Good morning and the Time Crashers are transported to 1913 and an Edwardian house party.  How will the celebrities handle Edwardian Etiquette?  Will it be like Downton Abbey?  Or will the Time Crashers be in for a rude awakening?  The run time for this episode is 46:12.

This time the Time Crashers are servants serving in a country house.  The boys are immediately disappointed to discover they are servants.  It is 1913 and World War I is just around the corner.  The elite are throwing up one last hurrah before the war and everything changes.  The Time Crashers are going to be preparing for a weekend shooting party.  Shooting parties demonstrated wealth and status.  Edwardians got together for a weekend of hunting, socializing, and showing off.

Each of the Time Crashers has a different status and each has a different guide to help them navigate the world.  Bottom of the pile is Zoe Smith and Olympian Greg Rutherford.  The downstairs staff is immediately greeted by the housekeeper and she oversees reviewing the rules and training for staff.  The housekeeper could sack a staff member with no reference.  I enjoyed seeing her thoughts on the staff.  From the looks of it, she will be commenting on the staff throughout the episode.

Kristie Alley and Keith Allen have more senior roles.  However, they still run afoul of the butler.  The butler was the highest-ranking member of staff.  He expects obedience and working to the highest standards.  Keith is the valet and Kristie is the ladies’ maid.  Both have a giggle over their guides. 

The staff members turn in for the night and wonder how they are going to handle their lives as Edwardian servants.  They wake up in the morning.  Greg is already at work clearing the chamber pots.  Greg wants to do a good job as the hall boy.  Zoe struggles with the morning routine and begins struggling with the work.  The housekeeper is not happy with Zoe’s efforts.  The footmen start preening in the morning.  Footmen were hired for their good looks and footmen, and the taller the better.

The hierarchy was strictly observed in the Edwardian household.  The housekeeper reminds them of the rules of the house.  The servants were to be addressed as William or Jane.  The servants were to be invisible as well.  Staff worked 80 hours per week with half a day off.  They got their news while ironing the masters’ newspapers.  After breakfast, everyone sets off to work.

The footmen are setting up a tent for an outdoor dinner.  However, setting up the tent and the table is going slowly for the men.  The tent is a bit of a challenge to put up.  Inside the maids are cleaning the house and prepare the reception rooms.  The maids are finding the corsets difficult to work in.  Fern struggles with keeping things cleaned up.  The housekeeper interrupts them to remind them that they needed to clean in silence.  Zoe refuses to pluck pheasants and is immediately dismissed without a reference.  The maids look at Zoe’s leaving and comment on it.  Being dismissed without a reference means she would never be able to find work again.

The work is done, and the servants are ready for the party.  The ladies serve tea to the mistress of the house and that does not go well.  Fern gets a ticking off.  The footmen are busy serving the shooting party outside.  How will the famous people handle life as Edwardian servants?  Will the shooting party go well?  Tune into the rest of the episode to find out about life in the Edwardian period.

After watching Manor House, I wondered how actors and famous people would handle the life of Edwardians.  It was not surprising to see them feeling overwhelmed by the experience.  The only person that was missing from this episode was Mr. Edgar, the butler from Edwardian Country House.  I would have enjoyed watching him handle those celebrities.  I also enjoy hearing the reflections everyone had on their experiences.  Overall it was a fairly good episode of the Time Crashers and one that could have been a little bit longer.  This would be one episode to show in the history classroom for a fun and frivolous day.

Good morning, we are going to continue our journey through history meets reality TV with Turn Back Time: The Family.  This would be a good series to show to a family and consumer education class.   The first episode explores the Edwardian period and the families are going to live the lives of their ancestors.  A row of terraced houses was transformed into family homes that belonged to the early 1900s.  Three families were chosen to live in the houses.  They will learn about 100 years of family history.
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The Taylor family is from Norfolk.  They are a family of six and are a busy family.  The second family is the Meadows family and they are a self-made family.  It is a family of four.  They run a polo school is excited to do something as a family outside of polo.  The last family is the Goldings and they are a family of five.  For them, family is about equality.  At the start of the show, the families will be given a guidebook with the rules they will have to follow.

The family was something to expire in the early 1900s.  One house was the typical upper-middle-class family, the second house was for a middle-class family and the last house belongs to a working-class family.  Which house will the families be assigned to?  The answer surprises them and the viewer.  The house assignments are based on what the family ancestors lived as.  The Taylors are confident that there was no millionaire ancestor in their family. 

