They preferred to spend their income on immediate carnal and material pleasures food, clothes, adornments, and left their houses to last 50 years at most just the period of a farmer s life. The early settlers seem to have been interested only in short-term matters and if we take the authors argument further, this may turn out to be a first stage of the forming of the American culture. The article made me believe that the popular solution of the housing problem in the early American colonies is the genesis of the American ideal that every person should start from a scratch and build up his own life. However, it was inferior to their anticipated home. Thus, the discomfort of the earthen floor and the small openings in the bare wooden walls was softened by dreams of floors laid with expensive sawn planks, glazed windows and white-limed walls.
Architecture reflects culture.
The impermanent buildings reflect the Americans optimism about material prosperity and happiness.