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A Four-Family Apartment House 



By George M. Petersen 



THE four-family apartment house, 

 and apartment houses in general, 

 are, properly speaking, tenement 

 houses and are so classed under the rules 

 of the Board of Health and Bureau of 

 Buildings in most of the citiesof thiscoun- 

 try. While the origin of the four-family 

 apartment is somewhat mysterious, it 

 was probably designed by someone who 

 wanted the class of tenants known in the 

 large cities as "flat dwellers" and who 

 also wanted more rents than could be 

 obtained from a two-family house. The 

 modern four-family apartment is nothing 

 more nor less than two two-family houses 

 joined together on a common wall. 



The wall dividing the house in the 

 center is of either fireproof or fire-resist- 

 ing material; such as hollow tile, old 

 brick, concrete blocks or stone, although 

 the hollow tile is the most commonly 

 used. This fireproof wall extends the 

 entire length of the house and from the 

 cellar floor to the ridge of the roof 

 without an opening of any kind except 



a fire-door in the cellar and the entrance 

 doors to the apartments. 



The building shown in Fig. i is 32 ft. 

 wide by 72 ft. long and is built on a lot 

 55 ft. wide by 160 ft. deep. 



The living-rooms and dining-rooms in 

 this house are finished in a fumed oak 

 effect, while the bedrooms and bath- 

 rooms are either natural oak or white 

 enamel. The rear halls may be finished in 

 the same kind of wood as that used for 

 the bedrooms. 



Bathroom floors should be of hard 

 lozenge tile to prevent the absorption of 

 water, but should never be glazed, as 

 the constant wear and tear to which the 

 av'erage bathroom floor is subjected will 

 crack the glaze and disfigure the floor. 



The floors throughout the remainder 

 of the house shoukl be of oak, with the 

 exception of the kitchen floor, which 

 may be of maple. 



With a properly constructed house a 

 four-family apartment is as desirable as 

 is a two-family flat and has the advan- 



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