After graduating in 1898 from Mount Holyoke College, Lillian Pettengill worked (undercover!) as a domestic servant, sharing her experience in a four-part series for Everybody’s Magazine, and later, in book form. (Toilers of the Home was subsequently published in 1903 by Doubleday.) 

In her writings, Pettengill refers to service as a glaring anachronism cradled in snobbery. 

This was especially evident, she found, in the kitchen. Other than the benefit of occasional solitude, service was a life of sparse pleasures. 

Many servants were not entitled to the same food as their employers. Some were forbidden onions, as the aroma might travel when waiting at table. Mealtimes were scheduled at the convenience of the homeowners, rarely taking servants’ own needs (nutritional, personal, human) into account. 

As for Pettengill herself, her own commitment to service was nothing short of exceptional. By 1918, she’d been decorated by the French government for helping combat the typhoid epidemic during the First World War. 

She concludes her book with a powerful reflection. 

Lineage is but an accident, heirlooms and legacies a caprice of fortune; all men are brothers, rank is by individual worth, and work a high privilege. It is the personal creed of thinking democracy.