Among the most substantial houses for workingmen will be found those of Herr Krupp, in Essen, Rhenish Prussia. By his system of employment he has the selection of the best mechanics in Europe. This system comprehends all the advantages to be found in model industrial establishments, including excellent tenements and gardens at low rents. A foreman, a gun‐maker, earning $45 per month, receives four rooms, a drying place on the roof, a cellar, and a garden for $45 per year. A workman with wages at 75 cents per day pays $37 per year for three large rooms, drying place, cellar, and garden. There are fair tenements, in two or three story blocks, situated in colonies just outside the towns. For $100 per year, one can obtain a most excellent tenement of seven large rooms, cellar, garden, etc. The houses in the colonies are owned by Herr Krupp. In fact, he believes that he receives better results by owning everything, and by being able thereby to control the sanitary surroundings of the dwellings of his people. These colonies, each having its name, are laid out with park, schools, churches, supply stores, etc. The housing of the single men is on the barrack plan.
It may be stated that the houses in Great Britain and on the Continent are of stone or brick, as the locality may afford, and the neat wood cottage of America cannot be found. It is quite impossible to compare the houses of European factory operatives with those of the same class in America. The great mass of the former are, generally speaking, quite as well housed as the latter, so far as the quality of the house is concerned; but so far as quantity of room and excellence of living are concerned, the advantage is with the operatives of America. When the operative of this country steps out of the boarding or the tenement house, he steps into an individual home the equal of which cannot be found in the factory towns of the Old World.
The cottage of the American factory operative, when he sees fit to occupy one, is superior to the cottage of the workingman of any other country. It is most gratifying to know that the individual homes are not only increasing in number in this country, but they are increasing in influence. In all the leading factory towns this is the course of progress.
The plates we give on this page represent one of the styles of modern cottages built by the Willimantic Linen Co., of Willimantic, Conn. With each cottage is quite a garden of several thousand feet of land. The rent is from $60 to $125 per year. These houses are located in such a way as to exhibit variety of styles; that is, two of like architecture are never placed side by side. The company has a large number of these houses occupied by operators and overseers. The cuts show the front and side elevations, and the plans of the two floors. These are given as a type of the detached workingmen’s homes used in this country.—Min. and Sci. Press.
Gangways v. Staircases.
Mr. A. Lindsay Miller, in the Building News, recommends for theaters and other public buildings the use of gangways instead of stairs.
In public works, especially dye works, they will not use the stairs, but gain access to the several floors by gangways, with a rise of about 5 ft. in 12 ft. or 13 ft. of length, and any one watching the speed and ease with which the workers run from floor to floor would at once understand why staircases are not used. Of course, architecturally, they have not the dignity of the staircase; but, in theaters and music halls, dignity is secondary to security. The advantage of the gangway is easily explained.
In going down a stair, each step, or, in a hurry, each second step, must be taken, and the slightest mistake throws the person down. In a stair 12 ft. long, at least six different steps require to be taken. In the gangway of the same length, a person in a hurry, or in the excitement of a panic, would take it in two bounds, and with perfect safety.