[1] In New York she became matron of the Wilson Industrial School for Girls where she worked with poor, largely immigrant families living in the east side tenement district of the city.
[1] Huntington took Friedrich Fröbel's concept of the kindergarten and applied it to the teaching of domestic skills in what she coined the "kitchen-garden system.
"[2] Using this approach, Huntington wrote several books aimed at adults who hoped to educate their children, specifically daughters, in cooking and housekeeping skills.
Among the major effects of the organization were the introduction of classes in manual arts in the New York City public schools and the founding of Teachers College at Columbia University.
[3] Along with Ellen Swallow Richards, she was one of the attendees invited to attend the first Lake Placid Conference on home economics in 1899.