Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1882-04-18
LOCAL INTEREST IN a NEW MODE
OF LIVING.

\ great rush into Apartment life
and demand for Apartment buildings
now 30 prevalent in the Eastern cities,
has awakened some interest and discus
sion of the subject in our own city.
A man without home of his own, in
Wheeling, must do his picking in very
prccarious and stinted pasture. We are
decidedly home people. There Is
lcSs number of restaurants, boarding
houses, and public places for lodging
and feeding, i'm this city, than any other
Of its population in radius of thou
sand miles.
But with an increasing population
and constantly increasing transient
population, the demand for accommo-
,lations of this kind i also increasing.
The same reasons have created a de
maud for apartment buildings, where
several small families can live under
one roof and be served with meals from
y common kitchen, thus dividing the
expense of one establishment among
number of tenants.
The cost of living just now has never
been 10 high, in Wheeling, in the his
tory OF the city, not excepting any peri
of during the war Ii is not less here
than in New York, Philadelphia or Chi
,agO. In fact, il i asserted that there
are better houses NJ lower rents, better
markets at lower rates, and better do
mestic service at lower wages, in any OF
the larger cities, than can be obtained at
the present time in Wheeling.
But the enormous expense of main
tanning household of the most modest
rretentions. is now being felt through
out the country. and = the one prime
cause Of dissatisfaction among the
classes Of population who work for
wages. The prices obtaining for the
common staples are largely artificial.
There Is no good reason why beefshOuld
rate at Is cents, or butter at - cents, or
Hour at SO per barrel, and other things
in proportion, but these prevail all the
same.
Whether the apartment" mode Of
living is any relief from the excessive
cost OF housekeeping or not. We are not
prepared to say, but the tendency to-
ward this style OF dwelling Is something
phenomenal in the East. In all the
larger cities the demand i constantly
in advance ofthe supply, while in New
York it is said that twice the number Of
large apartment houses which the city
now Possesses could easily be filed, and
the demand not even then satisfied.
One Of the greatest blessings, no
doubt, of this style of living is the relief
it gives hOu~ekeepers in the matter of
depending upon incompetent domestic
servants. 1t is the best solution Of this
problem vet devised. But whether or
not this flOcking together from the Sc
clUsiOn of private houses and separate
establishments to the more exposed life
of the hotel or the apartment house will
have beneficial influence upon society
il y question yet to be determined.
When 80 many thousands of the popu-
latiOn of our cities are largely entering n
mode Of life, the conditions of which are
more or less different from those which
have been supposed to he productive of
good, whether or not society will he
benefited by the change is problem
for study, although a problem upon
which, as upon most others of modern
social life, no solution can be accepted
that does nOt.come from a practical trial
OF the question at issue.