South End House is a settlement house in South End, Boston, Massachusetts. It stressed education and study, but gradually extended its activities until it contributed in a multitude of ways to the life of Boston, particularly to the south End neighborhood. [1] The house was controlled by a council of which William Jewett Tucker was the chairman; but the active work was carried on by a number of resident members. [2]
Established in 1892, and incorporated in 1897, [3] South End House was Boston's first settlement house and the fourth in the country. [4] Decades later, South End House and four other properties became an association, the United South End Settlements. [5]
The Andover House commenced its work in January 1892 as a social experiment, without traditions, or experience, and with little help from example. [6]
The movement for the Andover House began among a group of the younger graduates of Andover Theological Seminary, including Robert Archey Woods, who started the House, and was thereafter head of it. They got their inspiration from Professor William Jewett Tucker, afterwards president of Dartmouth College. Tucker encouraged Woods' desire for social service.The only pattern which Tucker and Woods had before them was Toynbee Hall. To London, accordingly, went Woods, and spent six months studying the methods of Toynbee Hall, under the direction of Canon Barnett. Canon Barnett's undertaking had at the heart of it two determining ideas. He desired to make the privileged of service to the unprivileged; to gather about him in the East End of London a group of men who should come from Oxford or Cambridge, as Arnold Toynbee had come, and share the rich happiness of their intellectual and social life with those from whom much of this joy had been barred by arbitrary and accidental environment. He desired also that this should be done in the spirit of the Christian religion, though the house had no formal connection with the church. It was understood to be an opportunity for the energies of some who, for various reasons, could not work under the conditions of the usual parochial societies. But the spirit of the founder was distinctively Christian. Jane Addams described it as "a bent to express in social service and in terms of action the spirit of Christ." These two ruling ideas Woods had already in his mind when he went to London, and he came away confirmed in them as the method to govern the house. The results of Wood's study he put into a book entitled English Social Movements, and in the light of this experience, the Andover House was opened. [6]
Tucker helped in many invaluable ways the establishment of the house -then, and for three years after, called the Andover House- and served as president of the Andover House Association. [6] The Andover House Association, which stood responsible for the work, however, represented from the beginning a large variety of persons having no identity of interest except that in the more progressive lines of social activity. [7]
After three years, the name changed from Andover House to South End House to remove the association with the theological seminary. The House is located at 6 Rollins Street. The location was selected so as to allow the work to reach both ways-toward the richer working people and toward those of laboring classes. In the first instance, the House was the home of a group of educated men, who in one way and another enter actively into all the better interests of the immediate neighborhood. The keynote of every effort was personal friendliness. As far as possible, the attitude of patronage was completely avoided. [7]
Woods never fell into the snare of preparation. He met needs as they came, adapted his program to the changing situation, and freely followed opportunity wherever it led. He believed that the house was for the community, not the community for the house. [6]
At the beginning, the work of the House necessarily had to be somewhat ill-defined. Indeed, the work of a university settlement could never take on the exact and highly organized form of an institution; however, the purpose of making the work regular and continuous was held strongly in mind. The original purpose included not only well-meaning effort, but careful study of actual conditions to accompany and inform such effort. As a rule, each resident visited a certain group of families and made it his duty to become thoroughly acquainted with them. As he learned about the life of the families, not as a canvasser learns, but as a friend learns about a friend, he made out a complete schedule, covering every significant point. Much time was also given to careful investigation of social problems, affecting the life of the city as a whole. In several instances, through such study, residents did useful work in the way of the improvement and development of some of the larger forms of philanthropic work in Boston. [7]
The residents cooperated with the various local agencies in the way of self-help, as well as of charity and philanthropy. They participated in certain local societies of the people's own; they served on a local committee of the associated charities; they acted upon the managing board of different charitable institutions, besides rendering a large amount of irregular service in such causes; they cooperated as far as possible, according to their particular inclination, with the work of the churches in the neighborhood, though they avoided the very appearance of proselytism; and this not merely as a matter of policy, but of principle. It was held to be very important to do everything through cooperation with existing agencies that could be done in that way. [7]
The House was not meant to be an institution foisted upon the neighborhood, but simply an influence which would act in support and confirmation of such good influences as were already in action; thus, the House undertook very little formal educational work, because the educational system of Boston, including evening elementary schools and the evening high school, so well filled the need in that particular. [7]
In the larger social field, Woods and Mr. Kennedy edited for the National Federation of Settlements a book on Young Working Girls, a summary of evidence from 2,000 workers; and under the Russell Sage Foundation A Handbook of Settlements in the United States.
