
What did the settlement house movement lead to?
The settlement house movement led the way to community organization and group work practice within the newly proclaimed profession of social work. Axinn, June, and Herman Levin. Social Welfare: A History of the American Response to Need. 4th ed. White Plains, N.Y.: Longman, 1997.
What were settlement houses in the early 1900s?
Around the turn of the 1900s, northern cities experienced an influx of immigrants from Europe and a Great Migration of African Americans from the American South. Settlement houses offered social, educational, and welfare services to migrant and impoverished communities.
What is a settlement house in Texas?
Settlement Houses. The Neighborhood House, established in Dallas in 1900 by the Dallas Free Kindergarten Training and Industrial Association, was likely the first of the many settlement houses set up around the state to provide educational and social programs for immigrants, the working class, and poor people.
What was the first settlement house in London?
Canon Samuel Barnett, pastor of the poorest parish in London's notorious East End, established the first settlement house in 1884. In the midst of this neighborhood (settlement), Toynbee Hall housed educated and wealthy people who served as examples, teachers, and providers of basic human services to the poor residents of the settlement.

Which era was the settlement house movement in?
The settlement movement was a reformist social movement that began in the 1880s and peaked around the 1920s in United Kingdom and the United States.
When did settlement houses start?
America's settlement house movement was born in the late 19th century. The Industrial Revolution; dramatic advances in technology, transportation, and communication; and an influx in immigrants caused significant population swells in urban areas. City slums emerged where families lived in crowded, unsanitary housing.
What were settlement houses in the Progressive Era?
Settlement houses were safe residences in poverty-stricken, mostly immigrant neighborhoods in major cities, such as New York, Boston, and Chicago. The settlement house movement began in England and then emerged in the U.S. in 1886 with the founding of University Settlement House in New York City.
Where did the settlement house movement start?
The settlement movement began in England in 1884 when a group of Oxford Univ. students established Toynbee Hall, a residence in a London slum. Sharing knowledge and skills with area residents, they strove to understand and solve urban problems.
What was a settlement house in the late 1800s?
Settlement houses were organizations that provided support services to the urban poor and European immigrants, often including education, healthcare, childcare, and employment resources. Many settlement houses established during this period are still thriving today.
What did the Progressive Era do for immigrants?
They were places where immigrants could go to receive free food, clothing, job training, and educational classes. While all of these items greatly helped immigrants, Progressives also used the settlement houses to convince immigrants to adopt Progressive beliefs, causing the foreigners to forsake their own culture.
Who started the settlement houses?
Toynbee Hall circa 1902 The settlement house movement started in England in 1884 when Cannon Samuel A Barnett, Vicar of St. Jude's Parrish, founded Toynbee Hall in East London.
Where did the settlement house movement start quizlet?
The first Settlement House was the Hull House, which was opened by Jane Addams in Chicago in 1889.
Who created the first settlement houses?
Stanton Coit, the founder of University Settlement, had a vision of neighborhood guilds made up of units of 100 families, which would be self-determining and self-supporting, and able to carry out whatever local reforms were needed.
What was the settlement house movement and who started it?
In 1889, Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr launched Hull House in Chicago. As word of these experiments spread, other settlements appeared in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago. Hull House inspired Charles Zueblin to organize Northwestern University Settlement in 1891.
What is the first settlement house in the US?
In 1889, Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr established Hull-House in Chicago, the first settlement house in the United States.
What was the purpose of a settlement house quizlet?
What was a settlement house? Community centers that offer services to the poor. How did these houses help immigrants? These houses helped the immigrants because volunteers would teach classes about English and American Government.
Who started the settlement houses?
Toynbee Hall circa 1902 The settlement house movement started in England in 1884 when Cannon Samuel A Barnett, Vicar of St. Jude's Parrish, founded Toynbee Hall in East London.
Who created settlement houses?
In 1889, Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr founded the Hull House in Chicago's near west side. [1] Inspired by London's Toynbee Hall, the Hull House broke ground as the first settlement house in the United States.
Who received benefits from settlement houses in the late 1800s and early 1900s?
Who received benefits from settlement houses in the late 1800s and early 1900s? middle class.
Who primarily ran settlement houses?
The first Settlement House was the Hull House, which was opened by Jane Addams in Chicago in 1889. These centers were usually run by educated middle class women. The houses became centers for reform in the women's and labor movements.
What was the settlement house movement?
The Settlement House Movement. by John E. Hansan, Ph.D. One of the most influential organizations in the history of American social welfare was the “settlement house.”. The establishment and expansion of social settlements and neighborhood houses in the United States corresponded closely with the Progressive Era, the struggle for woman suffrage, ...
How were settlements organized?
Settlements were organized initially to be “friendly and open households,” a place where members of the privileged class could live and work as pioneers or “settlers” in poor areas of a city where social and environmental problems were great. Settlements had no set program or method of work. The idea was that university students and others would make a commitment to “reside” in the settlement house in order to “know intimately” their neighbors. The primary goal for many of the early settlement residents was to conduct sociological observation and research. For others it was the opportunity to share their education and/or Christian values as a means of helping the poor and disinherited to overcome their personal handicaps.
How did settlements help the world?
It is important to note that settlements helped create and foster many new organizations and social welfare programs, some of which continue to the present time. Settlements were action oriented and new programs and services were added as needs were discovered; settlement workers tried to find, not be, the solution for social and environmental deficits affecting their neighbors. In the process, some settlements became engaged in issues such as housing reform, factory safety, labor organizing, protecting children, opening health clinics, legal aid programs, consumer protection, milk pasteurization initiatives and well-baby clinics. Others created parks and playgrounds or emphasized the arts by establishing theaters and classes for the fine arts and music education. A number of settlement leaders and residents conducted research, prepared statistical studies, wrote reports or described their personal experiences in memoirs (e.g., Hull-House Maps and Papers, Robert Woods’s City Wilderness, Jane Addams’s Twenty Years at Hull-House, and Lillian Wald’s House on Henry Street).
What did Hull House do for Black people?
Although Hull-House and other settlements helped establish separate institutions for Black neighborhoods , pioneered in studying Black urban communities, and helped organize the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Blacks were not welcome at the major settlements.
What actually happened to the residents of settlements?
What actually happened was that residents of settlements learned as much or more from their neighbors than they taught them. The “settlers” found themselves designing and organizing activities to meet the needs of the residents of the neighborhoods in which they were living.
How did the American settlement movement differ from the English model?
The American settlement movement diverged from the English model in several ways. More women became leaders in the American movement; and there was a greater interest in social research and reform. But probably the biggest difference was that American settlements were located in overcrowded slum neighborhoods filled with recent immigrants. Working with the inhabitants of these neighborhoods, settlement workers became caught up in searching for ways to ease their neighbor’s adjustment and integration into a new society. Settlement house residents often acted as advocates on behalf of immigrants and their neighborhoods; and, in various areas, they organized English classes and immigrant protective associations, established “penny banks” and sponsored festivals and pageants designed to value and preserve the heritage of immigrants.
What were the contributions of settlement workers?
At other times, bringing about a change required becoming advocates for a specific cause or acting as spokespersons appealing to a wider public for understanding or support for a proposed civic matter or political measure. From their advocacy, research and sometimes eloquent descriptions of social needs afflicting their neighbors, lasting contributions were made by residents of settlement houses in the areas of education, public health, recreation, labor organizing, housing, local and state politics, woman’s rights, crime and delinquency, music and the arts. Settlements soon became renown as the fountainhead for producing highly motivated social reformers, social scientists and public administrators, including such early notables as
Graduate-Level Courses
Scudder intended that CSA houses would enable women college graduates to apply the knowledge learned in economics and sociology classes while interacting with the urban poor.
Americanization Efforts
By 1911, Philadelphia had twenty-one settlements. Most were in South Philadelphia, but others opened in other neighborhoods, including two in Kensington: The Lighthouse, founded in 1893 at 153 W. Lehigh Avenue, and the Lutheran Settlement House founded in 1902 at 1340 Frankford Avenue.
What were the settlement houses?
The houses were the forerunners of neighborhood centers. In the United States women generally were the most prominent leaders of the settlement houses, a Progressive era movement that began in England in 1884 and spread to the United States in 1886. From the 1890s to the onset of World War I, young, White, middle-class men and women, motivated by social and religious concerns, left their homes and moved into the poor neighborhoods of the nation's largest cities to help alleviate the conditions and address the needs of local residents. One way they did this was to establish neighborhood centers to provide financial and material assistance to the poor, as well as social and educational opportunities for the people of the area. The most famous settlement house in the United States, after which most others were modeled, was Hull House in Chicago, founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Historians of the Progressive era have characterized the movement as an attempt of mostly upper-class women social reformers to "Americanize" immigrants. Women's leadership was notable from the outset, both nationally and in the state. Their participation resulted, first, from the fact that the movement coincided with the first significantly large group of women college graduates in the nation. With few professional avenues open to them, many found settlement work appealing. Second, a large number of this generation of female college graduates did not marry; the settlement houses, where they could both work and live, offered them a socially acceptable profession and a personally rewarding alternative to family life. So many women flocked to the settlement movement that they soon dominated its leadership.
Where were the settlements in Texas?
