Servants' Hall - History of Appleton and America
Servants in a residence like Hearthstone were to do their jobs without being seen or heard. This impacted everything from the clothes they wore to the way the house was designed.
The servants wore black with white aprons, such as the livery seen here, to keep from drawing attention to themselves. In a very real sense, they were to blend into the background.
The house design allowed them to move throughout the residence without interrupting the family.
Using this hall, servants could enter the first floor rooms through these doors to do their jobs.
From this hall they could go down the back servant steps to the basement to do laundry. These steps are crudely built with leftover wood to save money. The stairs are very dangerous with uneven treads and risers. They do not even include a railing. Imagine a young maid coming up the steps carrying a heavy load of wet laundry, wearing a long skirt so she can't see her feet, and she thinks she knows where the next step is... but she gets it wrong. Falls were the leading cause of death of servants in houses like this.
Compare those steps to these that go to the second floor. These servants steps are some of the nicest in the state. They were well made to impress the men who would be coming in through the middle-class door. When the tour moves upstairs, notice how these stairs change as soon as they are out of sight of anyone but servants.
Just like in the kitchen, upper class families did not spend money on the servants unless it was to impress someone who, in their mind, mattered.
