Residents can drop by the Campbell Historical Museum for free on Nov. 12 to check out its newest exhibit, Key Ingredients, which explores the many different types of housework done by women over the past three centuries.

“We don’t discount men from the home life; it’s just historically, women have done the domestic work,” says Kerry Perkins, museum supervisor. “This will look at how domestic work has transformed throughout the times—the differences and similarities.”

Key Ingredients looks at the lives of six women from different time periods: an Ohlone woman, a California pioneer woman from the 1860s, a Portuguese immigrant from the 1900s, a cannery worker from the 1930s, a divorced working mother from the 1970s and a contemporary woman.

Perkins says the exhibit idea came from Anna Rosenbluth, the museum’s collections manager and curator, when she was thinking about the changes in cooking and food throughout the centuries.

There are life-size cutouts of the women, Perkins adds, which have buttons museum patrons can press to hear their personal narratives. Each cutout features murals of kitchens from the appropriate time period by Wildways Illustrated.

Visitors might even recognize some of the people in the cutouts.

“Museum staff dressed up in costumes and recorded the narratives,” Perkins says, adding the costumes helped staff get into character.

“We worked with a local photographer,” Perkins says. “She made us look appropriate for each time period.”

The exhibit features interactive pieces, like touchable faux food and kitchen tools.

“Some of the kitchen tools from different time periods are very similar,” Perkins says.

Visitors can also try and guess which items are from which time period.

Key Ingredients replaces a decorative arts Victorian parlor exhibit and will stay up for at least three years. Perkins says this exhibit took three months to put together.

“It’s a really colorful exhibit,” she says.

Admission to the museum will be free from noon to 4 p.m. on Nov. 12, with refreshments served until 2 p.m. It is located at 51 N. Central Ave., Campbell.