fi Aware“ : z a ' ‘ ”-hzm‘. g—M’“ “-4._,.-.,-~%—v-—-—-———‘-— 4 i 1- V .w Housing Conditions in Main Line Towns An InVestigation made by MARION ’BOSWORTH ' Under the Direction of the Committee on Investigation Main Line Housing Association Ian—:7" (fie, dame/71??) 7......“— VA- I SCHOOL OF, I I FINE ARTS I ‘mi E‘ PENNSYLVANIA I w" COMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATION Bernard J. Newman, Chairman CarI A. DahIstrom Dr. David Wilbur Horn Miss Caroline Manning Samuel S. Richards Dr. B. K. Wilbur Mrs. Charles S. WaIton MMOS QM< Z< HNI; AKfS \ 2/ .22 mm ,_ , F0 2,) Kc A "5 3 REPORT OF A Survey of the Main Line District By MARION BOSWORTH INVESTIGATOR the station's come so close that it is frequently difficult to distinguish the outskirts of one town from another, lies the popular suburban residence district of Philadelphia. Excep- mtional train service has caused the territory to be built up rapidly : with the houses of the well-to—do and wealthy who, finding com- ~ mutation possible, can have their business in the city and resi- dence in the country. From Overbrook on out, town after town is made up of beautiful houses in large grounds with winding, well-kept roads, through woodland and private parks all well kept and attractive ; each town an ideal appearing town in which to live. Driving through these towns one gains the same impression. Fine old trees, lawns, gardens and mansions make up the landscape ‘ over the valleys and hills for mile after mile. It would seem, indeed, an incongruous place in which to seek for housing reform. Here surely reform would mean “revision downward” rather than upward. Ardmore, surrounded by fine es tates, has, to be sure, a business street, and many unpretentious houses; Haverford, the Quaker town with its beautiful and digni- fied old college, seems only divided by fine roads leading among fine old and new houses; Bryn Mawr, a suburb famous for its wealthy families, its college and boarding schools of high stand— ing, seems to have accumulated some of the dignity of age; . and Wayne, further out, and only included in this study because . of certain peculiarities in its housing totally unlike the other four ' towns, seems perhaps less suburban and more a small business : center by itself than do the towns closer to Philadelphia. But all ' these five towns share in common the characteristics of being : made up largely of the country homes of city men. It is a fact ‘ which will not be disputed, it may be supposed, that human needs : and human desires are, generally speaking, alike and only differ 3 (£93224 q LONG the main line of the Pennsylvania Railroad, where in the degree to which fortune permits them to be satisfied. Hence it may be assumed that if the country is good for the rich it is also good for the poor, and if the country is desired by the rich it may likewise be desired by the poor. But the well-to—do are able to live in the country and work in the city only because they are well—to-do and can afford to commute, while the poor must perforce live beside their work, as close as may be. It oc- curs here that the rich are, because of their wealth, to a large extent dependent on the services of the poor. Large possessions necessitate much work and care. These large houses and exten— sive grounds mean large numbers of workers. As we have said, the poor cannot afford to commute, so, theoretically, in a large community of large establishments there should be a correspond— ingly large group of working people nearby. With these three reasons :——health and desire, and the prOX- imity to work, drawing the poor to the country, and the expulsive power of bad living conditions and insufficient work in the city, the most logical place in the world to look for poor houses would be in a wealthy community. Ideally, of course, this would not be so, for the wealthy in planning their own houses would recognize the necessary sequel to populating a district with the service liv— ing classes and provide for it at least to such. an extent that bad housing and disease-breeding sanitary conditions near them should not be a menace to their own life and health. They must recog- nize the fact that a section built up with expensive houses is com— mercially desirable and brings a sufficiently higher price per acre than unfashionable districts to make exploitation of the living i necessities of the working classes (legal restrictions being nil) almost inevitable, so that the tendency would be to make a small land area house as many people and pay as large a return in rentals as a corresponding area in the city. This, however, unhap- pily, is not the case. If in the city the well housed are uninter- ested in the badly housed because the juxtaposition is so obvious that they have become accustomed to it, in the country a more dangerous situation rises by which the proximity is so concealed by large grounds shutting off all immediate surroundings, and out of the way districts, nearby, yet off the ordinary road of travel in which the poor are only too often packed in with all the worst evils of, city conditions existing in the middle of wide fields and woodlands. It is true, of course, that in all inequality of society that in- difierence and neglect of the suffering of our neighbors has direct retributive effect on those having the not helping. We see this in clear relief in the 4 a power to help and intensified effect of city contrasts. In the country the interrelation of rich and poor and their reciprocal effect upon each other is no less strong be- cause it is not seen, as it were, through a magnifying glass, and is prone to be overlooked. The very thing which makes it possible for slums to exist in the country, the demand