Houses for all [electronic resource] : the struggle for social housing in Vancouver, 1919-50 / Jill Wade.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Wade, Jill, 1942-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Public housing--British Columbia--Vancouver--History.

Public housing.

Housing policy--British Columbia--Vancouver--History.

Housing policy.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (264 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Vancouver : UBC Press, c1994.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Houses for All is the story of the struggle for social housing in Vancouver between 1919 and 1950. It argues that, however temporary or limited their achievements, local activists pplayed a significant role in the introduction, implementation, or continuation of many early national housing programs. Ottawa's housing initiatives were not always unilateral actions in the development of the welfare state. The drive for social housing in Vancouver complemented the tradition of housing activism that already existed in the United Kingdom and, to a lesser degree, in the United States. Jill Wade analyzes the housing problem that developed in Vancouver in the first half of this century: the chronic shortage of decent living conditions for those of low income, and the occasional serious crisis in owned and rented dwellings for others of middle income. Beginning in 1919 with the Better Housing Scheme and concluding in the early 1950s with the construction of Little Mountain, the first public housing project in Vancouver, the book also chronicles the responses of governments and activists alike to the city's residential conditions. It highlights the spirited, yet frustrated, campaign for low-rental housing in the late 1930s and the more successful, sometimes militant, drive for relief during the housing emergency of the 1940s. Fascinating and informative, Houses for All repairs the curious rupture in the collective historical memory that has left Vancouverites of the 1990s unaware of previous housing crises and past activism and achievements.

Contents:

Front Matter

Contents

Illustrations and Tables

Acknowledgments

Abbreviations

Introduction

Housing and Reform in Pre-Depression Vancouver

'Slum Dwellings': The Housing Problem in the 1930s

Responding to the Housing Problem in the 1930s: The Campaign for Low-Rent Housing

'A Camp Existence': The Housing Problem in the 1940s

Responding to the Housing Problem in the 1940s: The War on Canada's 'Number One Emergency'

Conclusion

Notes

Index

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references (p. [173]-230) and index.

ISBN:

7-7480-4955-6

1-283-22590-5

9786613225900

0-7748-5647-5

OCLC:

243616439