Many tenements began as single-family dwellings, and many older structures were converted into tenements by adding floors on top or by building more space in rear-yard areas. With less than a foot of space between buildings, little air and light could get in.
What were tenements buildings like?
Cramped, poorly lit, under ventilated, and usually without indoor plumbing, the tenements were hotbeds of vermin and disease, and were frequently swept by cholera, typhus, and tuberculosis.
What were tenements made of?
Apartments contained just three rooms; a windowless bedroom, a kitchen and a front room with windows. A contemporary magazine described tenements as, “great prison-like structures of brick, with narrow doors and windows, cramped passages and steep rickety stairs. . . .
Who built the tenements?
The majority of the tenement buildings that started springing up on the Lower East Side in the 1830s were designed by German architects, and constructed by German and Jewish builders, many of whom were much like the poorer, less educated immigrants who inhabited them.
When was tenement housing built?
New houses were not often built for the poor, and the affluent mostly built single-family homes for themselves. Tenements built specifically for housing the poor originated at some time between 1820 and 1850, and even the new buildings were considered overcrowded and inadequate.
Did tenement houses have bathrooms?
The Tenement House Act of 1867 legally defined a tenement for the first time and set construction regulations; among these were the requirement of one toilet (or privy) per 20 people.
Why are tenement ceilings so high?
They were built for wealth merchants and other business types who wanted high ceilings because it looked impressive.
What caused tenements to be built?
Tenements were first built to house the waves of immigrants that arrived in the United States during the 1840s and 1850s, and they represented the primary form of urban working-class housing until the New Deal. A typical tenement building was from five to six stories high, with four apartments on each floor.
Did tenement buildings have windows?
Only tenements built after that date had to meet its requirements: that all rooms have access to air. Since inner rooms had no way of facing the street or back yard, the law effectively required windows opening on air shafts.
What was a typical of city tenement buildings?
With too many people and too little space, something had to give. Thus was born the American tenement: narrow buildings, typically five to seven stories tall and with a footprint of 25 by 100 feet, carved into apartment units of approximately 350 square feet each.
Why did tenements have windows inside?
These windows have an appropriate name: tuberculosis windows. They were mandated by a 19th century city law requiring that tenements have cross ventilation to help reduce the spread of diseases like tuberculosis—the deadly “white plague” not uncommon in poor neighborhoods.
What is tenement building?
A tenement can refer to any multi-occupancy residential rental building. However, the term is associated most often with crowded, run-down buildings with low-quality living conditions.
Why is it called tenement?
In the United States, the term tenement initially meant a large building with multiple small spaces to rent. As cities grew in the nineteenth century, there was increasing separation between rich and poor.
Did tenement houses have electricity?
Due to the little amount of space, the living conditions in tenements were bad. Many people shared small 3 room apartments in tenements. Since there were 4 apartments per floor there were 5 to 6 families per floor. There was no electricity until after 1918.
How many people lived in a tenement apartment?
In one New York tenement, up to 18 people lived in each apartment. Each apartment had a wood-burning stove and a concrete bathtub in the kitchen, which, when covered with planks, served as a dining table. Before 1901, residents used rear-yard outhouses. Afterward, two common toilets were installed on each floor.
Was tenement life good or bad?
Tenement buildings were constructed with cheap materials, had little or no indoor plumbing and lacked proper ventilation. These cramped and often unsafe quarters left many vulnerable to rapidly spreading illnesses and disasters like fires.
How did people bathe before indoor plumbing?
Pre-Indoor Plumbing
Washing took place at a washstand in the bedroom, with a pitcher and a bowl; defecating happened in the outhouse or the chamber pot; bathing, when it occasionally happened, was often in a tub by the stove in the kitchen, where the hot water was.
How did Victorians go to the toilet?
Chamber pots did not always have to sit below a commode. For ease of use, Victorian women could simply hold the chamber pot in their hands, rest a foot on the top of the chair, and hold the chamber pot underneath the skirts.
Did tenements have stoves?
The History of Tenement Kitchens
Most kitchens did have had an icebox where one could temporarily store perishable goods, such as milk, and were equipped with a coal and in some cases, gas stove. With few fire regulations, tenement stoves posed many dangers to residents and were a common source of building fires.
Are tenements cold?
Keep the cold out
Tenements are often draughtier than newer homes, which can increase heating costs as well as making your home feel chilly. Although you do want a level of ventilation, sealing draughts around windows, under doors, between floorboards and in unused chimneys can make a big difference.
Why did old houses have 12 foot ceilings?
Tall ceilings were introduced in old homes to ventilate hot air without air-conditioning. When you have an HVAC unit in the home, you will need to pay extra to cool the added space of the home. The problems extend to the winter seasons as well, with the hot air rising above into the tall ceilings.