for workers, brings the connection between these two extremes of society very close. In perhaps the majority of the houses of the colored people touched in the investigation, laundry work was being done, often- times under such conditions and in such places as would have made the wearers of the clothes shudder. In this connection, we are reminded of an experience which, though it did not happen on the main line of the Pennsylvania Railroad, yet, may well hap- pen not infrequently, and well illustrates the ignorance of those hiring service of the adventures of their property while it is out of their hands. A lady and her daughter, sending their clothes out of the house to be washed, protested to their laundress at hav- ing to wait so long for their return. “Why, ma’am,” explained the laundress, “them clothes aint dirty enough to wash when we get them.” She and her family receiving apparently clean clothes to be washed, proceeded to wear them until they reached a fit con- ~ ditiOn for the tub. This story, of course, proves nothing on the effect of bad housing on the occupants of good houses, but it does illustrate the point which should be emphasized, that the wide- spread. ignorance on the part of the well—to—do of everything which is beyond their immediate vision, and yet which, nevertheless, effects most nearly and vitally every part of life. Laundry then is one means of close connection between bad sanitation and well- to-do people. Workers living in places where filth and squalor and disease are more prominent even than country air and sunshine, and la- boring in thecountry by day where the very words filth and squalor seem anomalies, are another means of contact between the poorly housed and the well-to—do. The men work largely out of doors, as gardeners, stable men, and on the roads, though house men, too, are not infrequent; but the women, especially the colored and Irish, do cleaning and cooking, sewing and washing, etc., by the day. The less obvious messengers carrying the effects of bad sani- tation abroad are animals and insects passing from one house into another. Chief among these, of course, is the house fly whose presence is almost universal, and whose disease carrying capacity is so great that it has been rechristened quite recently the typhoid fly. Late in summer and fall direct and close contact with flies can hardly be avoided by those at least who use the common roads and trains, even if they are so fortunate as to live in well 5 screened houses Mosquitoes, rats and mice have ways of travel- ing about and means of ingress which are quite closed to dogs and cats, and yet all these, as well as other points of contact which easily come to mind, are almost as great levelers of humankind physically as the common drinking cup ever was. And so the old lesson of the interrelation of all mankind is relearned and the more intelligent realize more and more that creating a small hy- gienic spot to go and live in is ridiculously futile unless that spot can be hermetically sealed ofi from the unhygienic area surround- ing it, from which unhygienic messengers are continually passing in and out. We can afford, perhaps, to be indifferent as to the sanitary conditions of Mars, we cannot, if we value our health, afford to be equally indifferent to the sanitary conditions of the earth, so long as we are all, rich and poor, inhabiting it together. So, in devel— oping a beautiful residence district like that of Ardmore, Haver— ford, Bryn Mawr and Rosemont, it should be considered first that a working population is the first necessity; for working on the roads, for building houses, for caring for the grounds and homes, and for personal service to the people who can afford to hire them. This assured, it must also be recognized that there must be shelter for these workers. “Why!” one landlord bitterly exclaimed, “they won’t let a sewer be put in on the street though we’ve all signed for it, because they want to crowd out the poor section by making conditions too bad to live in. They want the work done all right, but they expect the workers to roost in trees like birds.” Recognizing the need of cheap houses one can easily see the temptation of the less scrupulous to exploit that need, forcing a small bit of land to yield a large return in rentals by overcrowding it with houses and people. And in a community where there is no legal regulation of building, insufficient laws relating'to sani- tation and sewage, and the provisions existing disregarded and unenforced because there is inadequate provision for enforcing them, it must be seen that those landlords who are exploiting the imperative need of the working people will not be spending extra money in well drained cellars, adequate plumbing, tight partitions and decent repairs. There are not enough cheap houses to fill the need, the demand for houses is imperative and widespread, the ten— ant Cannot stipulate as to sanitary conditions, the law does not, the result is obvious. “The last time the landlady came around for her rent,” said one woman, “I told her I’d pay her when she had the roof fixed so it wouldn’t leak on my son’s bed. I says what’s the use of paying for a roof over your head when it ain’t all there, but she says if I don’t hand out that rent she’ll give me notice to get 6 out, and now I’m scared she’ll do it anyway. The chimney won’t work now, but I don’t say nothing to her. We pay $12.00 because we’ve lived here 20 years. All the rest pays $13.00, and now they’re putting them up to $14.00 whenever a new tenant comes in.” The woman’s husband earned $40.00 a month and at $12.00 the rent was more than a quarter of his income. In many cases the tenants seemed thoroughly anxious, where bad conditions were noted, lest the landlord should think they had been complaining and give them “notice.” As a consequence the Board of Health, which is not able with the fund at its dis- posal to hire inspectors to do more than investigate the complaints sent in to it, has no means of learning where bad conditions exist, for tenants do not dare complain and no one else has any particu- lar interest in doing so. It may be noted, however, that out of 123 complaints in the town of Ardmore alone, sent in by this As— sociation to the Board of Health of Lower Merion Township, 28 were found by the Board Investigator to be so bad that a 48-hour notice was served on the owners of these properties. 