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MOTHERCRAFT FOR SCHOOLGIRLS
824 which consists of "a substance
produced by drying, grinding (but not subjected to any other process) a plant or plants of a single species or any part thereof." Apparently it would be lawful for a herbalist to recommend a packet of horehound as a remedy for crushing
or
a mixture of horehound and members of Parliament may find the verbiage of some of the new clauses hard to understand, and not the least difficult of the tasks thrown on the Minister of Health will be to explain to the House precisely what the bill means.
some
condition, but not
coltsfoot.
Many
MOTHERCRAFT
SCHOOLGIRLS
FOR
national
teaching of mothercraft. Dr. Leslie Housden expressed the belief that to educate girls of 12 to 14 in mothercraft would result in a larger saving of expenditure on hospitals, juvenile courts, approved schools and prisons. Dr. Nicoll advised expert teaching, preferably by one conversant with the type of homes from which the pupils are drawn, besides being well-informed in the subject. She believes that sixty years ago girls of all classes had the opportunity in their own homes of acquiring a working knowledge of housecraft and mothercraft. This is debatable ; in many well-to-do homes the subject of childbirth and even care of the baby were matters of
secrecy, and the girl of 12-14 knew nothing whatever of the simplest facts concerning them, while the girl in the poorer home presumably imbibed the ignorance which the welfare centres now strive to combat. Evidently there is room for much extension in the teaching of mothercraft, and probably the teacher is the most important element in the scheme : whether she be doctor, nurse, health visitor or a member of the ordinary staff, it is essential that she should possess teaching several people about that time. At all events it did not and experience and the capacity to special knowledge arrive in time for the letter M in Big Murray, published in make acceptable contact with her pupils. 1908, and had to wait for definition in the Supplement SULPHUR AND SULPHANILAMIDE (The " craft " or business of a mother ; a mother’s duties in the family) with the first quotation from the Times of 25 CYANOSIS following upon the administration of sulphApril, 1914. Some years later Miss Chapman’s girls were anilamide or one of its derivatives is most commonly able to give in Westminster a convincing demonstration due to the presence of methaemoglobin in the blood. It and to answer unprepared questions on washing the baby, may, however, be due to sulphaemoglobin which unlike mother’s milk, and dangers and how to avoid them. methsemoglobin is not reconverted into haemoglobin in Instruction in mothercraft was recommended by the the blood, but remains in the red cells until these are Board of Education in 1910 and again in 1925, when destroyed. Since sulphaemoglobin cannot transport Dame Janet Campbell, in a circular issued by the board, oxygen, the presence of a large proportion of it may advised all mistresses responsible for girls approaching seriously deplete the oxygen-carrying power of the blood the end of their school life to consider what teaching and van den for a long time. The work of such girls may properly receive in the management of Bergh and IV, ierinoa2 makes it probable that sulphaemoinfants and little children." Sir George Newman was globinaemia results from the action of sulphuretted another advocate of such teaching. In his report of hydrogen, absorbed from the intestine, on the haemo1928 on the health of the school-child he said : " If the globin of the blood in the presence of oxygen and of a schoolgirls of this generation are to become the wise catalyst. Sulphanilamide and its derivatives act as mothers of the next, they must be taught the elements of such catalysts. Sulphuretted hydrogen is formed in mothercraft." Wherever such teaching was introduced the large intestine by bacterial decomposition of food it became an immensely popular subject-a result hardly residues. Archer and Discombe3 suggested that the surprising when it is remembered how many schoolgirls intake of eggs should be limited to one or two daily, a in poorer homes are forced by circumstances to help in low residue diet given and aperients forbidden. The the care of their younger brothers and sisters. Yet object of limiting the eggs was to reduce the amount somehow education in mothercraft does not seem of sulphur in the food residues of the large intestine. to have caught on in general ; as late as 1937 the joint Sulphur, however, is contained in protein, and the executive committee of the recently amalgamated amino-acids resulting from the digestion of protein are National Association of Maternity and Child Welfare believed to be absorbed in the small intestine. Archer Centres and for the Prevention of Infant Mortality found and Discombe forbade aperients, especially magnesium it desirable to appoint a mothercraft teaching subsulphate, and prescribed a low-residue diet with the committee to consider what steps should be taken " to object of reducing the water content of the food residues ensure that no girl should achieve motherhood without in the large intestine and thus discouraging bacterial having had adequate