The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1915-12-03
THE FIGHT FOR
BETTER HOMES
Movement Now includes 1873
Cities and Towns.
BAD HOUSING WIDESPREAD.
Five Years Ago There Were Scarcely
Half Dozen American Cities Which
Realized They Had a Housing Prob
lem, but a General Awakening Has
Taken Place.

lem, but a General Awakening Has
Taken Place.
BY JOHN iHLDER.
tField secretary National Housing asso-
/ ciationJ
| Years ago jacob Riis startled the
country by his revelations of how the
other half lived In New York. Due to
these revelations and TO the work of
public spirited citizens year after year,
the other half lives better in New
York today. New York did not like the
revelations It was inclined at first to
call Jacob Riis a bad citizen. Later it
changed the adjective to best"
The rest of the country contented it.
self with exclaming over New York $
badness and thanking Providence that
it was different. But it wasn't differ
ent except specifically. 1t had reason
10 he grateful that it did not have New
York's tall tcnements, solid rows Of
them, mile after mile. But under diff
ferent forms il had most of the things
that made New Ymks tenements so
bad. Philadelphia with its rows of lit
tie houses. Boston with its crowded
north end Chicago with its stockyard
and west side districts. needed only a
l,ils to point the finger of scorn nj
them, They did not have Rises, but
they dill have public spirited citizens
who began to understand and grapple
with these conditions.
Then came the turn of the small
cities and villages. They had thanked
Providence that they were not rs the
hig cities But Mt last even small cities
land villages are producing citizens
who dare to look Mt their home condi-
tions and say what they think.
Five years ago there were scarcely
hair q dozen American cities which re-
allied They had a housing problem.
To-day there are ISIS cities and towns
which have awakened to the fact.
ShlnS have been discovered wherever
there has been an investigation
Bad liqr sipg has been recognized NH
der Al lt' disFuises IN NeNa EpsIand
the wooden three dcc3seT7 the weed
peculiar to that locality IS being
fought New England is beginning 70
realize that. though. tie FIRE hazard is
real ind rhat ifhorEh ffeS iille tdoseof
chelsea and Salem are spectacular the
constant. unrccordcd losses TO health,
efficiency. morals. which come through
ctowding families together in dirk,
airless rooms. are much greater IN
total So twenty-thrcc towns and oile
city have already forbidden the cree
ton of more three deckers
IN the middle Atlantic stntes had
housing takes the form of the English
stun. closely packed little houses
which fill nearly every foot of space
within The blocks. Back yards are
filed with double rows of tiny dwell
ings, which can be reached only by
means of archways under the street
horses, There is no room in these lit
tie dwellings, for proper sanitary an
planes. so an outdoor toilet at tie
end of tie passagcWay serves al fami-
lies, and one outdoor hydrant supplies
all their water In some of the older
and most crowded sections Of thes"
cities there are large areas without
sewers.
In the middle west and the south,
where land oycrcrowding has not yet
developed to any such degree as II has
in The northern ana eastern cities,
there is had housing under another dis
guisc The one room cabin still persists
in The degenerate farm of the board
shanty III nearly All the states west of
the Allee.anies, although even the Al
lahtic sealoard. which has not known
the ploucef since the United Suites be-
came u nation has some of these re- I
minders of him.
The southwest and the Pacific coast
are not free from bad housing The
corrals Of Texas. the house courts OF
southern California. have already be-
come well intrenched. And even the
tenement or bargack dwelling has mp
peared Eut it is in northern Califor-
mia and farther north that the tene-
ment menace is the worst.
San Francisco rose from its ashes n
city OF wooden tenement houses. It's
enthusiasts boast OF 1t as the new Ath-
ems under the blue skies OF modern
Greece. It's builders house people in
dwellings from which no glimpse Of
blue Sky may I've seen. But in Califor-
mia there Is a state commission on I'M