Euthenics, the science of controllable environment / A plea for better living conditions as a first step toward higher human efficiency

by Ellen H. Richards

The author has elsewhere called it the Capitalists’ Opportunity. Instead of investing in an uncertain gold mine in some distant land, let the millions, for no less sum will suffice, be invested in a plot of land, whether an open field or a slum district depends on local conditions, and thereon cause to be erected habitations decently comfortable, wholly sanitary, and place over each group an inspector as both agent and teacher who shall be a friend to the tenants, and to whose office they may come freely with their needs. This plan has been in part carried out in the Model Tenements in New York, but variations and improvements are needed. There should be more light and air, more grass and trees, even if the buildings are fifteen-story towers.

The old story has been so often reiterated, “But the tenants will not use the devices,” that the capitalist has become callous to this appeal. The missing link in the chain has been the instruction to go with the construction.

All department stores, all venders of new mechanical appliances, have come to recognize the value of demonstration, or instruction, in the use of articles as an aid to purchase. The advocate of better dwellings must take a leaf from the commercial book and show how. It is in this that philanthropy has been weak in the past. It has assumed a power to see, where there was only a fear of handling the strange objects.

There is a virgin field for the capitalist who wishes to use some millions for the prosperity of the country to build a short trolley line to a district of sanitary houses with gardens, playgrounds, entertainment halls, etc.; such a village to contain, not long blocks, but both separate houses and tenements from two rooms up, possibly several stories high, where the elders may have light and air without the confusion of the street. Dust and noise will be eliminated. There should be a central bakery and laundry, and, most important of all, an office where both men and women skilled in sanitary and economic practical affairs may be found ready to go to any home and advise on any subject. There has never yet been such an enterprise with all the elements worked out. Several, however, have shown the way, the Morris houses in Brooklyn, for example.

It is easier to take a city block and construct fireproof, high buildings than to solve transportation problems. We are losing our fear of the high buildings as we see the great value of light and air. There is chance for work in this direction, for in spite of rapid transit some must live in the center of things.

Let a philanthropist or two, instead of building hospitals, set some bright young architects and sanitarians to devising such suitable housing conditions for city and suburbs as will obviate the necessity for hospitals. Any lover of his kind, any one who longs for fame, could find both it and the blessing of the homeless by this means, and in the end get a fair return for his investment.

The Federal Department of Labor[7] has studied workingmen’s houses, but living in the house has not been worked up. The housewife has no station to which she may carry her trials, like the experiment stations which have been provided for the farmer. Here is another opportunity for the capitalist to hasten the time when the State will supply these. The way will very soon be laid out and the first steps taken.

For the immediate present some standard of healthful housing is needed, and now that a similar type of house and of apartment house is being built in all cities and towns from one ocean to the other, and from Texas to Maine, such a standard is compatible with conditions.

A score card for houses to rent would save much wrangling. The agent shows the card with this house’s rating, and the tenant learns that some of his wishes are incompatible with the standard, and some would mean a much higher rent than he is willing to pay. Professor J. R. Commons, Department of Economics, University of Wisconsin, has devised a score card to serve the house hunter and householder as a standard of comparison. This should serve the house builder as well, indicating what the demand will be forty or fifty years hence.

At present the rating stands somewhat as follows: