AMERICAN HOMES
 

HOUSING IN THE USA

    Over 80 per cent of the population live either in the cities or in the huge suburban areas. There are more than two hundred of these metropolitan regions now. Some are so large that they have begun to merge together. This new urban network is called "megalopolis". The largest of these covers the area on the Atlantic coast from Boston, through New York south to Washington, D.C. - "BOSNYWASH".
    American homes are some of the biggest and best in the world. Many of them have a garage for one or two cars, a big modern kitchen, a living room, and a playroom for children on the first floor. Upstairs there are two bathrooms and three or four bedrooms.
    Some families have two homes. They have one house or apartment in the city or suburb where they live and work. But they have another home near the sea or in the mountains for weekends and vacations. Seventy per cent of Americans buy the home they live in. The other cannot buy a house or an apartment and some of them rent their home from a Iandlord. The poorest people live in "public housing" apartments. These apartments are not like rich American homes. People do not like to live in public housing projects, they are afraid of thieves and drug sellers.
    Americans who live in towns and cities move often. A family stays in one house for four or five years and then they move again. Some people move because they have found a new job. Other people move because they want a bigger or a smaller house. In American suburbs families come and go all the time.
    Americans are always trying to make their homes better. They take a lot of time to buy furniture and make their homes beautiful. They buy books and magazines about houses and furniture. They work hard on their homes in the evenings and on weekends. People love various gadgets about the houses: intercom systems, air-conditioning systems, the latest dish machines, garbage mashers, electric knives and can openers, etc.
    Americans like to think the United States is a young country, but really it has a long and interesting history. You can see some of its history in the styles of the houses. The lovely pueblo houses of Native American villages, the old pioneer log cabins, the plantation houses in the South, the beautiful colonial homes of the Northeast - they all are a part of American history. They are part of modern America too, because people copy the old styles in new houses. The history lives on.

NATIVE AMERICAN HOMES

    In the old days, the Native Americans on the Plains followed the buffalo. They had to move their homes quickly and easily. The women made the tepees - tall, round tents of buffalo skins. First they cut buffalo skins and cleaned them. Then they sewed them together. The camp moved often. Then the women took the tepees down and put them up again. But Native Americans do not live in tepees now. They have new houses, in villages, on their old lands.
    Many tepees had beautiful paintings on them. They showed animals and the sun, the moon, and the stars. The paintings usually had religious meanings. There was a fireplace inside the teepee. The smoke went out through a hole in the roof.
    Not all Native Americans followed the buffalo and moved from place to place, so not all of them lived in tepees. In the Northwest of the United States, they built big wooden houses for seven or eight families. The houses had "totem poles" outside. The door to the house was in a hole in the totem pole.
    In the hot, dry Southwest of the US, the Native American villages are called "pueblos". The pueblos were built in high places, on rocky cliffs. The people did not want their enemies to come near. Old pueblo houses did not have doors in the walls. People climbed up ladders to the roof. The "door" was a hole in the roof. Enemies could not easily come in that way.
    Native Americans made pueblo houses from stone, wood, and "adobe" - dry mud bricks. These houses are strong and clean. They are warm in winter and cool in summer. Modern Americans like the pueblo style. You can see adobe houses in many places in the Southwest. After all, it's the oldest real American style, and one of the loveliest too.

PIONEERS IN THE MIDWEST

    Before 1800, the Midwest of America was Indian country. Then, the Europeans came. They did not want to move around or live in tepees. They were farmers, and they wanted houses.
    The first European Americans, the "pioneers", were tough people. They came to a hard country. The summers were very hot, and the winters were very cold. On the prairies, there were no trees and no stones. There was only earth. So the pioneers cut pieces of grass and earth and built houses with them. These "sod houses" were very uncomfortable. The rain came in through the roof. Pieces of the earth fell into the food and onto the children's bed. The pioneers worked hard on their farms to make money. With the money, their built bigger, better farmhouses with wood, and tore down the old sod houses. No Americans live in sod houses now.
    It was easier in the Rocky Mountains because there were trees. The pioneers could cut them down and make small wooden houses, called "log cabins". Log cabins were warm and dry inside. The people were poor, but they tried to make their homes comfortable.
Pioneer women had no money, but they wanted nice covers for their beds. They could not buy them, so they cut up old clothes and sewed the pieces together. The beautiful bedcovers they made are called "patchwork quilts". Many American women still keep their grandmothers' patchwork quilts, and they like to make new ones with the old patterns.
    Nearly all Americans live in towns and cities now. And you can't be a pioneer in Philadelphia or Chicago. But some people try. They like to go to vacation homes in the mountains, miles away from the cities. A real 200-year-old log cabin is best, but there are lots of new ones too. There you can put your gun up on the wall above the fireplace. You can listen to the wind outside. You can talk about bears and rattlesnakes. For two or three weeks, you can be a pioneer again.

