THE TENTH STREET STUDIOS (B)
The first tenement-type building was erected in 1857 at 15
W. 10th street by the architect Richard Morris Hunt, a man some say brought
the apartment house to New York. The building known as the Tenth
Street Studios was the first built specifically for artists, and combined
studios and gallery space with living quarters. (4)
THE TENTH STREET STUDIOS (B)
Tenements evolved out of row houses, houses originally constructed for single families.
PHOTOGRAPH BY BERNICE ABBOTT, MARCH 30, 1937
POST-CIVIL WAR ROWHOUSES (C)
Typical tenements were five or six stories high.
The average apartment size was around 325 square feet. Apartments
on the first floor were even smaller, since in typical tenements, the hall
run through the building from the main entrance to the rear doorway leaving
a width of only about 10 feet or so per apartment. One would think
with the smaller square footage, the first floor apartments would be less
expensive and less desirable. It was the exact opposite. First
floor apartments were the most desirable because tenants didn’t have to
walk up the stairs to get to their apartments.
Amazingly enough, at the same time first floor apartments were the
most desireable, they were the most undesirable as well.
Tenants were supposed to place their garbage in garbage-boxes located
in front of their buildings, but tenants on the top floors of tenements
never wanted to bring their trash down to the inadequate trash bins when
they had a convenient airshaft they could dump their garbage into.
Since the airshafts were cleaned out maybe once a year if at all, first
floor tenements had to endure the horrible stench of the garbage, piling
almost completely to the second floor of the building.
Regardless of this horrible aspect, the first floor apartments were
considered the most desirable, thus costing up to three dollars more a
month in rent than top floor apartments. (5)
A report regarding the garbage disposal situation of the tenements from the New York Tribune in 1863:
"In front of each of these tenement blocks is placed a garbage-box, which is only another mane for a receptacle of heterogeneous filth and corruption, composed of potato-peelings, cabbage-heads, turnips, dead lobsters, oyster-shells, night-soil, rancid butter, dead dogs and cats, and ordinary black street mud, all forming one breeding filth, reeking in the fierce sunshine which gloats yellowly over it like the glare of a devil whom Satan has kicked from his councils in virtuous disgust."(6)
TYPICAL AIR SHAFT OF A TENEMENT (F)
Veiller quoted an early AICP report containing one of the first discussions regarding the horrendous conditions of the tenements:
"The tenements of the poor in this city are generally defective in size, arrangement, supplies of water, warmth, and ventilation; also the yards sinks [i.e., outdoor toilets], and sewage are in bad condition."(8)
In early tenements, there was little to no light nor ventilation in the front hall or on the stairs except for that which came in through the front and rear doors on the first floor, which was hardly adequate.
