Identifier: beautyforashes01baco (find matches)
Title: Beauty for ashes
Year: 1914 (1910s)
Authors: Bacon, Albion Fellows, 1865-1933
Subjects: Working class Tenement houses Poor
Publisher: New York, Dodd, Mead and company
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress

View Book Page: Book Viewer
About This Book: Catalog Entry
View All Images: All Images From Book
Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book.

Text Appearing Before Image:
tion of responsibility for public welfare, canhardly be estimated. It is to them that we look forthe development of better, more durable, more con-venient and more comfortable houses, that shall bewithin the reach of the hitherto neglected classes.It is to them that we must look, in the absence ofcivic experts, for the redemption of our cities fromtheir unnecessary ugliness. In my own city I have seen not only the actionbut the reaction of housing reform. Many peoplelabour under a delusion that I am an official with asalary. I thought you ought to know about thefamily back of me, comes buzzing over the telephone,every few days, with a description of one more caseof overcrowding or unsanitation. I am glad you are interested, I say (and rightglad I am), and the building inspector wiU appreci-ate your help. Wont you call him up please —No. 462?^ Fewer plaints come to me now from angry land-lords and weeping women, as the tenement law isbetter understood. But even the tenants who suffer
Text Appearing After Image:
•T3 ^ c s o J3 .2 oo LOOKING FORWARD 329 most grumble, occasionally, when we try to pull themout of an old house before it falls over them, espe-cially when they are misled about the law, by shrewdlandlords. I have a soiled and misspelled letter, in a pencilscrawl, whose message shows the sharpness of an-other wit than that which directed the hand. Itappeals to me to stop the demolition of a notoriousold tenement, whose ribs were bare of boards, andwhose condition beggars description. We thoughtyou were our friend, the letter says. We dontknow where to go, and, if you cant stop the work-men, will you shelter us yourself? The inspector assured me that they found betterplaces, and indeed, none could be worse. One of thefamilies, I found, was Lucindys! Her husband haddied, and she was trying to keep her little ones to-gether. We were glad to see her rescued once more,and installed in a better neighbourhood. A wonderful result has come from the educationalcampaign of the last six years,

Note About Images