'Each town has its distinct housing problems different from the others. In Ardmore there is much water in the cellars; in » Haverford, the extremely bad condition of surface drainage; Bryn Mawr has the only old tenement houses we encountered ; Rosemont, 011 Garrett Hill, has a real section devoted to workingmen’s houses; and in Wayne are the “chicken-coop” type of houses, built of boards and boxes covered with building paper. In all these towns .the condition of overflowing vaults and filthy old privies is com— mon, as well as lack of decent repair of the houses in which the poor live. ARDMORE. Ardmore, generally speaking, may be divided into two parts, the finer houses being mainly on the north of the railroad tracks, although some beautiful homes with large grounds are scattered about the southern outskirts. There is, quite unlike Haverford, a business section to the town with stores stretching out along the Turnpike. Behind the stores the streets run through a thickly built area consisting of attractive residence streets, toward . the east, but merging between “Vinegar Hill” and West Spring Avenue, into a poorer and poorer section, culminating at the edge of the Haverford College campus into one of the genuine slums along the main line. There is a single block on Spring Avenue, shunted off, as it were, from the rest of the street, or, from the rest of its own length through a stable yard at the lower end of ’7 SCHOOL or FINE ARTS ‘ UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA [m Holland Avenue. Holland Avenue itself ends abruptly at the edge of some low land, flooded in wet weather, and soggy in dry. From this low land part, at least, of W. Spring Avenue has been re— claimed for building purposes and certain of its houses, walled up from the swamp, have their cellars below its level. In the newest and best of these the Investigator was able to see daylight through the brick foundation wall, so cheaply and loosely was it built. Through this wall the water seeps, especially in wet weather. As has been intimated, this little section of a street is off the main highway and is, indeed, so tucked away that it would never be seen excepting by those having definite errands to the neighbor- hood. To these the casual effect of the street is not as bad as it might be because it has recently been macadamized and very good cement sidewalks laid, both of which give a fairly neat appearance. But the houses themselves are a sad sight for a sub- urban town with unoccupied land lying close about. On one side, indeed, the shabby old frame buildings have good sized yards more or less fenced in with gardens or at least space for gardens, and trees. On the other side, however, for about 500 feet frontage, are built thirty—two houses, most of them on 13 and 14 feet lots, set a few feet back from the street, a long, forlorn red brick row. The tiny square dooryards were once fenced, but few ves— tiges of this fencing now remains. One or two have attempted little flower plots, but in general a square of black, packed dirt constitutes the front yard. Forlorn on the street side as is this row of houses built in two sections with only thin party wall between them, the backyard side is immeasurably worse. At the end of the street a narrow alley leads in around the side and back of the row. This alley is on the banks of a small stream coming from the Haverford College grounds and that is dammed here and there in its course by the carcasses of cats or dogs and chickens mingled with other refuse. Its further bank is used as a dump heap for such rubbish and garbage as is not left in the rear yards . The land is so low that through the fall these yards were only accessible by wading through heavy mud and standing water cover- ing the filth thrown there. It would indeed be a discouraging task to attempt to keep these yards in good condition, and the Italians and Negroes peOpling these houses, it is safe to say, attempt little. Hanging out and taking in clothes and other necessary usage, it would seem must too, make cleanliness inside almost equally impos— sible. Rubbish of all descriptions, bits of garbage, old sheds and chicken coops, all of a most dilapidated description, and in the first row of houses, a water closet, furnish in almost every 8 _ n...» REAR HOUSES BUILT IN THE BACK YARDS 0F HOUSES FACING THE STREET. ARDMORE. case a description of the contents of these yards. Further down to the east stables, also ramshackle, become frequent until at the eX- treme eastern end a second row of red brick, fiat—roofed houses in the back yards of those 011 the street and facing out over the swampland, has been erected. In this little section of land thus doubly occupied, there are 43 persons housed on 8,415 square feet of land, which includes half the street and alleyway, or about 209 to the acre, a high average for city housing, and a disgraceful pro- portion in the country. This may be called the last word in hous— ing in Ardmore, and indicates not so much what has been done, for these figures stand