The families meet with their guides and the guides reveal which houses each family will live in.  The Taylors are assigned to the upper-middle-class home.  The Goldings are assigned to the middle-class home while the Meadows are assigned to the working-class home.  The Taylor meets the staff that will assist them through their journey.  They will have five servants in the home.  The Taylors are shocked at their good luck, believing that there was no money in the family.  So who made the family money?  Juliette the guide explains who made the money, and Mr. Taylor’s ancestor owned a cotton mill.

The Meadows will have a tougher challenge in the working-class home.  They will live in two rooms and the four will have to share a bedroom.  They will have to use a chamber pot or a privy.  It was a shock for the family.  Joe, the third guide, helps explain why the Meadows ended up in the working-class home.  Mr. Meadow’s grandfather was a general laborer.  Mr. Meadows will have to look for work to make money.  The oldest daughter will work as a scullery maid in the big house.

The Goldings will live in a middle-class home.  It is modest with seven rooms.  They will have running water and the latest cooking range.  Susan, one of the guides, explains why the Goldings live in a middle-class home.  Mr. Golding’s ancestor was a tailor who immigrated from Russia.  This ancestor prospered from the start.  So Mr. Golding would have had a white color job.

The families will shed their clothes and dress in period costumes.  They settle in for the night.  So how will the families cope with their roles?  What will the families learn about their ancestors?  How will the children adjust?  Tune into this episode to find out how the families will cope with their life.

This would be a good series to show during a history class and home economics or family and consumer education class.  It is a good summary of the evolution of the family over one hundred years.

Suzannah Lipscomb explores the hidden killers of the Edwardian home.  Queen Victoria died and it was the dawn of a new century.  The modern age was ushered during this time.  New ideas started to flourish during this period.

Suzannah looks at the first hidden killer: Electricity.  It was a new invention and at the time was not regulated like it is now.  In Victorian times, gas light was used but it was dirty.  Electricity was cleaner.  Gas and electric companies were in competition with each other.  Electricity was expensive and marketed to those who could afford it.  If you had the money and you wanted to be seen as sophisticated you needed to have electricity.  However, the wires were just bare and one touch you could get electrocuted.  The first wires were insulated with paper or lead which caught fire.  Despite this, there were many electric appliances invented.  There was an electric exhibition that showed off many electric items: lamps, hair brush, curling tongs, iron, and table clothes.

The next hidden killer in the Edwardian home was Asbestos.  It was strong, cheap, and was versatile.   The Edwardian's used it everywhere.  They used it in pipes and water tanks.  Floor tiles, ceiling tiles, toilet seats were also made from Asbestos.  However, it was a health hazard.   It was dusty and caused cancer.  It caused scaring in the lungs as well as difficulty breathing.  It was the most hidden of hidden killers and it took a long time to act.  The women were the most affected by Asbestos.

The next hidden killer in the Edwardian home was found in the kitchen.  It was the refrigerator.  However, the early fridges were all experimental and the chemicals they used in the refrigerator were unregulated and the inventors used guess work to figure out how to make things colder.  They used dangerous chemicals in the early fridges which could kill people if they leaked or were a fire hazard.  The Edwardian rich used refrigerators.  They were expensive. 

The final hidden killer in the Edwardian home was found in the bedroom.  Actresses inspired the trend since it was now becoming a respectable occupation for women.  They advertised make up, soaps, and other beauty treatments.  Edwardian women had to have pure, white skin in order to separate the women who worked outdoors.  Many of these treatments contained arsenic which would eventually kill them.  To continue to learn more about the hidden killers continue to watch the documentary.

For use in the classroom: just highlight, copy and paste into a word document or a google document for use in the classroom.  You can easily format these questions to your specifications.  All questions should fit onto one page after formatting.

You can find the link for the YouTube video here.

Hidden Killers of the Edwardian Home Questions:
1.  Who was the king that came after Queen Victoria? 
2.  How many British patents were issued?
3.  What was a new exciting Edwardian product? 
4.  Which two men invented the light bulb? 
5.  Who had electricity in their home?
6.  What was heated on the stove before electricity? 
7.  What type of fires rivaled coal?
8.  What provided clean energy? 
9.  Who were the most affected by asbestos? 
10.  What killed people more than car crashes? 

Hidden Killers of the Edwardian Home Answers:
1.  Who was the king that came after Queen Victoria?  -  Edward VII
2.  How many British patents were issued?  - 140,000
3.  What was a new exciting Edwardian product?  - Electricity
4.  Which two men invented the light bulb?  - Joseph Swan and Thomas Edison
5.  Who had electricity in their home?  - Lord and Lady Churchill
6.  What was heated on the stove before electricity?  - Iron
7.  What type of fires rivaled coal?  - Gas and Electric
8.  What provided clean energy?  - Asbestos
9.  Who were the most affected by asbestos?  - Women
10.  What killed people more than car crashes?  - Asbestos