Workman Place. Interior View of Yards Now Arranged in One Large Open Space With Playground, Sand Piles, Swings, Etc.
Interior View of Workman Place, Showing Shelter House and Playground.
A heartening example of the civic spirit generated in this region by the presence of this great object-lesson of Workman Place under the wise and watchful rule of the Association was the flag-raising that occurred in midsummer, 1917, on the Fitzwater Street side of the courtyard. Benjamin Barton, a resident of the block, went from house to house inducing his neighbors to scrub the steps and the cobbles till they shone with the lustrousness of Spotless Town; then they all, at his suggestion, hung out brave new flags, the eagles of Poland on their red and white field prominent among them. Little Maria Barton, dressed as the Goddess of Liberty, stood on the rear seat of the hard-working Ford car belonging to the Association and released the Star-Spangled Banner over the street, midway of the block. Mr. Barton and others made speeches, and Fitzwater Street is still talking of its great day.
The playground at Workman Place, the use of the roof of the Casa Ravello, the Hector McIntosh Playground at Front and League Streets and playgrounds in Richmond and Germantown in connection with properties about to be described, are noteworthy examples of the manner in which the Association is realizing Octavia Hill’s own insistent prescription of open spaces. The Hector McIntosh Playground, to which we have already referred, carries the name of the devoted second President of the Association. It dates from 1902, when two friends of the Association gave the land. Small as it is, even after the addition of the site of 957 South Front Street, it has played a most useful part in the lives of its patrons, young and old. Stockholders have generously subscribed funds for its maintenance, and during certain summers, in addition to the fun of the swings and games and sandpile, and the work of the morning kindergarten, there has been a series of seven or eight concerts of harp and violin costing a dollar apiece on the average, and bringing out a delighted throng to sing and to dance with the diminutive orchestra. The Board of Recreation and the Playground Association, always in sympathy with the objects of the Octavia Hill Association, have liberally cooperated in this work, in such ways as planting trees or providing a teacher.
In January, 1911, the Association was requested by a physician to turn a noisome group of houses, breeding-places of pestilence and notorious hospital-feeders, on East Rittenhouse Street in Germantown, into something that would not be a standing rebuke to the community and the worst possible advertisement of the thriving and progressive suburb. After a meeting at the house of Mrs. Elizabeth Lean Head, residents of Germantown subscribed for stock in the Association to the amount of $20,825, on the understanding that the fund would be wholly devoted to the purpose specified.
The Association thereupon acquired Nos. 523 and 531 to 551 inclusive, with a total frontage of 210 feet on East Rittenhouse Street and a depth of 165 feet. The houses, near the Reading Railroad, were occupied by Italians. There were 25 houses, some of them run-down and filthy beyond the power of words to portray. There was no underdrainage and two hydrants provided all the water there was. Externally there were gaptoothed sections of picket fence flat on the ground or sagging drunkenly; smashed boxes and wrecked barrels were the least, repulsive feature of the promiscuous clutter under the heavyladen clothes-lines. One building, a mere outhouse, rented for 50 cents a month, and its wretched occupant had just been removed in a dying condition from tuberculosis. Within were the old, familiar features of ruin and decay and smells unholy. Three houses were at once torn down. Others were renovated from attic skylight to cellar floor, with the installation of modern toilet facilities; and two new brick buildings—two stories high, well lighted and well ventilated—were built with apartments for 14 families. The two-room apartments rent for $6.50 per month, and the four-room apartments for $11.00. In the entire operation there are quarters for 35 families, and at the rear is a large space available for a general playground and for tenants’ gardens. There was much stone-work, and the difficult site necessitated a great deal of blasting in the solid rock.
East Rittenhouse Street, Germantown.
No Supervision on the Part of Owners or Agents Produces These Conditions.