for but one small section, but what has been started and what, unless the influence of the better element in- duces some building restriction, will. continue to develop to such an extent that it will, at some future day, require herculean efforts to clear away slums which are now in only the formative stage. The beginning of a system of rear houses, utilizing more or less roomy back yards for new buildings is a menace which may not be overlooked. It has been seen that these houses on West Spring Avenue, built as they are in long unbroken rows with no space between and little in front, are,in the condition of their rear yards, dangerous to the health of the entire community. The Profes- sor’s house and the college campus, but a stone’s throw away, the occasional large estates lying near by, and the close connection of one part of a community with another make it obvious that the en- tire town must be affected even now by the filth and insanitary conditions here. How much worse will it be when the rear row al- ready started is continued up the banks of the creek to the end of the street. Only the intervention of Haverford College, by purchas- ing the land, has prevented a small section of the swamp being built up in this same fashion. At present the only means of pre— venting the establishment of real slum districts 1n good neighbor- hoods is the purchase of the land at exorbitant prices. In neigh- borhoods less mainly connected, slumsm may grow unchecked to any extent to which the money—g etting instincts of the landlord may arr) them. The inside repair of these houses is not incongruous with the back yards. In most of the cellars there is water, sometimes only small pools, sometimes after rains, complete flooding. Water in one cellar usually means at least dampness if not water in the next. Two of these houses in the row were vacant, because, the neigh~ bors said, of this persistent condition. It was noticed, however, that they did not stay empty very long. In one an Italian woman, who spoke little English, indicated by hollow coughs, during the performance of which, she pointed into the cellar, the disease 10 fisse< :1» 939 woaguoab wo 3.84% .UEA 5mg 05 @821 mag/OH sgbfism 2: E #55me 3253 we “WASH 56 < .gom mmozmm< z< §N V? ,V . EU 3.1... ‘ mt, Tiunflvr VII if L Which has attacked several members of the family. Her husband says she will die unless they can find another place to live. One man tiled his yard to the stream, but the drain soon became closed. Another dug a pit in one end of the floor from which to dip out the water. In some the odors were foul enough, but whether from the stagnant standing water alone or from a leaking water closet pipe was difficult to determine. In the older row of houses long hopper water closets are beside the kitchen door in the back yards, the roof sometimes being used as a Window shelf on which to keep pots, pans and food—these were invariably in a filthy condition. The flow of water was weak, the valves for flushing had to be turned on by hand and were often out of order, with the bowl consequently filthy, and sending foul odors up into the kitchens. The seats were broken, floor satur- ated, and general conditions bad in the extreme. In the next row of houses the water closets are placed directly on the house drain pipe, Where it leads out into the sewer, in the extreme front of the cellar. In one house, for which the Italian occupants pay $18.00 a month, the Investigator could not get to the closet at all because the cellar floor was com— pletely inundated by sewage which had backed up and overflowed, the water closet bowl wet and shining in the light of the front win- dow. Solid matter and all, it lay sufficiently deep over the entire surface to make it necessary to wade in order to reach the closet at all. The tenant stated that repeated complaints to the landlord had been ignored. Some two weeks after, however, the condition was partially repaired, though it is doubtful if the repair was per— manent. Few of these cellar water closets were in good repair and working order. In some the flush wouldn’t work, in others the par— tition was broken away, leaving no privacy. In seven of the new- est houses, on the south side of the street, including the rear row, and five on the east, a small rear bedroom over the kitchen is fitted up as a bath room with a tub and very good water closet. This does _ not, however, interfere with its use as a bed room in cases of large families, although its possession seemed valued. These houses rent for $16.00, as against $13.00 and $14.00 for most of the others Houses in which the front two rooms have been thrown into one for: use as stores bring $18.00. The new houses even on the higher land on the north side of the street have water in th one in which household goods had been stored was sight; coal was wet, wood floating around in some 0 be dried out laboriously in the oven before it could water closets in these houses being on the second fl problem of sewage overflowing. It has however, e cellars, and ages having to be used. The oor there is no overflowed the 1 2 (i fresh air inlet in the front yard so that matter passing from the water closet to the sewer has been forced up over the yard and side- walk, poisoning the air all around with its odors. The interior general repair is likewise bad. Paper is dirty and torn, plastering fallen in great pieces, sink drains stopped, traps leaking, so that in some cases buckets had to be kept under the sinks. The roofs were frequently leaking, and in rooms overfull with cots there was no space to move the beds away from the leaks. The stairs were, in general, in good condition, but the cel- lar stairs were not only crowded to the limit with