Who typically lived in tenement housing?

The Jewish immigrants that flocked to New York City’s Lower East Side in the early twentieth century were greeted with appalling living conditions. The mass influx of primarily European immigrants spawned the construction of cheaply made, densely packed housing structures called tenements.

When did people live in tenement houses?

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.

When did tenement housing stop?

By 1904, landlords were required to install toilets in the tenements. But until 1918, there were no laws requiring that even electricity be installed in the apartments. In 1936, New York City introduced its first public housing project, and the era of the tenement building officially ended.

How did immigrants live in the 1900s?

They moved into poverty stricken neighborhoods and into neglected buildings known as tenements, which are “multifamily dwellings with several apartment-like living quarters”. Tenements were most common in the Lower East Side of New York City, the area in which a majority of immigrants found themselves settling in.

What kind of houses did immigrants live in?

At the turn of the century more than half the population of New York City, and most immigrants, lived in tenement houses, narrow, low-rise apartment buildings that were usually grossly overcrowded by their landlords.

What was life like for people living in tenements?

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 was bad about tenements?

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.

What’s the difference between an apartment and a tenement?

As nouns the difference between apartment and tenement is that apartment is a complete domicile occupying only part of a building while tenement is a building that is rented to multiple tenants, especially a low-rent, run-down one.

Where did most immigrants come from in the late 1900s?

Between 1870 and 1900, the largest number of immigrants continued to come from northern and western Europe including Great Britain, Ireland, and Scandinavia. But “new” immigrants from southern and eastern Europe were becoming one of the most important forces in American life.

How many people lived in tenements in 1900?

By 1900, more than 80,000 tenements had been built, but two-thirds of the city’s population, roughly 2.3 million people, lived in these tenements (Tenements). When confronted about these conditions, proprietors would shift the blame on the “filthy habits” of the tenants for the dismal state of the tenement houses.

Where did the old tenant houses go to?

Old tenant house residents began to vacate “the once fashionable streets” along the East River and headed north, leaving behind their masonry row houses for real-estate agents and house keepers to divide up into tenements ( Riis 7; Tenements).

How was housing built in the early 1900s?

housing estate as it was in the early 1900s A road on the Huxley Estate showing how the houses were built in pairs, such that adjacent entrances were shared with neighbours on one side and adjacent chimney stacks with neighbours on the other side.

How many tenements were built in New York City?

Both of these groups of new arrivals concentrated themselves on the Lower East Side, moving into row houses that had been converted from single-family dwellings into multiple-apartment tenements, or into new tenement housing built specifically for that purpose. Did you know? By 1900, more than 80,000 tenements had been built in New York City.