Arizona republican., 1900-10-06
NEW FORKS PRIZE TENEMENT

New York still continues to set the pace for American cities in the con- struction of model tenements. A Man haitian corporation is now planning the erection of some teneTents according to the design which received the first prize in the architects competition held last spring by the Charity Organi- zation society. This design calls for a block of houses covering four of the 100 by 125 feet city los. The block is six stories high. 10O feet wide and nine ty feet deep. By leaving only ten feet for the rear yard and by doing away with all air shafts the architects secure space for an open court thirty feet wide in the center of the block and a pas sageway ten feet wide leading to the street.
 Another innovation is the abolition of the puolic hall way. which runs the entire length of the ordinary tenement. Each tenement hs a private hall con meeting with the staircase. A further novelty in this plan is that each tene- ment has only one living room. \This is unusually large. however, after the fashion of the old New England family living room.
 The bedrooms, Of which there are from one to three in each tenement, are also of good size, being planned for two beds. Every room has window opening directly upon the court or the street. There Is gas range and a refrigerator in every tenement. In the basement are bath tubs, shower baths and steam drying laund.ies for the use r room will be about $1 per week.
 The striking feature of this interest ing plan is the emphasis laid upon the family life of the tenants. In the big tenement blocks of the conventional type family privacy is impossible. Such blocks are nothing better than domestic barracks in which families are quartered without regard to the requirements of a decent home life. In the plan which has been described a genuine family environment is made possible by tn private hall way and the large living room. The immense significance of the living room in the family life has been clearly set forth by a recent writer on the housing problem. MT. C. c. Fairchild. He says:
 Tn the planning of tsTements in our cities. the value of the living room is largely overlooked. With a family that Coes it's own work. the place where that family will live is the place where the household work must be done. What this family needs is the revival of the old New England living room. The space Of sitting room and dining roJom and kitchen should be put into one room. and that room carefully ar ranged for its various uses. Then the household work. which is now a family barrier, would become q family bond. The room where the mother , and her babies must sp5nd nearly all of their waking hours should be i the most sunny and airy and roomy that the situation allows and there should be q place in that room for the husband and father when he comes home. The home instinct should be cherished ard dignified by every device known to the architect and builder. The wage earners in our cities have little thought and no power in such a matter Yet the Vigor and healthfulneSs of family life depend greatly upon it's habitation. * Do not father and mother and children need a daily contact and service? This is what the New England living room gave. and this more than anything else fashioned the New England family life until it became one of the most gra- ciOus and one of the most potent in tiuences that the race has yet seen Boston Evening Transcript.
 He who lacks time 10 make also lacks time tO mend.