all kinds of ar- ticles but were in one or two cases missing at the lower end whence one had to jump into the dark place where there was rarely light enough to see whether the jump would be into water or not. The population of this section is almost entirely Italian and Negroes, the Italians railing against the “niggers” and the latter resenting as neighbors the “dagoes.” The few Irish still left here are vanishing as circumstances permit and are now only a scattered two or three. The Haverford College boys have been domg some work with the Italians and have evening classes in English for them. Beyond this, however, it is doubtful if much interest is 'taken in their manner of living. The large number of Italians brings the overcrowding up into high figures, for each family serves as a nucleus for a large group of Italian laborers. The dining room and tiny kitchen are kept for general use and the other rooms filled up with beds. The family has one bed room to itself, furnished with a double bed and a crib or cradle for the children, the parlor and two other bed rooms are filled with as many cot beds as will go in. In one of these six—room houses a family of 19 lived, cooked, slept and played the accordion. In cases where there was more than one woman around, the wife, sister, or mother, privacy was difficult to imagine. Of course, through such walls as these, vermin must travel with ease from house to house, though the Italian houses were scrubbed and cleaned remarkably well consid- ering the numbers they sheltered. The kitchens and dining rooms were often filthy, but in the bed rooms an attempt was usually made, often successfully, at cleanliness. The women, of course, have all the labor of this. The “boarders” pay in $3.00 a "week apiece which pays for rent, washing and cooking. The grocery bills are divided up among them. The Italians were in general im- patient with the insanitation and lack of repair. They wanted things in order The colored were mainly impatient with the “Da- goes.” While several of the Negro houses on this street were models of neatness, cleanliness and attractiveness, the most disgust- ing sort of dirt was in the others. Carpets unswept for a long, 13 long time, filthy tumbled bed clothing, rubbish on the floors, and ricketyness of furniture was very different from the bare floors and neatly made beds of the Italians. Some of the colored women on this street have been rather high—class servants, and feel keenly the necessity of living in a neighborhood of such squalor. But rents. are high and houses few, so the better class must perforce live with the poorer. On “Vinegar Hill” Chestnut Avenue has on one side a long row of red brick, six-roomed houses, more comfortable than those on W. Spring Avenue in that they are built in pairs with side yards and have attics which must make them very much more liv— able in the hot summer weather than the unsheltered flat roofs of the newer houses. The cellars, too, are deeper, and free from water excepting in a few instances where rain leaders in bad order sends water against the foundation walls. The problems here are more individual. The yards are ample and there are trees and plenty of space for gardens. They have been and still are mostly fenced, though the fencing is frequently tumble—down or lacking entirely. The only rear house is an old shed used as a dwelling by an old Irish woman whose only income is from the house in front of it, which she rents. There were formerly for this row of houses privies in the rear yard and wells on the rear porch with the slope toward the well. Now, however, most of the houses have sinks and hydrants in the kitchen or on the back porch and many have long hopper water closets also on the back porch. One or two have closets of a better type. The privies still left, how- ever, and there are many, were in an almost uniform state of overflow. In one the tenant said she only got the landlord to have hers emptied by appealing to the Board of Health. The privy of a house occupied by one of the few Italian families in this Irish neighborhood, was overflowing in ill—smelling streams over the garden and adjoining yard. The only two houses boasting bath tubs on this street are occupied and owned by two colored families who have fitted up very nice bath rooms. The old wells under the rear porches had been used in doubtless more cases than was dis- covered as garbage and rubbish depositories. One new tenant complaining to the landlady of the amount of dirt and rubbish left in the cellar by the old tenant was told to shovel it out into the old well. Another tenant pulled up the flooring over the source of bad smells and disclosed the old well full of decaying garbage, etc. The rents on these houses are advanced from the original $12.00 up to $13.00 and $14.00 for new tenants. There are many leaking roofs and some cases of stopped up plumbing. Some of the yards are filthy and full of rubbish and others nicely kept. The 14» “,.