From Cottage to Bungalow Houses and the Working Class in Metropolitan Chicago, 1869-1929
- List Price: $60.00
- Binding: Hardcover
- Publisher: Univ of Chicago Pr
- Publish date: 07/01/2001
Joseph C. Bigott takes on all of these fields in From Cottage to Bungalow, a sophisticated study of domestic structures and ethnic working-class neighborhoods in Chicago during the critical period of 1869 to 1929, when the city attracted huge numbers of immigrants.
Exploring the meaning of home ownership in this context, Bigott develops two case studies that combine the intimate lives of ordinary people (primarily in Chicago's Polish and German communities) with broad analyses of everything from real estate markets to the very carpentry practices used to construct houses. His progressive methods and the novel conclusions they support chronicle not only the history of housing in Chicago, but also the organizations of people's lives, and the ways in which housing has affected notions of who is -- and who is not -- a worthy American citizen.