COLONIAL STYLES IN THE NORTHEAST

    Do you think that America is a new country? Go to Virginia or Maryland or New England. You will find a lot of old buildings. You will find old towns and villages, churches, and houses.
    Three hundred years ago, when the Europeans came to northeastern America, they lived in simple huts. But later, they built houses in the styles of their home countries. The Dutch colonists built tall narrow houses along the Hudson River. The French on the St. Lawrence River built fine houses with windows in the roofs and the English built large houses with warm red-colored bricks, or white painted wood.
    The largest number of new Americans were English. So the first towns of Virginia and New England copied English towns. The houses were square, and they had beautiful long windows. Americans still love this "colonial" style of house. There are many colonial houses in the Northeast of the US. Williamsburg, Virginia, is a famous colonial town. It is now a museum. All the houses and shops are open to visitors.
    Modern American houses often copy the Williamsburg style. Many new houses have Williamsburg roofs, doors, and windows. The towns, suburbs, and villages of the northeastern states have a lot of colonial-style houses, both old and new.
    Some Americans like early styles of furniture too. Old American and European furniture is beautiful, but it is very expensive. So some people buy twentieth-century copies. In many American homes, you will also see beautiful old patterns of flowers and birds on new wallpapers and on chair and sofa covers.
    Some Americans love eighteenth-century furniture, but they like twentieth-century kitchens and bathrooms. A house can have a nice fireplace in the living room, but there will be a freezer and dishwasher in the kitchen. Americans like beauty but they like to be comfortable too.

PLANTATIONS IN THE SOUTH
 

    In the "deep South" of the US the weather is warm and the land is green. The Europeans came there in the seventeenth century. They found deep forests and wide rivers. They found hundreds of beautiful flowering trees and flowers. But they brought one very important plant with them: cotton. They cut down the forests and planted cotton - miles and miles of cotton.
T    he cotton planters soon grew rich. They built big, beautiful houses. These "plantation" houses had large rooms with high ceilings. They had tall pillars in front, and big trees near the houses. They were cool in the hot summer months. The planters bought beautiful paintings and furniture for their homes. They lived very comfortable. The men worked on the plantation. But the women did not need to work. Their slaves did the work for them.
    The slaves lived in poor, small houses behind the big house. They worked in the cotton fields and in the white planter's house. Their lives were very hard.
    Slavery ended a hundred years ago. But life is still hard for many black people. You will see many beautiful houses in the South, plantation houses in the country and lovely old townhouses too. The best of these are in Savannah, Georgia, and Charleston, South Carolina, and in New Orleans, Louisiana. But you will not see many black people in these houses. They still have the worst houses and the worst jobs.
    Both rich and poor southern houses often had deep porches in the front and back. Old people sat there in the evenings and looked out at the street. Young people liked to sit on the porch too. Modern houses in the South usually do not have porches in the front. People don't want to sit and watch cars and trucks. They are busy inside. They are watching programs on TV about today's rich Americans in today's richest houses.

