What was tenement housing

With these massive waves of newcomers came a major housing challenge for cities. With too many people and too little space, something had to give. Thus was born the American tenement: narrow buildings, typically five to seven stories tall and with a footprint of 25 by feet, carved into apartment units of approximately square feet each.

The crowded buildings solved the housing supply problem, but often provided abysmal living conditions, with little natural light, poor ventilation, and no indoor plumbing.

These conditions attracted the attention of social reformers, including journalist and photographer Jacob Riis , who documented them in How the Other Half Lives. This work of muckraking photojournalism described tenements as "ugly barracks" with "rotten floors" and "poorly patched roofs. Jane Addams cited tenement conditions in Chicago:. The lateth-century social reformer, Jacob Riis, also wrote passionately and effectively about housing reform.

So better tenements did appear. Today's sprawling New York housing projects are a midth-century solution to the same miserable problem of fitting objects into a box. Still, we need to remember that poverty and crowding, as much as architecture, is the villain that haunts all large cities.

Make no mistake, it is a terrible thing to be called into the ranks of the urban poor. I'm John Lienhard, at the University of Houston, where we're interested in the way inventive minds work. Sam bass Warner, Jr. Riis, The Battle with the Slum. New York: the Macmillan Co. During this era, America became The first native New Yorkers were the Lenape, an Algonquin people who hunted, fished and farmed in the area between the Delaware and Hudson rivers.

Europeans began to explore the region at the beginning of the 16th century—among the first was Giovanni da Verrazzano, an Italian New immigrants to New York City in the late s faced grim, cramped living conditions in tenement housing that once dominated the Lower East Side.

During the 19th century, immigration steadily increased, causing New York City's population to double every decade Ellis Island is a historical site that opened in as an immigration station, a purpose it served for more than 60 years until it closed in The Industrial Revolution, which began roughly in the second half of the s and stretched into the early s, was a period of enormous change in Europe and America. The invention of new technologies, from mechanized looms for weaving cloth and the steam-powered locomotive to The United States experienced major waves of immigration during the colonial era, the first part of the 19th century and from the s to Many immigrants came to America seeking greater economic opportunity, while some, such as the Pilgrims in the early s, arrived in About 33 million Americans can trace their roots to Ireland, the small island off the western coast of Europe, which has a population of just 4.

The Irish, like many immigrant groups arriving in America, were fleeing hardships at home, only to endure further troubles Select personalised ads. Apply market research to generate audience insights.

Measure content performance. Develop and improve products. List of Partners vendors. Your Money. Personal Finance. Your Practice. Popular Courses. Personal Finance Home Ownership. What Is a Tenement? Key Takeaways A tenement typically refers to low-income housing units that are characterized by high-occupancy and below-average conditions. Tenements first arose during the industrial revolution in the U. Tenements have been characterized as having many people living under the same roof in squalid conditions.

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