Paper #2
Megan Lonergan
CORE Gotham City- Saturday
October 24, 14
Tenements
When you hear that someone lives in New York City, you might assume that they live in an apartment building of some sort. What most people do not know though is that back in the 19th and 20th centuries these apartment buildings used to be tenement housing. A tenement was a substandard multi-family dwelling in urban areas that were usually occupied by the poor. Known as tenements, these narrow, low-rise apartment buildings–many of them concentrated in the city’s Lower East Side neighborhood–were all too often cramped, poorly lit and lacked indoor plumbing and proper ventilation. By 1900, some 2.3 million people (a full two-thirds of New York City’s population) were living in tenement housing. (Riis)
The best historic sight to give you a better sense of what tenement living was like is the Tenement Museum located on Orchard Street in New York. Having been giving the opportunity to tour around the museum you get a real feel for what life was like back in the late 19th century and early 20th century. Tenement houses were usually 5 stories high with a bar or pub located at the bottom cellar level. The tour guides of the museum call it a 5-4-3-2-1 layout. There were 5 floors of apartments, 4 apartments on each floor, each apartment had 3 rooms, there were 2 bathrooms on each floor, and the whole building shared 1 backyard. This meant that 20 families lived in a single building about 25 feet wide and 100 feet long. These families were not small either, the average family size was 4 people but there have been cases were up to 12 people were living in a single apartment at times.
As you walk through the empty apartments you don’t get to fully imagine what it was like to live there because there was no furniture or belongings that took up space, they were just empty rooms. However, after going in to one of the apartments that were recreated to look like a real tenement back in the day you cant help but wonder how a family could live in such a small place. There were only 3 rooms in the whole apartment and they consisted of a kitchen, one bedroom, and a parlor. The kitchen held all the family’s belongings such as food, china, dishes, laundry, water, and more. The one bedroom was usually for the parents and any infants they might have had and had a small bed along with a crib and all the family’s clothes in it. And finally the parlor was where the family would entertain their guests and usually had a few chairs, maybe a desk, and some family heirlooms hanging from the walls. If it was a larger family, it was assumed that the children would sleep on the floor in the parlor wherever they could find room. Not only were the living conditions horrible, the diversity of cultures also proved to be a problem.
The majority of immigrants, who flooded to the lower East Side tenements, were German people fleeing from revolution, and Irish people fleeing from famine. (Riis) Despite sharing the common factor of being in a new country, these two groups of people did not get along well. They differed in religion, language, culture, and beliefs which made it hard to see eye to eye on matters. As if liking one another wasn’t already a problem, the fact that they lived in such close corners to each other made people even more hostile. Once a couple got married the wife was suppose to stay at home, not work, and look after the household duties. This included laundry, cooking, cleaning, and looking after the kids. Due to the fact that there was no running water within the tenements this meant that the woman had to haul up buckets full of water everyday, usually 5 or 6 times a day. These buckets weighed anywhere from 25-35 pounds and if you lived on one of the higher floors that meant more stairs you had to climb. Because everyone shared the same backyard and fountain for water the woman usually crossed paths doing laundry or cleaning outside. Conflicts often arose because these women of different cultures were now being forced to co-habitat with one another on a daily basis. German people thought themselves to be of a higher class than the Irish people and therefore they looked down upon the Irish. (Riis) The Irish felt this was unfair since they were of the same equal status since they lived in the same type of housing and held similar types of jobs. Ultimately, everyone co-existed if not for any other reason than the fact that they had no choice and nowhere else to go.
Another problem many of the tenement dwellers saw was sickness and death. The tenement houses were very cramped living spaces and therefore, if someone got sick it was likely that others surrounding them would as well. It did not help the fact that many tenements did not have good lighting or good ventilation to try and prevent further sickness. The ones who suffered the most from sickness were usually the infants. This is because infants need to be properly fed and cared for however, in these horrible conditions most of the time they were not given the proper care they needed. Since infants have such fragile immune systems they were often the first ones to get sick and 1 out of every 10 infants usually ended up dying. (Riis) It’s horrible to think that not only could parents not provide better lives for their children but, now they couldn’t provide any type of life for them at all. Funerals often cost families too much so it was common for a family who lost a child or loved one to convene funeral gatherings in their tenements. This meant even more people crowded into an already crowded space. The immigrants who lived in these tenements saw the hardest times of all.
I take for granted how lucky I am to live in a house with running water, multiple floors, multiple rooms, along with lighting and proper plumbing. I don’t think many people realize or are aware of what life was like in the city back in the day. New York City today would never allow such type of subpar housing to exist. There are so many different rules, laws, and regulations that building owners have to abide by in order to ensure that the people living there are not in danger in anyway. It is sad to think that it took so much death and despair for a change to come about in housing structure.
Sources
Riis, Jacob A. 1849-1914., and Museum of the City of New York. How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York. New York: Dover, 1971.
Riis, Jacob A. 1849-1914. The Battle With the Slum. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover Publications, 1998.