practical instruction in mother- decomposition. Purgatives, especially magnesium sulcraft." For two years Dr. Agnes Nicoll conducted phate, increase the amount of liquid in the large intestine a mothercraft class at Kilburn Polytechnic Evening and hurry the contents of the small intestine into the Institute, and though war conditions have caused the large intestine before absorption is complete. class to disperse, her syllabus and list of equipment have Richardson 4 has studied the effect of diet upon the formed the basis for the regulations accepted by the incidence of sulphaemoglobinaemia in mice. To different N.A.M.C.W.C. & P.I.M., which has constituted itself a groups of mice he gave a basic diet containing very national examining body in the subject. The syllabus little combined sulphur, and added different sulphurprovides for two courses, one for women and girls over 16, containing compounds in such proportions that the the lectures and demonstrations to be given by doctors, amount of sulphur added was in each case the same. nurses and health visitors, and the other for schoolOther groups of mice, having the same basic diet with children under 16, the instruction usually to be given by the same additions, were given 2% of sulphanilamide nurses with health visiting experience. Emphasis is laid mixed with the food. Fourteen days later he found that on the fact that the classes only aim at qualifying girls the animals receiving only the basic diet had an average to become happy and reasonably efficient mothers : at of 4-9% of sulpheemoglobin in the blood. The addition present the teaching given in welfare centres comes too of magnesium sulphate and of thiourea to the diet had late, and is largely wasted because it has been preceded produced no aobreciable increase in the amount of by the unskilled advice of mother or mother-in-law. 1. Snapper, I. Ned. Tijdschr. Geneesk. 1922, 66, 2541. The maternity and child welfare group of the Society 2. van den Bergh, R. and Wieringa, H. J. Physiol. 1925, 59, 407. of Medical Officers of Health devoted its first meeting of 3. Archer, H. E. and Discombe, G. Lancet, 1937, 2, 432. - the year (held on March 29) to a discussion on the 4. Richardson, A. P. J. Pharmacol. March, 1941, p. 203.
IN 1909 Miss Florence Chapman, headmistress of a girls school in Tottenham, began to give instruction to her pupils in what is now known as mothercraft. This word Miss Chapman claimed to have invented, though some think it was coined earlier by J. F. J. Sykes when medical officer of health for St. Pancras. No doubt the time had come for the pleasant and convenient word to be born ; and perhaps it sprang full-blown to the lips of
"
Snapper
produced by drying, grinding (but not subjected to any other process) a plant or plants of a single species or any part thereof." Apparently it would be lawful for a herbalist to recommend a packet of horehound as a remedy for crushing
or
a mixture of horehound and members of Parliament may find the verbiage of some of the new clauses hard to understand, and not the least difficult of the tasks thrown on the Minister of Health will be to explain to the House precisely what the bill means.
some
condition, but not
coltsfoot.
Many
MOTHERCRAFT
SCHOOLGIRLS
FOR
national
teaching of mothercraft. Dr. Leslie Housden expressed the belief that to educate girls of 12 to 14 in mothercraft would result in a larger saving of expenditure on hospitals, juvenile courts, approved schools and prisons. Dr. Nicoll advised expert teaching, preferably by one conversant with the type of homes from which the pupils are drawn, besides being well-informed in the subject. She believes that sixty years ago girls of all classes had the opportunity in their own homes of acquiring a working knowledge of housecraft and mothercraft. This is debatable ; in many well-to-do homes the subject of childbirth and even care of the baby were matters of
secrecy, and the girl of 12-14 knew nothing whatever of the simplest facts concerning them, while the girl in the poorer home presumably imbibed the ignorance which the welfare centres now strive to combat. Evidently there is room for much extension in the teaching of mothercraft, and probably the teacher is the most important element in the scheme : whether she be doctor, nurse, health visitor or a member of the ordinary staff, it is essential that she should possess teaching several people about that time. At all events it did not and experience and the capacity to special knowledge arrive in time for the letter M in Big Murray, published in make acceptable contact with her pupils. 