The experience in setting college dinner tables or sweeping college
recitation rooms counted for next to nothing in equipping a student
to care for her own home; and the benefit to the "calico girls"
was no longer obvious, as the price of tuition had now been raised
several times. In May, 1894, the Academic Council voted "that
the council respectfully make known to the trustees that in their
opinion domestic work is a serious hindrance to the progress of
the college, and should as soon as possible be done away." But
it was not until the trustees found that the fees for 1896-1897
must be raised, that they decided to abolish domestic work.

Miss Shackford, in her pamphlet on College Hall, describes, "for
the benefit of those unfamiliar with the old regime," the system
of domestic work as it obtained during the first twenty years of
Wellesley's life. She tells us that it "brought all students into
close relation with kitchens, pantries and dining-room, with brooms,
dusters and other household utensils. Sweeping, dusting,
distributing the mail at the various rooms, and clerical work were
the favorite employments, although it is said the students always
showed great generosity in allowing the girls less strong to have
the lighter tasks. Sweeping the matting in the center of the
corridor before breakfast, or sweeping the bare 'sides' of this
matting after breakfast, were tasks that developed into sinecures.
The girl who went with long-handled feather duster to dust the
statuary enjoyed a distinction equal to Don Quixote's in tilting
at windmills. Filling the student-lamps, serving in a department
where clerical work was to be done, or, as in science, where
materials and specimens had to be prepared, were on the list
of possibilities. Sophomores in long aprons washed beakers and
slides, seniors in cap and gown acted as guides to guests. A