CALIFORNIA LIFESTYLES
 

    Why do so many new ideas come from California? It must be something in the air. New lifestyles, new kinds of medicine, new religions, new house styles - so many new things come from California.
    Look at bungalows, for example. A bungalow is a simple house of one story with a yard around it. Bungalows first became popular in Southern California around 1900. Thousands of them were built very quickly. The style traveled all over the US, and for a long time, all bungalows were called "California bungalows".
    Then take a look at the Spanish style of house. It's popular in many places now. But it started in California. The old Californian "Spanish Mission" houses have thick adobe walls and round roof tiles. They are cool and comfortable. Inside, there are tiles on the floor, and heavy wooden doors.
    Santa Barbara, a favorite Californian vacation town, is famous for its Spanish architecture. The story began in 1925. A big earthquake destroyed many of the buildings. After this disaster, a woman called Pearl Chase worked hard to bring in new laws. All the buildings in Santa Barbara, she said, must be in the Spanish style. with white walls and red roofs. People agreed with her, and Santa Barbara today is one of the prettiest towns in the USA.
    Californians love the sun, and their houses show it. The old ranch houses in California copied the mission style. In the center of the house there was an open place, or "patio", with buildings on two or three sides. Californians liked the patio. They liked to live half inside and half outside. New houses today often have patios. People work, sunbathe, and talk to their friends on the patio. New, modern houses all over the USA have copied the idea of the Californian patio.
Some Californian ideas are not so easy to copy. Go up in an airplane, and look down at Los Angeles or San Diego. What are all those blue things next to the houses? That's right. They're swimming pools. Not many people outside California can pay for their own swimming pool in their own backyard.

FARMHOUSES
 

    Everyone who flies or drives across the USA is surprised by its size. The land goes on and on. There are, of course, great cities and suburbs. But beyond them the land seems to go on forever, mile after mile of fields and grassland and mountains.
    Sometimes, in the middle of this great, empty country, you will see a farmhouse. Some farmhouses are old, and some are new, and they are often very different.
    In the Midwest, the farmhouses are made of wood. The winters there are very cold, and the farmhouses have steep roofs so the snow can fall off them easily. They have small windows so the heat stays inside. In the summer, there are millions of insects, so screens cover the windows. Inside, the kitchens are big. Once, the farmer's wife cooked meals for all the workers. Then she went outside and rang the big dinner bell. You can see old dinner bells in some farmhouses today.
    The Southwest is cattle country. In Texas and New Mexico, the cattle farmers lived on ranches. The ranches were big because the cowboys lived in the ranch with the rancher and his family. The ranch houses had strong walls too, because enemies sometimes attacked.
The first farmers in America were poor. But they worked hard, and slowly some of them grew richer. They built bigger and better farmhouses. They bought comfortable furniture. They built houses in interesting styles. But modern farmhouses are not very interesting. Farmers in the South do not want porches now. Air conditioning keeps them cool inside. In the Southwest, new ranches have concrete walls and big glass windows.
    It is not easy for American farmers today. They can't always get good prices for their crops. Many small farmers have sold their farms to bigger farmers. Fifty years ago, two men and two horses worked on 80 acres. Now, two men and a lot of machines farm 1,000 acres. The small farmhouses are empty and quiet. Only the wind goes in and out through the broken old doors.

OLDER CITIES
 

    The older cities of the USA are nineteenth-century cities, and of course, there were no cars then. People had to walk from one place to another. The cities were small, and all the houses were close to shops and churches. Now, the old cities have a lot of new buildings, but not all the old houses are gone.
    In New York, there are old "brownstone" houses. In Boston, there are old brick houses. San Francisco's old houses are stucco, painted in beautiful, bright colors.
    And then trains and cars came. Rich people could now live outside the towns in new suburbs. The suburbs had bigger houses with large backyards. Rich people liked the clean air and the quiet.
    The old houses in the city centers or "inner cities", were suddenly empty. Soon, poorer people moved in. The owners of the houses would not pay to repair broken doors of leaking roofs. The old houses began to fall down. Now, nearly all the old cities have poor inner cities. Two of the worst areas are the South Bronx in new York and the West End of St. Louis. There are a lot of people there with bad homes and no hope.
In the 1960s, city planners tore down some of the old houses. They built apartments in tall tower blocks for poor people. But people do not like these new buildings. They are afraid of criminals. There are no friendly stores near home.
    Now, some richer people want to go back to the inner cities. They want to live near the stores and offices in the city. They buy old houses and "gentrify" them. They clean them up and build new kitchens and bathrooms. The old houses are soon beautiful again.
    The rich people are moving back into the cities, and the old houses are now very expensive. The poor people have to leave. Some of them have lost their homes. They can't easily find new places to live. Now, thousands and thousands of Americans have no homes. They sleep on the city streets or in the railroad stations.

