"The houses of this type are usually roofed with large strips of zinc, nailed directly upon the rafters. These roofs are low, unceiled and, as a result, the houses are extremely hot. The walls are of imported lumber, sometimes the boards being matched and in other cases clapboarded. The better houses are painted to diminish the depreciation and to awaken the pride of the occupants in their homes. The walls are six or seven feet high. The floors are of boards and raised from one to two feet above the ground. The houses are set upon posts so that there is a clear space under them that can be easily cleaned. On the interior they are divided by half partitions into two or three rooms and are usually provided with separate kitchens, frequently one kitchen serving for from one to four houses. These houses cost from $70 to $150, the average being about $80, according to their size and construction. This description refers to the better houses of this type and, unfortunately, the majority of the single plantation houses are not so well constructed.
"These tenements represent the older type of plantation houses and fortunately very few of them are being built at the present time. Their construction has been prompted by the same reason that has induced employers to build the single type of plantation house—the desire to hold a resident supply of labor on the plantation. They are, however, far inferior to the single houses.
"The better rural tenements are built with zinc roofs, board walls and floors, and are raised from one to two feet above the ground. They are unceiled and have no windows. In the inland many of them have zinc walls. The poorer ones are located on low, swampy land and are built of oil cans, pieces of boxes, and other odds and ends. Some of them have separate kitchens and sanitary facilities, but many have nothing except such temporary and inadequate structures as the occupants have themselves built. The first reason for building tenements of this type has been, of course, to house the greatest number of laborers at the least expense. They are long structures, one or two rooms wide, each room an apartment, and crowded with people. Although these rural tenements are not usually being built at present, there are still hundreds of them in use.
"The worst housing conditions upon the plantations prevail in the buildings, usually tenements of this type, set aside as sleeping quarters for unmarried laborers. This type of labor is transient, coming for a few months during the busy season and then passing on to another section of the Island. Consequently, they are crowded into whatever quarters may be available at the time. The leaky rooms of the old sugar mills, the worst rooms in the tenements, single houses that have been unused for six months and are out of repair and filthy, are usually used for the emergency—an emergency that lasts from three to six months. Six, eight, or ten hammocks are hung up between bare walls in a room 10 feet by 15 feet and are all filled each night. Conditions of ventilation and general sanitation are frightful.
"There is one notable exception. One of the largest centrals of our Island has constructed a large, well-ventilated, and comfortable men's apartment. The floor is of matched boards, solid and clean. The walls are also of matched boards, but there is an open space two feet wide at the top of the walls extending around the building. Overhanging eaves prevent the rain from beating in through this opening. The roof is of heavy paper nailed to a thick wooden ceiling. Frames are arranged in the interior of the building for hanging hammocks, and around the walls are large individual lockers for the use of those sleeping there. Finally, the building is cleaned thoroughly every day.
"No description of the housing conditions of rural laborers would be complete without mention of the gardens cultivated by the occupants of the houses. It is safe to say that nine out of every ten laborers in the rural sections, with the exception of those who live in plantation houses where there is no land that they are permitted to cultivate, have planted some sort of garden. It is also true that these gardens are, in most cases, of very little practical use. Well cultivated and productive gardens belonging to rural laborers are hard to find.
"The average garden consists of two or three plantain or banana trees, a few tubers, and some medicinal plants. Frequently, there are many and beautiful flowers. Whatever vegetables there may be are poorly cared for and do not produce more than a third of a proper yield.
"This subject is of tremendous importance. The soil and climate of Porto Rico are such that it should be able, even with its dense population, to produce most of its food. There are unused plots of ground around practically every hut in the interior of the Island. The decrease in the production of sugar is going to throw many laborers out of work and they will be obliged to raise most of their own food or suffer. Many reasons have been advanced to explain the absence of good small gardens. The laborers themselves say that they do not plant and cultivate gardens because they do not own the land and they are allowed to plant only on condition that they give the greater part of their produce to the landowners. They claim also that it does not pay to break up the ground for one crop and that after they have got plantains, etc., growing they may be obliged to move. It is also true that in most cases they have not money enough to buy the seed or hire the oxen and implements needed for breaking up the ground.
"Also, in some parts of the south coast, it is too dry for profitable gardening. On the other hand, landowners frequently say that the reasons why laborers in the rural sections do not plant gardens are lack of knowledge of gardening methods, lack of realization of the benefits that they could derive from good gardens, and custom. Without discussing the relative merits of these reasons, there are two things that must be faced—such laborers must be educated, so far as possible by example, and they must be offered the opportunity to hold land with some fixity of tenure, either by purchasing it on the installment plan or by obtaining leases from the present landowners."