CORE Gotham City- Saturday
October 24, 14
Tenements
When you hear that someone lives in New York City, you might assume that they live in an apartment building of some sort. What most people do not know though is that back in the 19th and 20th centuries these apartment buildings used to be tenement housing. A tenement was a substandard multi-family dwelling in urban areas that were usually occupied by the poor. Known as tenements, these narrow, low-rise apartment buildings–many of them concentrated in the city’s Lower East Side neighborhood–were all too often cramped, poorly lit and lacked indoor plumbing and proper ventilation. By 1900, some 2.3 million people (a full two-thirds of New York City’s population) were living in tenement housing. (Riis)
The best historic sight to give you a better sense of what tenement living was like is the Tenement Museum located on Orchard Street in New York. Having been giving the opportunity to tour around the museum you get a real feel for what life was like back in the late 19th century and early 20th century. Tenement houses were usually 5 stories high with a bar or pub located at the bottom cellar level. The tour guides of the museum call it a 5-4-3-2-1 layout. There were 5 floors of apartments, 4 apartments on each floor, each apartment had 3 rooms, there were 2 bathrooms on each floor, and the whole building shared 1 backyard. This meant that 20 families lived in a single building about 25 feet wide and 100 feet long. These families were not small either, the average family size was 4 people but there have been cases were up to 12 people were living in a single apartment at times.
As you walk through the empty apartments you don’t get to fully imagine what it was like to live there because there was no furniture or belongings that took up space, they were just empty rooms. However, after going in to one of the apartments that were recreated to look like a real tenement back in the day you cant help but wonder how a family could live in such a small place. There were only 3 rooms in the whole apartment and they consisted of a kitchen, one bedroom, and a parlor. The kitchen held all the family’s belongings such as food, china, dishes, laundry, water, and more. The one bedroom was usually for the parents and any infants they might have had and had a small bed along with a crib and all the family’s clothes in it. And finally the parlor was where the family would entertain their guests and usually had a few chairs, maybe a desk, and some family heirlooms hanging from the walls. If it was a larger family, it was assumed that the children would sleep on the floor in the parlor wherever they could find room. Not only were the living conditions horrible, the diversity of cultures also proved to be a problem.
The majority of immigrants, who flooded to the lower East Side tenements, were German people fleeing from revolution, and Irish people fleeing from famine. (Riis) Despite sharing the common factor of being in a new country, these two groups of people did not get along well. They differed in religion, language, culture, and beliefs which made it hard to see eye to eye on matters. As if liking one another wasn’t already a problem, the fact that they lived in such close corners to each other made people even more hostile. Once a couple got married the wife was suppose to stay at home, not work, and look after the household duties. This included laundry, cooking, cleaning, and looking after the kids. Due to the fact that there was no running water within the tenements this meant that the woman had to haul up buckets full of water everyday, usually 5 or 6 times a day. These buckets weighed anywhere from 25-35 pounds and if you lived on one of the higher floors that meant more stairs you had to climb. Because everyone shared the same backyard and fountain for water the woman usually crossed paths doing laundry or cleaning outside. Conflicts often arose because these women of different cultures were now being forced to co-habitat with one another on a daily basis. German people thought themselves to be of a higher class than the Irish people and therefore they looked down upon the Irish. (Riis) The Irish felt this was unfair since they were of the same equal status since they lived in the same type of housing and held similar types of jobs. Ultimately, everyone co-existed if not for any other reason than the fact that they had no choice and nowhere else to go.
Another problem many of the tenement dwellers saw was sickness and death. The tenement houses were very cramped living spaces and therefore, if someone got sick it was likely that others surrounding them would as well. It did not help the fact that many tenements did not have good lighting or good ventilation to try and prevent further sickness. The ones who suffered the most from sickness were usually the infants. This is because infants need to be properly fed and cared for however, in these horrible conditions most of the time they were not given the proper care they needed. Since infants have such fragile immune systems they were often the first ones to get sick and 1 out of every 10 infants usually ended up dying. (Riis) It’s horrible to think that not only could parents not provide better lives for their children but, now they couldn’t provide any type of life for them at all. Funerals often cost families too much so it was common for a family who lost a child or loved one to convene funeral gatherings in their tenements. This meant even more people crowded into an already crowded space. The immigrants who lived in these tenements saw the hardest times of all.
I take for granted how lucky I am to live in a house with running water, multiple floors, multiple rooms, along with lighting and proper plumbing. I don’t think many people realize or are aware of what life was like in the city back in the day. New York City today would never allow such type of subpar housing to exist. There are so many different rules, laws, and regulations that building owners have to abide by in order to ensure that the people living there are not in danger in anyway. It is sad to think that it took so much death and despair for a change to come about in housing structure.
Sources
Riis, Jacob A. 1849-1914., and Museum of the City of New York. How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York. New York: Dover, 1971.
Riis, Jacob A. 1849-1914. The Battle With the Slum. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover Publications, 1998.