‘..i xv v KITTERING AVENUE. Houses with Side Yards, but no Back Yards—An Example of Building Congestion Unjustifiable Even in a Large City. 15 average number of persons per house is much less than on West Spring Avenue, and conditions though often bad, much less uni- formly so than in the lower slum. In the rear of these houses a new, narrow, little “blind” street has been opened and built up solidly with small red brick houses in pairs, on narrow cramped little lots, having no rear yard at all and only a very small side space for hanging clothes. These houses show the/tendency in building new houses, generally noted, of crowding as many as possible on a small plot of land. So, in general, we find in Ardmore the tendency to overcrowd the land; we find cheaply built houses with leaking foundation walls and water in the cellars; we find overflowing privy vaults in juxtaposi- tion to wells supplying drinking water; we find in general disease- breeding conditions as the result of no original sanitary inspec— tion and lastly, we find people, many of whom came into the coun— try for the sake of healthful living, compelled to endure as bad conditions as in the city and paying for these bad living conditions exorbitant rents. HAVERI'ORD. Haverford has no business section and only a few scattered stores in various neighborhoods. Most of the residences are ample and dignified, and there is no extensive building of rows of paired houses for medium rentals or streets of cheap working men’s houses as in Ardmore. The newer developments here are mainly on an entirely higher scale and yet there is probably no worse spot along the main line than one existing on the main Turnpike in Haverford, of which we shall speak later. The poorer houses of Haverford are in very limited and well—defined sections. The chief of these is a neighborhood known as Preston Village, consisting of Preston Avenue and Buck Lane between Railroad Avenue and Old Haverford Road, and those sections of the latter streets lying between the former. Here are Irish in the majority, colored and a few Italians. Buck Lane is the better of the two, though on both streets many own their own homes and the houses are in the main in fairly good repair. Nearly all have good sized yards and there is none of the land crowding of Ard— more. The most obvious problem is filthy surface drainage. On both Buck Lane and Preston Avenue sink and other waste water from the houses empties into open drains, sometimes paved with brick or stone and sometimes only dirt ditches running through the side yards, under the sidewalk and into the gutter Where, on its way down the hill, it increases in size and smell .until it seems quite 16 .5?on 22:5 8 @2252 w 2E wmswwm 32m 8E2 Baum“: 550 can $83302 £85 £25 69329 we 33th :oEEoQ 0:9 .93? mmozmm< z< , a solid stream of filth at the bottom, remaining until a good rain comes and clears it out. In several instances this trough leading under the sidewalk has rotted away or become displaced so that the contents flow over the footway which is often of earth and very rough and uneven without this added feature. At the end of the two streets, this sewage collects in a large ditch along the Haver— ford Road, concealed somewhat by long grasses from the eye but not from the nose. This ditch extends down past Preston Avenue where it turns toward the electric right of way and eventually emp— ties into a stream by the side of the railroad. It is a noxious thing poisoning the neighborhood for the flow is sluggish and the scum gathers thick on the surface, while now and then the remains of a cat or two may be observed adding strength to the pollution. It must be a breeding place for mosquitoes in summer and for dis— eases that affect the children playing about it. A row of houses face on this ditch and must reap the full injury of its presence there during the hot weather. This row of houses on the Old Haverford Road consists of samples of good and bad repair, of clean and filthy yards, of each of our three most numerous nationalities. There is a clean, attrac- tive little pair of houses, renting for $14.00, and occupied by Irish- Americans. The houses are in nice repair, clean and fresh, but the yards are dirty with waste water There are no hydrants in the“ houses or the waste water condition might be worse. Those living on the lower end of Preston Avenue complain that conditions are much worse there since hydrants were put in and more water used making more waste. Here, however, all the water is from pumps on the rear porches, and all the waste empties into a wooden trough passing under the rear windows of both houses to the alley— way at the side where it goes to the main ditch on the street. This trough is, as may be imagined, foul and bad smelling. In fact, all these houses in the whole neighborhood seem each to be hemmed in by little moats of sink water, for the drains all begin in the back and go along one side to the street, and across the front is the gutter. The fourth side may be supplied by a neigh— bor’s ditch so that there are smells all around. Next to this pair of good houses an Italian family live, with many in the family, a filthy old stable, and yardfull of rubbish. A‘ colored family over beyond them have a tiny little yard cluttered with privies and sheds about the kitchen door. Here an attempt is made to keep ‘clean and homelike in spite of the leaking roof and dark hole of a cellar with four feet high ceiling, to get into which one must bend down or go on hands and knees. Another bad condition is that of the privies. Most of these 18 , , .— ‘ . :I u LIJMM,E' . , i HAVERFORD ROAD. SURFACE DRAINAGE FROM THE SURROUNDING STREETS AND HOUSES. A BREEDING PLACE FOR MO-SQUITOES. GUTTER VERY FOUL AND FILTHY WITH HOUSE SEWAGE. 