The money with which to buy, build and maintain the holdings of the South End House was gathered either by the personal work of Woods, or by reason of confidence in him. [6] The plant included: [8]
Former locations included: [8]
The gatherings at the House, while they were by regular appointment, were very informal in their nature, beginning with recreation of various kinds, and leading always toward the mental and moral improvement of those who came. There were clubs for boys and girls, for little children, for young men and young women, and there was a weekly meeting for mothers of the neighborhood. But in all these, the numbers were small, and the effort was constantly to have the influence of a personal rather than a mechanical one. In connection with this work, much aid was given by persons from other parts of Boston, both men and women. [7]
There was instruction in nursing, housekeeping, cooking, playacting, sloyd, basketry, millinery, dressmaking, lacemaking carpentry, printing. There was collection of stamp savings, probation work in the juvenile court, a room registry of approved houses, a music school, and close cooperation with a district conference of the Associated Charities. An association of caddies gathered from the neighborhood were sent every summer, under direction, to the hotels in the neighborhood of the White Mountains. Mothers and children were taken into the country. [6] The residents of the House and a number of other persons who were actively interested arranged two Free Art Exhibitions, held by permission, in 1895, in a large hall owned by the city. Each exhibition lasted for four weeks, including Sundays, and was attended by over 40,000 people. [7]
Some of the Andover House Association records are held by Northeastern University. [9] Some of the South End House Association records, for the period of 1909–1944, are held by Simmons University. [10]
Lawrence is a city located in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States, on the Merrimack River. At the 2020 census, the city had a population of 89,143. Surrounding communities include Methuen to the north, Andover to the southwest, and North Andover to the east. Lawrence and Salem were the county seats of Essex County, until the state abolished county government in 1999. Lawrence is part of the Merrimack Valley.
Hull House was a settlement house in Chicago, Illinois, that was co-founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Located on the Near West Side of Chicago, Hull House, named after the original house's first owner Charles Jerald Hull, 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; by 1920, it grew to approximately 500 settlement houses nationally.
The South End is a neighborhood in Boston, Massachusetts, United States which is bordered by Back Bay, Chinatown, and Roxbury. It is distinguished from other neighborhoods by its Victorian-style houses and the parks in and around the area. The South End is the largest intact Victorian row-house district in the country, covering over 300 acres (120 ha). It has eleven residential parks. In 1973, the South End was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Much of the neighborhood was originally marshlands in Boston's South Bay. After it was filled in, construction began on January 7, 1849.
Woodlawn is the name of a community in northeast Birmingham, in Jefferson County, Alabama, United States.
The settlement movement was a reformist social movement that began in the 1880s and peaked around the 1920s in the United Kingdom and the United States. Its goal was to bring the rich and the poor of society together in both physical proximity and social connection. 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 settlement movement also spawned educational/reform movements. Both in the UK and the US settlement workers worked to develop a unique activist form of sociology known as Settlement Sociology. This science of social reform movement is neglected in the history of sociology in favor of a teaching-, theory- and research university–based model.
Andover Newton Theological School (ANTS) was a graduate school and seminary in Newton, Massachusetts, affiliated with the American Baptist Churches USA and the United Church of Christ. It was the product of a merger between Andover Theological Seminary and Newton Theological Institution. In recent years, it was an official open and affirming seminary, meaning that it was open to students of same-sex attraction or transgender orientation and generally advocated for tolerance of it in church and society.
Denison House was a woman-run settlement house in Boston's old South Cove neighborhood. Founded in 1892 by the College Settlements Association, it provided a variety of social and educational services to neighborhood residents, most of whom were immigrants. Several notable women worked there, including Nobel Prize winner Emily Greene Balch, labor organizer Mary Kenney O'Sullivan, and pioneering aviator Amelia Earhart. The original site at 93 Tyler Street is a stop on the Boston Women's Heritage Trail.
Helena Dudley was an American social worker, labor organizer, and pacifist. As director of Denison House in Boston from 1893 to 1912, she was an influential leader in the early settlement movement, and aided thousands of poor and working-class immigrants at a time when government relief programs were lacking. Appalled by the working conditions in local sweatshops, which she learned of through her settlement house neighbors, she became increasingly active in the labor movement. She helped organize the Women's Trade Union League in 1903, and supported the Bread and Roses strike in 1912. After World War I she worked to promote the League of Nations, and for many years she was a leading member of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.
The College Settlements Association (CSA) was an American organization founded during the settlement movement era which provided support and control of college settlements for women. Organized February 1890, it was incorporated on January 5, 1894. The settlement houses were established by college women, were controlled by college women, and had a majority of college women as residents. The CSA was devised to unite college women in the trend of a modern movement, to touch them with a common sympathy, and to inspire them with a common ideal. It was believed that young students should be quickened in their years of vague aspiration and purely speculative energy by possessing a share in this broad practical work.
Rivington Street Settlement was an American settlement house which provided educational and social services on the Lower East Side of the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York. Under the auspices of the College Settlements Association (CSA), it focused on the mostly immigrant population of the neighborhood. Originally located at 95 Rivington Street (1889-), other locations later included 96 Rivington Street (1892-1901), 188 Ludlow Street (1902–), 84-86 First Street (1907-), and Summer Home, Mount Ivy, New York (1900-). The Rivington Street Settlement was established by college women, was controlled by college women, and had a majority of college women as residents. The Rivington Street Settlement was a kind of graduate school in economics and sociology, with practical lessons in a tenement–house district - a kind of sociological laboratory.