1908, and had to wait for definition in the Supplement SULPHUR AND SULPHANILAMIDE (The " craft " or business of a mother ; a mother’s duties in the family) with the first quotation from the Times of 25 CYANOSIS following upon the administration of sulphApril, 1914. Some years later Miss Chapman’s girls were anilamide or one of its derivatives is most commonly able to give in Westminster a convincing demonstration due to the presence of methaemoglobin in the blood. It and to answer unprepared questions on washing the baby, may, however, be due to sulphaemoglobin which unlike mother’s milk, and dangers and how to avoid them. methsemoglobin is not reconverted into haemoglobin in Instruction in mothercraft was recommended by the the blood, but remains in the red cells until these are Board of Education in 1910 and again in 1925, when destroyed. Since sulphaemoglobin cannot transport Dame Janet Campbell, in a circular issued by the board, oxygen, the presence of a large proportion of it may advised all mistresses responsible for girls approaching seriously deplete the oxygen-carrying power of the blood the end of their school life to consider what teaching and van den for a long time. The work of such girls may properly receive in the management of Bergh and IV, ierinoa2 makes it probable that sulphaemoinfants and little children." Sir George Newman was globinaemia results from the action of sulphuretted another advocate of such teaching. In his report of hydrogen, absorbed from the intestine, on the haemo1928 on the health of the school-child he said : " If the globin of the blood in the presence of oxygen and of a schoolgirls of this generation are to become the wise catalyst. Sulphanilamide and its derivatives act as mothers of the next, they must be taught the elements of such catalysts. Sulphuretted hydrogen is formed in mothercraft." Wherever such teaching was introduced the large intestine by bacterial decomposition of food it became an immensely popular subject-a result hardly residues. Archer and Discombe3 suggested that the surprising when it is remembered how many schoolgirls intake of eggs should be limited to one or two daily, a in poorer homes are forced by circumstances to help in low residue diet given and aperients forbidden. The the care of their younger brothers and sisters. Yet object of limiting the eggs was to reduce the amount somehow education in mothercraft does not seem of sulphur in the food residues of the large intestine. to have caught on in general ; as late as 1937 the joint Sulphur, however, is contained in protein, and the executive committee of the recently amalgamated amino-acids resulting from the digestion of protein are National Association of Maternity and Child Welfare believed to be absorbed in the small intestine. Archer Centres and for the Prevention of Infant Mortality found and Discombe forbade aperients, especially magnesium it desirable to appoint a mothercraft teaching subsulphate, and prescribed a low-residue diet with the committee to consider what steps should be taken " to object of reducing the water content of the food residues ensure that no girl should achieve motherhood without in the large intestine and thus discouraging bacterial having had adequate practical instruction in mother- decomposition. Purgatives, especially magnesium sulcraft." For two years Dr. Agnes Nicoll conducted phate, increase the amount of liquid in the large intestine a mothercraft class at Kilburn Polytechnic Evening and hurry the contents of the small intestine into the Institute, and though war conditions have caused the large intestine before absorption is complete. class to disperse, her syllabus and list of equipment have Richardson 4 has studied the effect of diet upon the formed the basis for the regulations accepted by the incidence of sulphaemoglobinaemia in mice. To different N.A.M.C.W.C. & P.I.M., which has constituted itself a groups of mice he gave a basic diet containing very national examining body in the subject. The syllabus little combined sulphur, and added different sulphurprovides for two courses, one for women and girls over 16, containing compounds in such proportions that the the lectures and demonstrations to be given by doctors, amount of sulphur added was in each case the same. nurses and health visitors, and the other for schoolOther groups of mice, having the same basic diet with children under 16, the instruction usually to be given by the same additions, were given 2% of sulphanilamide nurses with health visiting experience. Emphasis is laid mixed with the food. Fourteen days later he found that on the fact that the classes only aim at qualifying girls the animals receiving only the basic diet had an average to become happy and reasonably efficient mothers : at of 4-9% of sulpheemoglobin in the blood. The addition present the teaching given in welfare centres comes too of magnesium sulphate and of thiourea to the diet had late, and is largely wasted because it has been preceded produced no aobreciable increase in the amount of by the unskilled advice of mother or mother-in-law. 1. Snapper, I. Ned. Tijdschr. Geneesk. 1922, 66, 2541. The maternity and child welfare group of the Society 2. van den Bergh, R. and Wieringa, H. J. Physiol. 1925, 59, 407. of Medical Officers of Health devoted its first meeting of 3. Archer, H. E. and Discombe, G. Lancet, 1937, 2, 432. - the year (held on March 29) to a discussion on the 4. Richardson, A. P. J. Pharmacol. March, 1941, p. 203.
IN 1909 Miss Florence Chapman, headmistress of a girls school in Tottenham, began to give instruction to her pupils in what is now known as mothercraft. This word Miss Chapman claimed to have invented, though some think it was coined earlier by J. F. J. Sykes when medical officer of health for St. Pancras. No doubt the time had come for the pleasant and convenient word to be born ; and perhaps it sprang full-blown to the lips of
"
Snapper