Northwestern University Settlement House

Last updated
Harriet E. Vittum holding book, Northwestern University settlement house children gathered around, 1914 Harriet E. Vittum with children.jpg
Harriet E. Vittum holding book, Northwestern University settlement house children gathered around, 1914
Northwestern University Settlement House Northwestern University Settlement House 3.JPG
Northwestern University Settlement House

The Northwestern University Settlement House is an Arts and Crafts style house located at 1400 West Augusta Boulevard in Chicago, Illinois, United States. The Settlement Association was founded in 1891 by Northwestern University to provide resources to the poor and new immigrants to the West Town neighborhood. The actual Settlement House structure was built in 1901 by Pond & Pond. It was designated a Chicago Landmark on December 1, 1993. [1]

Contents

It is the longest continually operating settlement house in the country,[ citation needed ] as well as the largest settlement house in Chicago since the closing of Hull House which was founded by Jane Addams.

History

The Northwestern University Settlement House was one of the major contributions in Chicago history to creating American social reform, as part of a broader, international movement. Advocates of the Settlement movement such as Samuel Barnett and Arnold Toynbee in the UK, and Lillian Wald, Harriet Vittum, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient Jane Addams in the U.S., influenced the social policy arena. Among the many achievements in changing public institutions, they promoted fair salaries for workers and improvement of poor neighborhoods, turned feminism into a social force, advocated the concept of juvenile court, brought about recognition of the child as a person with rights, and developed vast programs to integrate immigrants and promote multiculturalism.

In January 1891, the President of Northwestern University, Henry Wade Rogers, his wife Emma, and two faculty members founded the Settlement Association. They modeled the house on the University Settlement model, developed by Toynbee Hall in London, even featuring designs from portions of the Jane Addams' Hull House. The Northwestern University Settlement House formally opened its new building at 1400 W. Augusta Boulevard, in 1901. Northwestern University Settlement House provided the poor of Chicago's West Town neighborhood with educational and recreational programs. Its mission was to provide resources that empower its "neighbors" to take personal responsibility for overcoming the obstacles of poverty and improving the quality of their lives. It was one of the first to aid Polish immigrants in the late 19th century to the early 20th century.

Today, Northwestern University Settlement House continues to run a traditional settlement operation, providing holistic educational, experiential, arts and emergency services to the entire family, currently serving more than 40,000 individuals annually.

Related Research Articles

Jane Addams American activist, sociologist and writer

Laura Jane Addams was an American settlement activist, reformer, social worker, sociologist, public administrator and author. She was an important leader in the history of social work and women's suffrage in the United States and advocated for world peace. She co-founded Chicago's Hull House, one of America's most famous settlement houses. In 1910, Addams was awarded an honorary master of arts degree from Yale University, becoming the first woman to receive an honorary degree from the school. In 1920, she was a co-founder of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

Hull House 19th and 20th-century settlement house in the United States

Hull House was a settlement house in Chicago, Illinois, United States that was co-founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Located on the Near West Side of the city, Hull House opened to serve recently arrived European immigrants. By 1911, Hull House had expanded to 13 buildings. In 1912 the Hull House complex was completed with the addition of a summer camp, the Bowen Country Club. With its innovative social, educational, and artistic programs, Hull House became the standard bearer for the movement that had grown nationally, by 1920, to almost 500 settlement houses.

Toynbee Hall

Toynbee Hall is a charitable institution that works to address the causes and impacts of poverty in the East End of London and elsewhere. Established in 1884, it is based in Commercial Street, Spitalfields, and was the first university-affiliated institution of the worldwide settlement movement—a reformist social agenda that strove to get the rich and poor to live more closely together in an interdependent community. It was founded by Henrietta and Samuel Barnett in the economically depressed East End, and was named in memory of their friend and fellow reformer, Oxford historian Arnold Toynbee, who had died the previous year.

Henrietta Barnett

Dame Henrietta Octavia Weston Barnett, DBE was an English social reformer, educationist, and author. She and her husband, Samuel Augustus Barnett, founded the first "University Settlement" at Toynbee Hall in 1884. They also worked to establish the model Hampstead Garden Suburb in the early 20th century.

Little Italy, Chicago

Little Italy, sometimes combined with University Village into one neighborhood, is on the Near West Side of Chicago, Illinois. The current boundaries of Little Italy are Ashland Avenue on the west and Interstate 90/94 on the east, the Eisenhower Expressway on the north and Roosevelt to the south. It lies between the east side of the University of Illinois at Chicago campus in the Illinois Medical District and the west side of the University of Illinois at Chicago campus. The community was once predominantly Italian immigrants but now is made up of diverse ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds as a result of immigration, urban renewal, gentrification and the growth of the resident student and faculty population of the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). Its Italian-American heritage is primarily evident in the Italian-American restaurants that once lined Taylor Street. The neighborhood is home to the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame as well as the historic Roman Catholic churches Our Lady of Pompeii, Notre Dame de Chicago, and Holy Family.