19 houses have both wells and privies and too many of them are in bad relation to each other. Most of the vaults were overflowing; one had been ordered cleaned by the Board of Health on complaint of the district nurse, a sanitary lesson it seemed, for an anxious owner hovered about the Investigator here, and great respect for our opinion on the subject of privies was shown all the way down the street. Perhaps the greater number of houses on Preston Avenue are built in pairs so that each has on one side a neighbor directly ad; joining. Many have, instead of an attic, a third story giving extra bedroom space. In several instances an owner lived in one side of the house, renting the other half and living on the rent. One or two even owned several houses or half—houses on this street. One such house sheltered an Irish owner in one side and two colored families in the other. The rear yard is used in common and is in- describably filthy with an almost unapproachable old stable by the alley in the rear, two privies heaped clear to the seats, and a pump in the middle draining out by a filthy garbage-strewn ditch through the soggy yard to the alley. The colored man is employed in cart-Z, ing off rubbish and evidently carts much of it to his own premises for heaps of riif-raff are everywhere. In another case nearby a shed does double duty as storage house for old furniture and rubbish and chicken coop. Its condition may be imagined. Farther up the hill is a house in forlorn repair. The tenants are Italian and speak brokenly and can get little satisfaction from the landlord. The pump has been out of commission for a week,- which necessi- tated carrying all water; the cellar windows were gone, letting in rain and cold air beneath the floors, and the shutters were broken and hanging. The drain from the pump was troughed partly with old rotten wood or with nothing, and the slope was so slight that it seemed probable that much of the water ran back into the well. The privy vault was unlined and the well not far away. Around the corner is another pair of houses occupied by two Irish women who wash for a living. Their well, used in common, had been out of repair for six or eight weeks, apparently stopped up with a dead animal, for the women said the water tasted queer for some time until one of them sickened of it and found it impos- sible to use. Soon after that something like whitened skin began coming up, but they tied a bag over the spout and continued using it until the water stopped coming entirely. A man was sent to fix it, but was overcome by the stench in the well and had to be hauled out. After that nothing was done. The women, who depended on their earnings for their own and their children’s living, had to haul all the water for washing, as well as household use, from Preston 20 .mqu‘EBQ 29E mo> menEDm Scam HZO dunk/35:0 5395 wz<>> 7: mumbofi Zofi 95mm little care taken to guard against conflagration. The interior of these rooms looks very much like patch work quilts for they are papered with scraps of wall paper of every conceivable size, shape and hue pieced out with newspapers when the scraps ran short. The whole place seems, in its squalor, filth and general state of being about to tumble down, so unstable that one would feel in- clined to employ a strong means to clear off the spot if it were not that shelter for these people is so difficult for them to find at rentals within their means, that one can hardly think where they could go if they were deprived of their shelters poor as they are. The Fritz Street group is in the rear of the Highland Avenue» houses; farther down the avenue is another row of rear houses, fronting on the electric right of way, occupied as are the others by Italians and negroes. These are metal houses, made of sheet metal sides and roof on a wooden frame, with cement floors. They con— sist of two rooms, but are built in pairs with doors between so a pair may be used as a single four-room house. Each pair has a hydrant beside the door, and a privy in front. The windows are, one to a room, only about two feet square so that in case of such overcrowding as was found in one of the houses where a family of thirteen Italians lived in a four-room house, five lodgers sleeping in a single bed room, and the father and mother and six children in the other two bed roOms, the ventilation is inadequate indeed. These houses must be, at most seasons of the year almost unbear— able to live in. There is no shade and only space for irregular garden patches in front of the houses. The backs are directly against the back fence and outbuildings of the houses on High— land Avenue. The summer sun beating 1n must make these places like metallic ovens, with their small windows and unprotected walls. In winter the cement floors and single sheeted sides must be equally hard to endure. The only advantage to these houses is that they are cleaner than the old wooden buildings about, and are fireproof, although one or two have wooden partitions inside. One room opens directly from another in a box like fashion. They measure about 10 X 11 X 8, forming the standard minimum sleep- ing space for two persons. The rentc' 1s at the rate of $2 00 per room, or $8. 00 for four rooms. In most of these the roofs are leaking, 1n some into every room. In places, too, the metal partitions between rooms have rusted through. Without, the yards are hard tramped dirt, with no grass or trees. The hydrants drain across the fronts of the houses in a shallow bricked ditch which is foul and bad smelling in places, and empties on a neighbor’s land. Some of the drains are in fairly good repair, others hold the foul water and are in a filthy condition. The privies are out of repair and offensive. 42 . wan .._v .