Housing the Great Migration
Background

During the first few decades of the 20th century, rural people living in the south had trouble making a living. Jobs were often unavailable, and rural people had few opportunities for education. What's more, African Americans faced severe racism: lynchings, beatings, and other forms of racial violence not only cost dozens of innocent African Americans their lives but also terrorized many others.

During World War I, northern industries expanded to meet the demands of war, and many white men went overseas to serve in the military. As a result, the north offered more job opportunities for rural people than ever before. African Americans in the south and whites living in the mountains of Appalachia began to migrate to northern cities in large numbers. By 1920, half a million blacks had moved north, and hundreds of thousands more followed in later decades. During the 1940s and '50s, thousands of Appalachians also moved north, particularly to Ohio's industrial cities. But the north didn't offer these migrants as much success as they had hoped. Although more jobs were available in the north, they often didn't pay well enough to cover basic living expenses.

At times, native white residents resented Appalachians and African Americans taking jobs; often, natives did not want to live in the same buildings or neighborhoods as Appalachians and African Americans. Thus, as soon as these migrants began moving into apartments and homes in the inner city, whites began moving away, and landlords stopped keeping the buildings in good shape.

This pattern, known as white flight or urban blight, created two new trends in urban life: the expansion of the suburbs and the need for urban renewal. Suburbs boomed after World War II. Benefits from the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, also known as the GI Bill, made it possible for veterans to leave the inner city since the GI Bill gave veterans low-interest mortgages to purchase new homes. What's more, white flight occurred because of the increase in automobile production and highway construction. The 1956 Interstate Highway Act provided $26 million to build an interstate highway system more than 40,000 miles long.

At the same time, developers such as William J. Levitt were designing new suburban communities. Levitt created mass-production techniques in home building, using pre-assembled or prefabricated materials so homes could be built in weeks instead of months. Although these homes all tended to look alike, Levitt's homes were popular because they were affordable. Kettering in Dayton is an example of a new suburban community that cropped up in Ohio during this era.

Meanwhile, inner-city ghettos were fast becoming slums. The houses and apartment buildings needed repair; some lacked indoor plumbing. The situation became so bad that in 1949 and 1954, the federal government passed National Housing Acts and began financing urban renewal projects in certain cities. In 1968 it passed another Civil Rights Act to reduce racial discrimination in housing markets. The goal of the government's urban renewal plan was to rebuild run-down inner-city areas and help them adapt to current and future needs.

Many cities launched large housing projects in an attempt to end overcrowding. A later effort to solve the housing problem was the Model Cities Program, begun in the 1960s. Designed to improve inner-city areas, the model cities program required citizens to participate in the planning process. Generally, this program failed because neighborhood groups and city governments usually disagreed about neighborhood planning. What's more, many of the citizen planners had no experience in urban development and planning.

By 1970, another trend in urban renewal began to emerge: environmental planning. Wasteful use of natural resources as well as pollution dangers led the federal government to restrict harmful industrial activities in residential areas. The Environmental Protection Agency was created to help maintain healthy neighborhood environments. Planners had to prove that their buildings would not have a harmful impact on the environment.

In the 1980s, urban planners became interested in restoring old neighborhoods through neighborhood planning projects. They tried to preserve old buildings and recreate the historic flavor of the neighborhoods.

More recently, cities have confronted the problem of urban blight by encouraging public-private partnerships that allow the use of public money to stimulate private investment in the neighborhoods. The government provides incentives for private businesses to move into a neighborhood. Cincinnati has attempted this approach in its Over-the-Rhine district, but without much success.

Jacob G. Schmidlapp
Model Homes Inc.
Laurel Homes
During the early 20th century, Jacob G. Schmidlapp, the son of a poor German immigrant, moved to Cincinnati. He founded the Union Savings Bank and Trust Company, made his fortune and became a philanthropist, devoting much of his time to charities. One of his primary concerns was housing; Schmidlapp believed America's workers were not being given decent, affordable housing. So in 1911, Schmidlapp decided to construct housing for Cincinnati workers, based on his belief that a family should only have to pay a day's wages for a week's rent.

Between 1911 and 1914, Schmidlapp built 96 apartments in various residential neighborhoods. Because he believed that good housing should be available to everyone, not just whites, he created the Model Homes Company in 1914 to create better housing for African Americans and whites. Before his death in 1919, Schmidlapp and his partners constructed over 400 units for the working class.

For many of his homes and apartments, Schmidlapp used a "square house" design, which featured a kitchen and living room on the first floor, and two bedrooms and a bath on the second. His goal was to have sunlight enter each room. The company's first big project was Washington Terrace, a community within itself designed specifically for African-American working families. Washington Terrace, which housed more than 500 people and had spaces for recreation, meeting rooms, and picnic areas, also had a cooperative grocery store. Although this project was hailed across the nation as innovative and successful, its success was limited. Washington Terrace housed only a small number of families because many people could not afford the rent. Washington Terrace later became one of the Cincinnati Metropolitan Housing Authority's small family communities.

Because the city lacked low-rent housing, the city of Cincinnati built Laurel Homes, the first public housing project, in the late 1930s in the city's West End. Laurel Homes was originally built for some of the poorest families, but only about 10-percent of those displaced by the construction were able to afford to live there. Further, about half of the people who lived in the tenements that were demolished to make way for Laurel Homes were African Americans, but the new Laurel Homes rented primarily to whites. African American civic leaders and the Better Housing League protested, and this housing project was soon integrated.