Orange Valley Social Institute was an American settlement house established during the settlement movement era to provide educational and social opportunities for the people of the neighborhood. It was located close to Newark in The Oranges' hatting district at No. 35 Tompkins street, Orange Valley, New Jersey. Opened April 1, 1897, under the auspices of a committee of citizens of Orange, New Jersey, it was later governed by a Board of Directors of the Settlement Association. It was maintained by private contributions. Head residents included Bryant Venable, The settlement contained a kindergarten, boys' games club, basket weaving club, shuffleboard club, mothers' meetings, chair caning club, bowling club and a library. In the first nine months of 1902, 497 persons borrowed 3,568 books, while there was an average daily attendance of about 30 at the reading rooms.
University of Chicago Settlement was a settlement of the University of Chicago. It was established January, 1894, by the Philanthropic Committee of the Christian Union of the University of Chicago. Initially, two graduate students were in residence "to provide a center for educational, religious and philanthropic work." Mary McDowell became head resident September 15, 1894.
Neighborhood House was an American settlement house in Chicago, Illinois. It was opened in October 1896, by Samuel S. and Harriet M. Van Der Vaart, under the auspices of the Young People's Society of the Universalist Church, of Englewood, Chicago, and with the assistance of teachers of the Perkins, Bass, and D. S. Wentworth public schools. It was officially established in the Fall of 1897 by Harriet Van Der Vaart as the outgrowth of the kindergarten opened the year before "to bring together for mutual benefit people of different classes and conditions."
Neighborhood House is an American community center located in Louisville, Kentucky. Founded in 1896, as North Broadway Social Settlement it was renamed Neighborhood House in 1902, when it incorporated.
Whittier House was an American social settlement, situated in the midst of the densely populated Paulus Hook district of Jersey City, New Jersey. Christian, but non-denominational, its aims were to help all in need by improving their circumstances, by inspiring them with new motives and higher ideals, and by making them better fitted by the responsibilities and privileges of life. It cooperated with all who were seeking to ameliorate the human condition and improve the social order. It opened in the People's Palace, December 20, 1893. On May 14, 1894, it incorporated and moved to 174 Grand Street.
Lawrence House was an American social settlement in Baltimore, Maryland. Its beginnings were in 1893, when Rev. Dr. Edward A. Lawrence and a friend took up lodging at 214 Parkin Street. Lawrence died suddenly later in 1893, and in his memory, the Lawrence Memorial Association organized in 1894 and purchased a house at 816 West Lombard Street. The settlement incorporated in the Fall of 1900. In 1904, the place was enlarged by the addition of the adjoining house, 814 West Lombard Street.
Civic Service House was an American social settlement and a school for citizenship, located at 110-112 Salem Street, Boston, Massachusetts. Established October, 1901, by Pauline Agassiz Shaw as a center for civic education, recreation, and organization for the common good. The house set out to do specialized settlement work along civic lines, and purposed to reach a constituency approaching or within the privileges of citizenship. The character of work was that with adult immigrants, in clubs, classes, lectures and civic committees. The constituency included Jews, Italians, Poles and Irish. Improvement clubs, educational classes for men and women, occasional concerts and recreational features were available, but these were subordinate to the effort for civic betterment. Children's work was not included, and social features were made incidental to a program of study and service.
Anna E. Nicholes was an American social reformer, civil servant, and clubwoman associated with women's suffrage and the settlement movement in Chicago. She devoted her life to charitable and philanthropic work.
South Park Settlement was an American settlement movement-era settlement established in the South Park neighborhood of San Francisco, California on January 2, 1895, by the San Francisco Settlement Association. It was founded in one of the crowded districts of San Francisco. The pretty little oval park on which the Settlement House faces was formerly the fashionable residence district of the city. But within a few blocks on either side of South Park were many little streets, whose crowded tenements furnished homes for less prosperous working people. Its goals were to establish and maintain a settlement in San Francisco as a residence for persons interested in the social and moral condition of its neighborhood; to bring into friendly and helpful relations with one another the people of the neighborhood in which the settlement was situated; to cooperate with church, educational, charitable and labor organizations, and with other agencies acting for the improvement of social conditions; to serve as a medium among the different social elements of the city for bringing about a more intelligent and systematic understanding of their mutual obligations; as well as to do social and educational work in the neighborhood; co-operate in the civic work of the city; and investigate social and economic conditions.
Amity Church Settlement was an American settlement house founded in 1896 and auxiliary to Amity Baptist Church. It was located at 314 West 54th Street in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York. Its purpose included the religious and social well-being of the neighborhood. Services included educational classes, lectures, and poor relief. The director was Rev. Leighton Williams, Pastor. The undenominational spirit and able management of the House attracted confidence and financial assistance from outside Baptist lines. Its basal function was that of establishing residence in the crowded neighborhood where its work lay and bringing to bear upon the labor in hand the influence of the home. It sought to unite the idea of the Church and of the social settlement. The settlement was unincorporated, and was maintained by Amity Baptist Church and by voluntary contributions. The work was classified as (1) religious, including the various church services; (2) educational, including kindergarten, industrial school, evening classes, public lectures under the board of education; (3) medical, including dispensary and nursing work; (4) social, including Workingmen's Institute, social clubs and entertainments; (5) relief work; and (6) neighborhood work, including visitation and all work outside of the building, as well as promotion of neighborhood interests.