Connecticut western news., 1909-11-18
CONSTRUCTION OF
 CONCRETE HOUSES
STILL IN EXPERIMENTAL STAGE

0f Constructor HaS MOI Ter been
 Demonstrated -Edison and Others
 Working Out The Problem.
 With the very praiseworthy desire to reduce the cost of small dwellings so that degree of comfort and cleanliness can be secured by the householder of eX- tremely limited means, few men i'll this country are trying to perfect con- crete house which can be cast Ill one operation inside a set of molds to be used over and over again, says the Engineer ing News. Thomas A. Edison's catholic mind some four years ago saw the possibilities in 3his one-pieoe house, and his admirable publicity department since then has not allowed the idea to be con- fined to his laboratories, where tests have been conducted with ever promised, but hardly realized success. In con- sequence the reading public, influenced no doubt by MT. Edison's successes in other fields, is quite ready to believe anything about the economies, beauties and durability of the molded building.
 For the engineers and architects en- gagged in studying this question we have no criticism, although we think that the difficulties of the problem they have attacked will engage their atten tion for somewhat longer period than they now anticipate; but we do wish to I,a C1, in p lay press is exploiting the matter aud bestowing lavish praise upon a proposi- tion which is not yet beyond the eXper imental stage. Heretofore prominence has been given entirely to the Edison patent, but ill the Oct. 3 number of The Survey, a New York weekly devoted to sociological and philanthropic progress there is very laudatory article de- scribing house quite similar to that of Mir 'Edison's. particularly in the fact that, by virtue of the great number to be molded from one set of forms. the cost will be reduced to about $I 200 for a house costing under present methods two or three times that amount
 The dwelling shown ill The Survey is quite worthy of praise from the sani- tarian's standpoint. It is light and airy. easily cleaned and, for the use for which it is intended, reasonably good looking. But the prime advantage claimed for it is cheapness, since it will be admitted that for a sufficient sum, fairly reason able as present costs go, houses can be and in fact are being constructed equally as serviceable as the molded house. This cheapness is brought about mainly by two items, the reduction in cost in forms due to their repeated use and the reduction in labor, due to the rapid pouring of the walls and floors, to say nothing of fixtures, as a unit.
 Neither of these has been tried outside of a laboratory, and never on a large scale. Even granting that the main structural elements of house can be poured from a few openings in one operation-and that is something few engineers with experience in concrete construction will concede-there is every reason HOW LO D6llGVG GntlC It WILL De practically impossible to construct forms which can be placed and removed at small labor and expense and which, at the same time, can stand the hardships of usage long enough to reduce the first cost per house to the desired minimum.
 If this can be done at all, it is some thing which must come as gradual development through actual construc- tion and not as the result of theory plus laboratory experiment.. We are far from denying that there are possibilities in cheap concrete dwelling construction ill the hands of men who understand the business and who know the best roads by which to move forward. What we would emphasize is that possibilities are not yet actualities, and that success is more likely to be attained by simple methods than by any complicated and revolutionary process.