The next housing project for the West End became Lincoln Court, which was modeled on Laurel Homes but designated primarily for African American families. Designed as an extension to Laurel Homes, Lincoln Court was located on the south side of what is now Ezzard Charles Drive, right across the street from Laurel Homes. The project was completed in 1942.

These projects originally were built as temporary housing or "starter homes." This would give low-income families quality, basic housing at an affordable price while they worked to improve their economic status. The average stay for families was about two years. However, those individuals who could not improve their lot in life stayed on and in the early 1980s, the average stay was about 7 years. Further, while these housing units opened primarily to white families, over the years they have become housing increasingly inhabited by African Americans and by the elderly.

Laurel Homes and Lincoln Court are under renovation right now to become market-rate, affordable rental housing and homeownership units.

Avondale
The Great Migration of African Americans nearly tripled their numbers in Cincinnati between 1940 and 1970. By 1940, much of the city's low-income housing in the West End had been razed to provide a stronger industrial base and a superhighway system. Also, there were very few housing vacancies in black areas of the inner city.

By 1940 Avondale was mostly a middle-class white neighborhood with a few streets on which African American families lived. As more and more African Americans moved to Cincinnati, they were faced with critical housing shortages, except for the racially-mixed areas such as those in Avondale. Additionally, more prosperous African Americans were moving out of the inner city and looking for decent housing for themselves and their families. Avondale, with its well-built and architecturally beautiful houses, seemed to fit the bill.

As African Americans moved in, unscrupulous real estate agents capitalized on the trend by using scare tactics to get white families to sell their homes. Large homes often were divided into multi-family dwellings and property values fell.

By the late 1950s, the city of Cincinnati embarked on the Avondale-Corryville Redevelopment Project in an attempt to improve these neighborhoods for residents. The plan, which included fixing up old buildings and upgrading shopping areas, eventually failed because the city was unable to create affordable housing and put too much money into commercial buildings instead of homes. Crime and poverty rose in the area. In early 1966, Cincinnati police passed an anti-loitering ordinance to keep people from being outside.

In 1967, following the death of the Reverend Martin Luther King, Junior, and a controversial conviction of an African-American man in court, some Avondale residents rioted. The city eventually responded by creating a new plan for the neighborhood, "Project Amen," in the late 1970s. This project, funded by federal grants and All-American basketball star Oscar Robertson, involved local black leaders in the planning.

Mariemont
A planned village for working people, Mariemont was the brainchild of Mary Muhlberg Emery, a philanthropist and far-sighted developer. Mariemont, which is on the eastern outskirts of the city in the mid 1920s, was the area's first planned community. Mrs. Emery based her design and model on an old English village and gave the community schools, winding roads, a village green, a hospital and an attractive small-business district. Alarmed by the shortage of affordable housing, her vision was to build a community for working-class families. While living in this community, workers would be close to business and industry nearby.

The original plan called for rental of residential units; once the village was finished, houses would be sold to people with mixed incomes—from the working poor to the middle class. But by the time homes were built, construction costs had risen so much and they instead were purchased by members of the middle-class. Those high costs, and discrimination against African Americans, were enough to keep Mariemont from becoming racially mixed.

Dayton's Model Cities Program
At 3:30 a.m. on Sept. 1, 1966, a longtime black resident of West Dayton—one of Dayton's largest ghettos—was cut down by gunfire from a passing car. After rumors flew that Lester Mitchell was shot by "white marauders," rioting began, which resulted in the destruction of several city blocks. The mayor called in the Ohio National Guard to restore order.

After the riot, the city of Dayton realized it had to do something to improve the living conditions of its poor African-American residents. Blacks living in West Dayton had an infant mortality rate and an unemployment rate twice that of other areas of Dayton, and a substandard housing rate three times that of other areas of Dayton. It was time for action.

In 1967, the city of Dayton applied for the federal government's Model Cities Program and was approved for a multi-year grant. The program's goal: to involve West Dayton residents in the improvement of their neighborhoods. In particular, the Model Cities Program wanted to expand living opportunities, create better job opportunities and job training, and improve recreational facilities and other buildings in the area. False starts and other difficulties delayed the project, which didn't begin officially until 1973 and was headed by Ron Gatton. In general, the program was considered a failure because of poor fiscal management, lack of available land for residential development, and poor planning.

Burns-Jackson Project (Oregon District)
In the mid-1960s, some residents of the Burns-Jackson area in east Dayton—concerned that their neighborhood was decaying—formed an organization called the Burns-Jackson Corporation. These residents wanted to preserve the historic flavor of the neighborhood and create an integrated community that would be home to a diverse range of residents. In 1966, the corporation secured Bertrand Goldberg, a Chicago architect, to create an exciting new plan for renovating the area. Goldberg's plan called for relocating residents into new quarters within the area while construction took place. He would restore 197 dwellings, building a whole new community around them. Unfortunately, the city government disagreed with Goldberg's plan, and the corporation disbanded in 1972.

Later that year, the city of Dayton devised its own plan for the district and began restoring it in 1973. This plan has been considered a mixed success. Although the city successfully restored the neighborhood—making it a beautiful addition to the inner city—many lower income residents could not live there because housing costs were too high.

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