“n V One which stands a few feet from the front of the house is on a raised bit of land and is overflowing across the yard. Another has filth scattered on the ground all about it. The whole place is ex— tremely dirty and has much rubbish packed in between the houses and about the yards. Some of the tenants have built sheds and chicken coops for themselves in front of their houses. It is in general a forlorn spot and the houses are merely shelters, inade— quate in every respect. Next to this row is an old wooden building, occupied by 14 Italians, in such filthy condition inside and out as to be diflicult to ‘ inspect. The two old privies in the yard were in dreadful condi- tion, one having only half a seat, the yard is strewn with filth, the shed is a mass of rubbish, and the cesspool, in the middle of the street, is overflowing. Inside conditions were as bad. The dark cellar seemed to have coal in one part, the other was a dark pit of water. Its windows were merely holes knocked in the foundation walls and boarded up. The foul smell of stagnant water makes it an evil place to get into. In the kitchen the sink is enclosed and smells offensively, one window is partly covered by the roof of the _shed, and much plastering has disappeared. The bed rooms were fairly alive with bedbugs crawling over beds, walls and ceilings. The beds for nine lodgers were packed in thick. Across the street is another pair of houses occupied by nine and ten Italians, where the general repair is much better, but sanitary conditions almost as bad. The sinks are untrapped and odorous, the yards are masses 'of slop water and refuse, and a cesspool in the center of the side— walk is crossed only by a loose slab of stone. These houses are built directly against a high bank to the height of the second story which has been hollowed out to make a place for the build- mg. Across the street from the Fritz Street property is another metal house of a better sort. This has two rooms and rents for $8.00. It is plastered and papered and in neat order and good repair. Behind it is another row of shacks of the “chicken coop” variety, and beside it, a few yards away, are two large vats or cess- pools about 12 feet in diameter, covered with boards and used to empty contents of privy vaults into. The owner of the property states that this is an almost unendurable nuisance in summer, but is necessary because there is no sewer on the street and nothing to do with overflowing cesspools and privy vaults but disposal of this sort, since the law forbids emptying anywhere on the ground. He states that the street as a whole has been petitioning the Board of Health for a sewer for two or three years, but that they have been unable to obtain it and the problem of sewage disposal is an 43 impossible one for him to solve satisfactorily for this property and the Fritz Street houses. Be this as it may these large loosely covered depositories must be a serious menace to the health of the community, though it is doubtful if they are very much worse than the condition of the houses and yards across the street on Fritz street. The whole problem of this section is a difficult one. It is distinctly a work— ing men’s neighborhood and practically certain to remain so. As it is, it is a really serious evil in the community, and yet it seems to be the only place where the quarry men and laborers can find shelter at a price within any possible means they may have. Here they can rent only a single room for $2.00 adding to it as they can afford more space. A new tenement house being built by the owner of this property, on Highland Avenue, may provide more decent quarters, though it is doubtful if the rentals will be low enough to come Within the reach of all the people now living in the shanties. It is sure that these laborers are here and that they must have shelter even so poor shelter as these “chicken houses” are since, as the owner said, “They can’t roost in trees.” Respectfully submitted, MARION BOSWORTH. CONCLUSION. The Committee on Investigation believes this study of areas in five Main Line Towns clearly demonstrates the presence of slums hitherto unsuspected. As laws now read there is no check upon the growth of these slums. Social conditions, acting upon them tend to make them more ugly. Ignorant or unscrupulous builders, for their personal gain, contribute still further to their growth. Without legislation and supervision they are bound to be a menace to the health and morals of their residents and to the public. It is no answer to say that the Main Line is not a place for working people. Wherever communities are built, the day laborers and the mechanics are needed. It is a matter of public health and civic pride that they be provided with decent homes in sanitary environ— ments. Other communities have faced this problem with success. Either it must be faced here with broad vision or the consequences Will become increasingly apparent. Every year’s delay adds to the cost of correction. Bad housing in town or city always tends to- ward low standards of health, character and morals; sickness, con- 44: .m> < tagious disease, and death. It means increased expenses for p0- lice and jails and reformatories, for free hospitals, dispensaries and district nurses, for charity agents and numerous demands upon public and private philanthropies; higher tax rates and decreas- ing property values, without one iota of gain to the community. Fortunately the slum areas found have not developed so that they cannot be corrected, but to correct them and to prevent fur- ther developments like them each Township must have larger appropriations for its Health Board, original sanitary inspection by a sanitary inspector under the Board of Health, regulative building laws, protective town plans, and finally, model housing de- velopments to care for the small wage earning classes. All these are feasible in the Main Line Towns. The Committee takes this occasion to express its appreciation of the co—operation it has received from the Township Commission- ers and Boards of Health in the endeavor to abate these nuisances. ____——s——_‘ ‘; SCHOOL OF i FINE ARTS ] UNIVERSITY .‘ OF YLVANIA flN§_n__ 46 n ii, 3;. :2_.:44 444-2442: r . u ’A .11 “A- in 43.96 82 74 5?.00 3 5 30,01 81 fa/o/e/r flreao/ Version# DL1.0 ll‘ll\l\‘l>ll\ll\l 1 ’A .11 “A- in 43.96 82 74 5?.00 3 5 30,01 81 fa/o/e/r flreao/ Version# DL1.0 ll‘ll\l\‘l>ll\ll\l 1