Homes for War Workers 



A new type of standardized dwelling which 

 can be built by unskilled labor in two weeks 



Bv John Walker Harrington 



Workmen's houses of concrete, all different from each 

 other, can be built exceedingly rapidly and cheaply 



WAR workers' dwellings may be 

 built at about half the usual cost 

 and in half the customary time 

 by a novel method originated by Mr. 

 Alfred C. Bossom, a New York architect, 

 according to estimates submitted by him 

 to the Council of National Defence. 



His scheme is the result of personal 

 studies of actual conditions at leading 

 American shipyards and munitions plants. 

 It also embodies his experience as an ex- 

 pert retained by large industrial corpora- 

 tions in this country as well as by the 

 housing committee of the London Com- 

 mon Council. 



The construction is best adapted for 

 fireproof materials. Wood may also be 

 employed. 



Under the Bossom 

 plan, large sums may be 

 saved in preparing the 

 sites proposed. The 

 ground for a hundred or 

 so of workmen's cot- 

 tages is leveled off at 

 once. Then a military 

 trench digger is run 

 along the lines for the 

 foundations. The re- 

 sulting ditches are 

 sheathed inside with 

 boarding which projects 

 a few inches above the 

 earth. As there are to 

 be no cellars, the work 

 of excavation is soon 

 completed. 



There next appear 

 strange devices re- 

 sembling the cradles 

 on which ships are 

 sometimes carried 

 overland and from 

 which they are again 

 launched into the 

 water. These house 

 cradles are huge 

 frameworks of heavy 

 timber which are 

 readily moved on roll- 

 ers. Suspended from 



them at regular intervals are three up- 

 rights of reinforced concrete or steel, or 

 even wood, which are to be part of the 

 skeleton of the one-story dwellings. The 

 cradles are steadied against the pull of 

 these verticals by counterweights piled 

 on low platforms on their opposite sides 

 and are adjusted by wedges, until every- 

 thing is made plumb. The pillars are 

 then lowered into the trough, and their 

 feet are soon embedded in concrete 

 dumped into the foundation form from 

 wheelbarrows. As soon as the cement 

 hardens, the cradle is withdrawn and the 

 next three posts are launched. As several 

 cradles may be used at once in building 

 a house, both the outer wall uprights and 



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Here is a typical plan for one of the proposed cottages. This 

 particular one would be a two-family house, semi-detached 



740 



