The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1909-02-24

HOTELS ARE THE GOALS
Society Abandons Mansions to Occupy
the Hotels, suburbanites Take
to Hotels and Farmers
May do so.
[Gate City Special Service. !

NEW YORK, Feb. 24.-New York
will soon be city absolutely without
homes. Even at the present time it
may be called the greatest homeless
city in the world and estimates based
on the latest census figures show that
by 1920 more than 100000 persons.
or practically the entire population Of
the city will be entirely extinct on
Manhattan Island. The disappearance
of the institution known as the Great
American Home is proceeding rapidly
in all the large cities of the country
but conditions are such that 1t is ad-
vancing with far greater speed in the
metropolis than anywhere else. A
century ago nearly if not quite a ma
jority of families owned the houses in
which the lived. Today. in all the
large cities of the country, not ten
per cent do so. and In New York the
proportion is only about two per cent.
At the present time the total num-
Der of residents in New York is only
little short of 100000. OF these less
than 10000 families, or, on the basis
of five to family, 100000 persons.
own the homes in which they live. All
the remainder, SO per cent of the
city's total population, occupy homes
owned by someone else. Sitting under
ones own vine and fig tree is purely
an imaginary occupation. so far as
New Workers are concerned The
twentieth century in fact may be said
to mark the beginning of new era.
After the stone Age the Iron Age.
the Fire Age. and all the ether ages
the Homeless Age seems now to be at
hand.
This change is partly the result of
necessity and partly the result of
choice. At the tremendous prices OBJ
tanned for New York real estate even
modest home represents an invest
ment of from $4,000 upward. which
Of course, puts homecoming quite
who is compelled to house his family
In hotel. apartment. tenement or
boarding house-or else go to the sub
urbs. More than 100000 people in
New York live in flats. which. on the
one extreme. are called apartments
and may cost $4,000 year rental,
and, on the other extreme. are known
as tenements and rent for $40 month.
Approximately 100000 persons make
hotels their residences and 5000
more, bachelors chiefly. live in clubs.
Perhaps million and half are hous-
o6 in, hno rdi foh 1irI,, ,fe h;oI,
occupy the buildings once used as
private homes. The remainder is
made UP of those who rent houses.
Even among those who can afford
TO own homes, however a rapidly in
creasing number are turning to ho-
to dwell outside the city in many
cases prefer the convenience of a
hotel life to the responsibilities of a
house of their own with the inevitable
servant problem. Many of those who
are classed as suburbanites are hotel
dwellers and to accommodate these
elaborate and luxurious hotels are
springing up in suburban points about
the city.
The truth of the whole matter is
that domestic life has been brought
to realization of exactly the same
factor that has marked the CONNER
cial development Of the country, that
is, that consolidation means saving
of expense-to some one. In the field
of the great industries it is still &
question as to whether the consumer
profits, but the field of domestic act
tivities there is no doubt that the user
that is the consumer, of home car
get more for his money in comforts
and Injuries through a corporation
than as an individual, Statement
which is borne out by the fact thai
the man of moderate means or
the one side, and fashionable society
on the other, are both coming more
and more to inhabit country hotels.
The most exclusive and artistic
suburban fields of New York are Ions
Island on the one side and Westches