[page 13]
Let us now once again get a general view of our District--a black sheep, as it were, at the rear door of an admirable and very exclusive section of the city.
What an anomaly we have here! The Schenley Farms District with its wonderful semi-public buildings and magnificent rich men's homes produced by Pittsburgh's millions and these squalid hovels and dilapidated tenements for workingmen--they too a product of Pittsburgh's millions or should I say perhaps Pittsburgh's greed for millions?
In talking over the housing situation, a prominent business man said the other day: "But within the past six or seven years Pittsburgh has realized wonderful improvements." It is indeed true. Every cloud has its silver lining and in this case it is the Schenley Farms District. But what benefits does it confer upon the inhabitants of our unsanitary houses and tenements, to whom the ominous, dark side of the cloud is horrible, lifelong reality?
Yet we must not get the impression that the situation is altogether dark. A reawakening due to the recognition of the bad housing conditions in Pittsburgh is already visible. The Chamber of Commerce and other civic organizations are doing conscientious work. The Chamber of Commerce Housing Committee has developed a plan for the building of small sanitary dwellings for workingmen which seems practical as well for the investor as for the prospective dweller.
[page 14]
May it not be that the district we have studied might prove the logical one for the inauguration of this committee's plan? And perhaps then, too, prophecy may become fact and,
"Instead of the thorn shall come
up the fir tree, and instead of the briar
shall come up the myrtle tree.And they shall build houses and inhabit
them; and they shall plant vineyards
and eat the fruit of them."
[page 15]