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54 Unit 4, Chapter 15

Name Date

PRIMARY SOURCE from Twenty Years at Hull-Houseby Jane Addams

On September 18, 1889, social reformers Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starrmoved into Hull-House, a dilapidated mansion in the midst of the Chicago slums.As you read this excerpt, think about why they undertook this social experiment.

Section 2

In those early days we were often asked why wehad come to live on Halsted Street when we couldafford to live somewhere else. I remember one manwho used to shake his head and say it was thestrangest thing he had met in his experience, butwho was finally convinced that it was not strangebut natural. In time it came to seem natural to all ofus that the Settlement should be there. If it is natur-al to feed the hungry and care for the sick, it is cer-tainly natural to give pleasure to the young, comfortto the aged, and to minister to the deep-seated crav-ing for social intercourse that all men feel. Whoeverdoes it is rewarded by something which, if not grati-tude, is at least spontaneous and vital and lacks thatirksome sense of obligation with which a substantialbenefit is too often acknowledged. . . .

From the first it seemed understood that wewere ready to perform the humblest neighborhoodservices. We were asked to wash the newbornbabies, and to prepare the dead for burial, to nursethe sick, and to mind the children.

Occasionally these neighborly offices unexpect-edly uncovered ugly human traits. For six weeksafter an operation we kept in one of our three bed-rooms a forlorn little baby who, because he wasborn with a cleft palate, was most unwelcome evento his mother, and we were horrified when he diedof neglect a week after he was returned to hishome; a little Italian bride of fifteen sought shelterwith us one November evening, to escape her hus-band who had beaten her every night for a weekwhen he returned home from work, because shehad lost her wedding ring. . . .

We were also early impressed with the curious iso-lation of many of the immigrants; an Italian womanonce expressed her pleasure in the red roses that shesaw at one of our receptions in surprise that they hadbeen brought so fresh all the way from Italy. Shewould not believe for an instant that they had beengrown in America. She said that she had lived inChicago for six years and had never seen any roses,whereas in Italy she had seen them every summer in

great profusion. During all that time, of course, thewoman had lived within ten blocks of a florists win-dow; she had not been more than a five-cent car rideaway from the public parks; but she had neverdreamed of faring forth for herself, and no one hadtaken her. Her conception of America had been theuntidy street in which she lived and had made herlong struggle to adapt herself to American ways.

But in spite of some untoward experiences, wewere constantly impressed with the uniform kind-ness and courtesy we received. Perhaps these firstdays laid the simple human foundations which arecertainly essential for continuous living among thepoor: first, genuine preference for residence in anindustrial quarter to any other part of the city,because it is interesting and makes the humanappeal; and second, the conviction, in the words ofCanon Barnett [the founder of the first settlementhouse, Toynbee Hall, in London] that the thingswhich make men alike are finer and better than thethings that keep them apart, and that these basiclikenesses, if they are properly accentuated, easilytranscend the less essential differences of race, lan-guage, creed, and tradition.

Perhaps even in those first days we made abeginning toward that object which was afterwardsstated in our charter: To provide a center for ahigher civic and social life; to institute and maintaineducational and philanthropic enterprises; and toinvestigate and improve the conditions in theindustrial districts of Chicago.

from Jane Addams, Twenty Years at Hull-House (Urbana:University of Illinois Press, 1990), 6566.

Research Options1. Use a print or on-line encyclopedia to find out

more about the settlement-house movement,including Hull-House. Prepare an oral report.

2. Find out more about Jane Addams. Then write abrief authors note for a new edition of TwentyYears at Hull-House.

CHAPTER

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