The settlement movement was a reformist social movement that began in the 1880s and peaked around the 1920s in England and the United States. Its goal was to bring the rich and the poor of society together in both physical proximity and social interconnectedness. Its main object was the establishment of "settlement houses" in poor urban areas, in which volunteer middle-class "settlement workers" would live, hoping to share knowledge and culture with, and alleviate the poverty of, their low-income neighbors. The settlement houses provided services such as daycare, English classes, and healthcare to improve the lives of the poor in these areas. The most famous settlement house of the time was Hull House, founded by Jane Addams and Ellen Starr.

Ellen Gates Starr

Ellen Gates Starr was an American social reformer and activist. With Jane Addams, she founded Chicago's Hull House, an adult education center, in 1889; the settlement house expanded to 13 buildings in the neighborhood.

Toronto Neighbourhood Centres ("TNC") is an association of multi-service nonprofit neighbourhood centres located in communities across Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The current association includes 30 member agencies that provide supports to residents of their local geographic neighbourhoods, including social services, opportunities for association and enabling collective action to improve community conditions. Based on a historic "settlement house" model, these modern neighbourhood centres hold great promise for revitalizing community in a global era.

The Stanton Street Settlement is a Settlement movement, a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit community organization in New York, New York, United States. Its mission is to provide a safe, caring, tuition-free environment where children from the city's Lower East Side can develop their minds, bodies and spirits.

Irving Kane Pond American architect

Irving Kane Pond was an American architect, college athlete, and author. Born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Pond attended the University of Michigan and received a degree in civil engineering in 1879. He was a member of the first University of Michigan football team and scored the first touchdown in the school's history in May 1879.

Chicago Commons

Chicago Commons, known since 1954 as the Chicago Commons Association, is a social service organization and former settlement house in Chicago, Illinois, in the United States. Originally located on the near Northwest Side and now headquartered in Chicago's Bronzeville neighborhood, it serves underresourced communities throughout the city.

The Institute for Juvenile Research (IJR) is a research, demonstration and training center housed in the Department of Psychiatry, College of Medicine, University of Illinois at Chicago. The institute has more than 40 faculty members and 65 professional staff members. IJR programs address pressing issues such as HIV risk, access to effective school services, the epidemiology of drug abuse, services for families in the child welfare system and the training of child mental health providers. The institute also offers child psychiatry clinical services and training programs in child and adolescent psychiatry, psychology and social work.

Erie Neighborhood House

Erie Neighborhood House is a social service agency that works primarily with low-income, immigrant families in Chicago, Illinois. Operations began in 1870 as a ministry of Holland Presbyterian Church, a Protestant congregation located northwest of Chicago's Loop, and the organization quickly became part of the settlement house movement that emerged in the late 19th century. It currently offers programs and services from four locations—two in Chicago's West Town community area, a third in Little Village, and fourth at Jose De Diego Elementary School in East Humboldt Park—to a population characterized as predominantly Latino.

West Side, Chicago District in Illinois, United States

The West Side is one of the three major sections of the city of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, along with the North Side and the South Side. The West Side consists of communities that are of historical, cultural, and ideological importance to the history and development of Chicago. On the flag of Chicago, the West Side is represented by the central white stripe.

Cornelia De Bey

Dr. Cornelia De Bey was a Progressive Era reformer, homeopathic doctor, Chicago public school administrator, labor advocate, and leader in the women's suffrage movement. She worked with the famous Hull House community of social reformers, including Jane Addams, Julia Lathrop, Alice De Wolf Kellogg, and Ellen Gates Starr. She advocated for major school administration reform, exposing corruption, advocating for more democratic decision-making, and defending the unionization of teachers.

Eleanor Sophia Smith American composer and music educator

Eleanor Sophia Smith was an American composer and music educator. She was one of the founders of Chicago's Hull House Music School, and headed its music department from 1893 to 1936.

Mary Rozet Smith

Mary Rozet Smith was a Chicago-born US philanthropist who was one of the trustees and benefactors of Hull House. She was the companion of activist Jane Addams for over thirty years. Smith provided the financing for the Hull House Music School and donated the school's organ as a memorial to her mother. She was active in several social betterment societies in Chicago at the turn of the 20th century.

Mary McDowell

Mary Eliza McDowell was an American social reformer and prominent figure in the Chicago Settlement movement.

Lazarus Averbuch (1889–1908) was a 19-year-old Russian-born Jewish immigrant to Chicago who was shot and killed by Chicago Chief of Police George M. Shippy on March 2, 1908. The incident occurred during an era of public fear of foreign-born anarchists in the United States, following their involvement with the Haymarket affair in 1886. The exact circumstances of the shooting remain contested, but Averbuch's death has inspired speculation, ideological arguments, and works of fiction.

Julia I. Felsenthal

Julia I. Felsenthal was an American social worker based in Chicago. She was one of the founders of the National Council of Jewish Women.

References

  1. "Northwestern University Settlement House". City of Chicago Department of Planning and Development, Landmarks Division. 2003. Retrieved 2007-06-27.

Coordinates: 41°54′00″N87°39′46″W / 41.9000°N 87.6628°W / 41.9000; -87.6628