower-bath, but it is unclear whether or not this was "plumbing" or just a bathing vessel. Most if not all of the water in the house during the Andrew Wylie & family period would have been hand carted from a well on the property; they would have to do more work for less water. Because of this, water was a more precious resource and was used more selectively and sparingly. According to the Boisen family (descendants of Theophilus Wylie) there were multiple lavatories, a toilet, bathroom, and sink during their time in the house; there is no record of these existing besides these firsthand accounts. We also have letters where multiple people refer to the cistern in Mr. Wylie's cellar (as early as 1857); the indoor water that the family had access to was rain water collected into the cistern and brought up with a bucket like a well. 

How else did the Wylie families practice sustainability in their everyday lives?

A couple of the other highlights we have relating to fashion specifically are a crazy quilt made by Rebecca Wylie and our mural in the front hall that features a mother and daughter "grassing" their clothing.

Crazy Quilts:

Crazy Quilts gained popularity and drew inspiration from Japanese art exhibited at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition in 1876. The changing industrial environment and burgeoning industrial revolution gave average women access to household sewing machines and silk, making crazy quilts a widespread fad of the late 1800s. Both Wylie families moved here from Pennsylvania at different times so they may have caught wind of the trend through friends and family still in the area. Crazy quilts often would incorporate fabrics or patches that held significance to the family and could be seen from a modern-day perspective as a form of "upcycling" (and preservation of ephemera). Different elements of crazy quilts could be from old clothing or from silks that became popular during the Victorian period; by 1884 cigar and cigarette companies would include small pieces of silk that could be given to those interested in making crazy quilts. 

Grassing: 

Grassing is the practice of laying your light/white clothes out in the sun to dry, brighten, and bleach them. Grassing is the earliest form of bleaching; typically, this process involves boiling clothing with lye and leaving it out in the sun for a week or more! We have a letter from Louisa Wylie in 1862 where she mentions wanting to go get her clothing bleached but fearing it would take too long. More modern bleach made from Chlorine wasn't developed for household use until 1888, and in 1864 would have most likely only been available to chemists and merchants in the laundry business. Therefore, grassing was cheaper but took longer while sending clothes off to be bleached was slightly faster but was only available to those with extra money. 

Water Usage: Then vs. Now

How much water would each Wylie family have used compared to an average family today?

Andrew Wylie & family most likely used more water simply because they had more land to take care of and grew most of what they ate, however, both families relied heavily on rainwater to take care of the land. Theophilus Wylie & family were more focused on floriculture (less subsistence farming, more growing flowers for fun) by the time they lived in the house and would hand water their flowers in addition to relying on nature. Water would have been additionally used for cleaning both the family & the house, cooking, drinking, and for something called the "water cure". The "water cure" (hydrotherapy) grew out of the new popularity of bathing and consisted of an ice bath that was thought to be a "cure-all" for most ailments. Some of the things that increase household water usage for families today weren't a problem for the Wylies like leaking from indoor plumbing which accounts for 18 gallons of wasted water (as of 2016). If Theophilus Wylie and his family did, in fact, have some indoor plumbing, they may have faced the same issues (especially with household plumbing recently becoming standard in the late 1800s-early 1900s) but on a much smaller scale. 

What are some modern threats to our water sources?

Acid rain is a problem that only became relevant post-industrial revolution and can be directly linked to human consumption of fossil fuels; the air pollution during this time wouldn't have been built up enough to cause a major change in the health of the rainwater that the Wylies were collecting. Large-scale commercial farming and lawn care both use an exorbitant amount of water to maintain; the post-industrial revolution was a time when manicured lawns began to emerge as both a status symbol as well as patriotic proof that the United States was just as prosperous and refined as England. One problem with the modern lawns in Indiana is the propagation of Kentucky Bluegrass (Poa Pratensis); Kentucky Bluegrass is native to Europe, Northern Asia, Algeria, and Morocco and was brought here during the lawn craze as turf grass. The spread of invasive grasses like Kentucky Bluegrass has become so uncontrollable that they are now considered "native" grass because they are so hard to eradicate. Kentucky Bluegrass changes the ecosystem and chokes out other actual native plants and a lot more water is needed to keep it alive in hotter months because it is meant for colder climates. The groundwater in Indiana is also extremely hard (full of magnesium and calcium) which would have been beneficial to the Wylie families because they would get minerals from drinking the rainwater, but is annoying to us today because it stains our clothes and our dishes and makes things generally harder to clean. 

Did you know? The push lawn mower was invented in 1870 by Elwood McGuire from Richmond, Indiana! 

What can I do to help keep Indiana's water healthy?

Some of the biggest threats to Indiana's water health today are air pollution and water pollution from runoff pesticides/soil in agricultural areas. 

Girls Room