NEWER CITIES
 

    It is easy to find your way around old American cities. The tall, high-rise banks and office buildings are all "downtown", in one place. Some inner-city areas are rich and comfortable. Some are poor and dirty. A lot of people live outside the city in suburbs, and come into the city to work.
    But America's new cities are harder to understand. They do not have one big center. Every suburb has a center. Suburbs have grown into real towns. They have big "shopping malls". People can park their cars easily there. They can buy food, clothes, furniture, and sportswear - all the things they need. There are more than a hundred stores in a mall, under the same roof.
    The suburbs have now offices too. They are in big, modern buildings. Soon, small factories open near the office buildings. Old factories were noisy and dirty. People did not like to live near them. But modern factories are clean and quiet and people are happy to live near them.
    In new cities, only a small number of people go into the city center to work. A lot of people drive around the city from one suburb to another. These new suburbs are called "urban villages". They are good places for families. They have parks and big backyards. There are good schools and stores. But the houses in urban villages are expensive. A lot of people can't buy them. Poor people still live in the old inner cities in older, poorer suburbs. A large number of them are black. They can find jobs in the new urban villages, but they have to make long trips to work.
    The new American "urban villages" have made life easier for some people, but they haven't found all the answers to the problems of American cities.

SUBURBS
 

    In the last seventy years, American suburbs have grown very quickly. Millions of people wanted bigger, better new homes, and they wanted them fast. American builders had to have new ideas for quick and easy building.
    In the 1920s and 1930s, people could choose a house from pictures in a pattern book. Then they bought the pattern, and gave it to a builder. He could build the house for them. People in Kansas, Florida, Iowa, and Maine could all choose the same pattern.
    Sears Roebuck, the big mail-order company, had a better idea. They sold houses through the mail. People could choose a house from the catalog and order it by letter. Sears Roebuck sent the wood, already cut, the nails, the water pipes, the windows, the paint, the lights - all the pieces of the house. Then a builder could build it quickly and easily. Sears Roebuck houses were very good. They had good designs and only the best wood. Sears stopped selling houses in 1937, but you can see many old Sears houses all over the USA today.
    In the 1940s, William Levitt was one of the US's biggest builders. His workers could build hundreds of houses and make a new suburb in one week. Levitt's suburbs were very big. In one area, the street names started with A. In the next area, they were all B names. In the D area, there was Duck Lane, Daffodil Lane, Downhill Lane, and Deep Lane. People laughed at William Levitt's houses, but they were cheap and comfortable. Families liked to live in them. They put new lights in front, built on new rooms, and painted then in new colors.
    American suburban houses often have big backyards. There are no fences between houses. A lot of houses are "ranch" houses with only one floor and no stairs.
    The suburbs are comfortable for families with children. Young families can make friends easily with other young families. They can work hard and make their home better and better. But some young Americans think the suburbs are boring. They move out of their parents' house and find an apartment in the city. That's fine, for a year or two. But then it's time to get married and start a family. Suddenly, a suburban home is a very good idea.

TRAILER PARKS
 

    Americans love travel around. They often move from state to state, of from city to city. Sometimes they go to find a new job. Sometimes they want to study in a new college. Sometimes they're looking for sunnier weather.
    People move to a new place, and they want a cheap home. They want to buy it quickly and easily. And the cheapest, easiest homes of all are "mobile houses" in trailer parks.
    The oldest mobile homes are over 40 years old. Travelers and families on vacation used them. Cars could pull them along the road. But a lot of modern mobile homes are very big. They are almost 12 feet wide, and some are 70 feet long. They have kitchens with stoves, refrigerators, and running water. They have bathrooms with toilets and bath or showers. Some mobile homes have two bedrooms.
    Mobile homes are big, but they can travel. Trucks take them from the factory to the trailer park. In the trailer park, the mobile home stands on concrete. Water and electricity is there already. There are thousands of trailer parks in the USA. You will find two or three near most towns.
     Some people like to move their mobile home. They take it with them to a new town. They find a new place for their home in a new trailer park. But a lot of people build new rooms on their mobile home. They make a nice garden around it. Then the mobile home cannot easily move. The people want to move, so they sell their mobile home. They can buy a new one in the new town.
    Some trailer parks are now small suburbs. They have swimming pools and clubhouses. But rich people do not live in trailer parks. A family in a trailer park makes some money and moves to a suburb or a city apartment. Young people do not usually stay in the mobile home for very long.
    Very poor people cannot buy new mobile homes. Some of them buy old trucks or buses. They build a home inside. Maybe the home is not very beautiful, but it stops the rain from coming in.

