Please continue through the Butler’s Pantry to the next room.
This room is often mistaken for the breakfast or informal dining room, but it was in fact the Servants’ Hall – a dining and break room for the house staff. This is the central hub that connects the kitchen to the rest of the home. Female staff would come down the back stairs into this space, and don their aprons for the day. Other staff would come up from the basement stairs to access this space. This space served as a thoroughfare of sorts. Staff would pass through here as they carried prepared meals on their way to the dining room, or perhaps to greet guests at the front door, or attend to Tom in his office.
However, this was also intended to be a space of relaxation and leisure for the staff. This room was likely furnished with a table large enough to seat the entire house staff. There may also have been a more comfortable seat like a rocking chair for the maids to enjoy while mending linens or, if they were lucky enough, just taking a quick break. Staff dishes would have been stored in the built-in China cabinet.
Early in their life at Lucknow, the Plants are said to have employed up to 30 or 35 people across the estate. That would have included a housekeeper, maids, a cook, and possibly a lady’s made. A staff of that size would also have included everyone working outside of the mansion – groundskeepers, stable hands, farm hands, perhaps a blacksmith, and certainly a chauffeur. Some of these employees would have lived in the mansion, others in the gate lodges, the dormitory-style housing in the stables, or at the Plant Farm.
By the 1920s, the Plants were experiencing financial difficulties and had scaled their staff down. They were actively attempting to sell Lucknow at this time, and in an advertisement for the property, Tom outlined the staff he employed to “conduct” the estate. This included:
· three servants in the house (likely a cook, and two maids or a housekeeper and maid),
· a “combination gardener and houseman” – this was someone who did cleaning, maintenance, and other general work around the house to keep it presentable and running smoothly.
· "A combination chauffeur and stableman"
And one more male employee who seems to have been in charge of the most strenuous physical labor – keeping the cows, maintaining and repairing roads, and cutting wood and ice, as needed.