HOMES FOR ELDERLY PEOPLE
 

    In the old days, American families were bigger and grandparents and great-grandparents lived with their families. But now, families are smaller and many old people live alone. At the same time, Americans are living longer and Ionger. The numbers of old people are always growing.
    Some old people stay in their old homes. They do not want to move from their hometown. They are near their friends and family. But some do not have a lot of friends. They want to meet new people. They want to live in a quiet place with other people of their age.
    A large number of old people move to the South. It is warm there. You do not have to walk through the snow in winter, or pay a lot of money for heating.
    There are new towns in the South only for old people. One of these is Sun City near Phoenix, Arizona. All the families in Sun City must have one person over the age of 50, and children under 18 years old can't live there.
    Sun City is a quiet town, but it is interesting. There is a very good library there. There is Arizona's largest swimming pool and there are eleven golf courses in this town. Sun City has churches, sports centers, an orchestra and two beautiful boating lakes. It also has nearly 150 clubs. Some houses in Sun City have gardens. Some do not. Some have one bedroom. Others have two or three. But all the houses and apartments are easy for old people to live in.
    The people of Sun City are very friendly. A "Hello Group" welcomes newcomers. Another group visits sick people at home.
    There are hospitals in Sun City, of course. Old people often have to go to hospital. But the hospitals are small. Old people get sick and they have to leave Sun City. Soon, new and bigger hospitals will open.
    Sun City has a lot of wonderful things, but there is one thing it does not have. There is not one children's school in Sun City.

THE VERY RICH
 

    There are no kings and queens in the USA, but there are some very rich people. And some of their houses are almost palaces.
    In the nineteenth century, the rich families of New York wanted to leave the city in the hot summer months. They built vacation homes in Newport, Rhode Island. These millionaires called their vacation homes "cottages". Cottages are usually small and plain, but Newport houses were the biggest and grandest in the States. The rich Vanderbildt family paid eleven million dollars to build their house in 1890. It was a large amount of money at that time.
The Newport cottages were open for only seven weeks every year. But in that time, there were parties all night long, and the music never stopped. The millionaires gave their visitors wonderful jewels, and their horses slept on linen sheets.
    Thirty years later, there was another famous millionaire in California. His name was William Randolph Hearst, and he made a lot of money from newspapers. He wanted to build a wonderful house to show his money to the world. Hearst met Julia Morgan, a clever architect. She drew the plans and built "Hearst Castle" at San Simeon, California. It was not easy to work for Randolph Hearst. In the morning, he had one idea. In the afternoon, he had another. Two days later, he wanted her to change the plans again.
    Hearst traveled all over Europe and collected furniture for his house. It was in the Spanish style, so he often went to Spain. Sometimes he needed a train to carry all his thousands of treasures. Hearst died in 1951. His castle is now a museum.
    Rich people today do not like to show their money. They are afraid of thieves. Their houses have tall walls all around them, and big dogs in the yards. Some of today's richest people are movie and rock stars. There are movie stars' houses in Beverly Hills, near Hollywood. Tourists come by bus to see actors' and actresses' beautiful homes, but they can only look in through the gates. The stars like to have in peace and quiet.

HOUSES OR WORKS OF ART?
 

    Works of art are not only found in museums. Some people live in them. There are surprising houses in all kinds of places all over the USA.
For some people, a house is not good enough. They want to live in a castle. Only a rich person can build a real castle out of stone. But some people have done just that. Most American castles are in California, the land where the most unusual dreams come true. But not all castles are for rich people. Castle styles are sometimes copied in wood, and painted to look like stone. Even a small house, with only one or two bedrooms, can look like something out of a fairy tale.
    It's not very difficult to make your house look different. There are a lot of "do-it-yourself" stores in the USA to help you. You can go to the store and buy pillars and statues to make your house into a Greek temple. Or you can buy iron lamps and gates to make your house look Spanish. There are many books about building, and you can learn how to rebuild your own house without the help of a builder.
    For some people, even castles and palaces are not good enough. They want their house to be completely different. The Elephant House in Margate City, New Jersey, is certainly different. The front door is one of the back legs. You climb a stairway to the rooms in the elephant's body. There are also shoe houses, teapot houses, and duck houses. So if you want a really interesting home, go to the States. You'll find one you've never dreamed of.