Some eighteen known settlements ultimately came into existence in urban areas of Texas-Austin, El Paso, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio, and Waco. One settlement, however, was established in the small coal mining town of Thurber by the Methodists. Some of the institutions belonged to both the Texas Association of Settlements and Community Centers and Neighborhoods and the National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers. Although the minority communities were often the principal beneficiaries of the settlement workers, minority involvement in leading the houses has not been thoroughly documented. Historians have nonetheless noted that between the 1940s and 1990s both Black and Hispanic women took on increasingly larger roles and often became staff members at Bethlehem, Inman, and Houchen. Not surprisingly, their new responsibilities pushed the centers to reflect more of their concerns. At Houchen, for instance, the staff threw its support behind the League of United Latin American Citizens by allocating space for two of its chapters. Over time, the settlements were gradually transformed into neighborhood centers, such as the Inman Christian Center in San Antonio and Evangelia Settlement in Waco, which have continued to offer an array of recreational and educational programs. They have also added projects that reflect new social needs, such as drug-prevention and delinquency-prevention programs. Ultimately, many have become voluntary nonprofit neighborhood-based agencies that serve low-income residents. Some have continued to sponsor English classes to help newly arrived immigrants adjust to American society. Others have added programs to assist the elderly and joined the United Way.
What were the houses that served Mexican Americans?
Notable settlement houses that served Mexican Americans, a principal target of reformers, were the Rusk in Houston, the Mexican Christian Institute (later the Inman Institute) in San Antonio, and the Rose Gregory Houchen Settlement in El Paso. The Bethlehem Settlement in Houston was one of the few houses that served African Americans about which anything is known. All four were founded between 1909 and 1917. Rusk provided charitable assistance to the poor of Houston's Second Ward. Inman championed the cultural, intellectual, physical, and moral development of the Mexican community in San Antonio. In general, settlement workers in Hispanic communities offered the residents English-language classes, entertainment programs, books in Spanish and English, and arts and crafts courses. At least one Black nurse was in the Visiting Nurses Association, which was in residence at Rusk from 1914 to 1936. The Bethlehem Settlement, directed by a biracial committee, had a nursery and kindergarten. Other activities included a self-improvement club for older girls and occasional maid-training classes. The city of Houston demolished Bethlehem in 1940 to make way for a housing project. Significant settlement activities among Blacks in Houston did not resume until some years later, after a new biracial committee was organized. El Paso and Austin were also the sites of settlement house activity among Mexican Americans. The Houchen Settlement, founded in 1912 by the Methodist Church, served the residents of the Segundo Barrio in south El Paso. An initial $1,000 donation provided a "Christian rooming house" for single Mexican female workers and a kindergarten. Although female Methodist settlement workers dominated Houchen's early days, a Mexican student, Ofilia Chávez, was also on the staff. Within its first six years of operation, Houchen established a full array of "Americanization" programs, such as citizenship and English classes, Camp Fire Girls, Bible studies, working girls' clubs, and Boy Scouts, all of which lasted the forty-year period between 1920 and 1960. The Houchen Settlement added a nurse in 1920, who helped start a medical clinic for Segundo Barrio residents. Between 1930 and 1950, Houchen probably served some 15,000 to 20,000 individuals each year, approximately one-fourth to one-third of the Mexican population of the city. The Inter-American House, established in Austin in 1943 with a $1,000 grant obtained by University of Texas professor George I. Sánchez, followed the longtime practice of involving university students in settlements and thus provided lodging for a small group of female student workers. Lectures and discussion programs were the mainstay of Inter-American. Other programs included arts and crafts classes, musical instruction, and a playschool for children.
What were the Wesley Houses in Dallas?
Besides the club women's involvement, women associated with the mission projects of the Dallas Methodist churches established similar institutions called Wesley Houses, named for John Wesley, the founder of Methodism. These religious settlements sought to bring Christian light to those who lived "under the shadow of the evil about them." The Wesley Houses in north Texas served American and immigrant workers in a factory and laundry district as well as a cotton mill area, where saloons and other places of vice existed. In addition to a kindergarten, the Wesley Houses offered sewing classes, boys' and girls' clubs, sports, meeting rooms for community organizations, health services, and mothers' clubs. Founded in the belief that working-class women would improve their mothering skills under the guidance of the better educated settlement workers, the mothers' clubs were intended to improve home life.
When was the first settlement house built?
The first settlement house was Toynbee Hall in London, founded in 1883 by Samuel and Henrietta Barnett. This was followed by Oxford House in 1884, and others such as the Mansfield House Settlement.
What were the names of the early settlement houses?
Other notable early settlement houses were the East Side House in 1891 in New York City, Boston's South End House in 1892, the University of Chicago Settlement and the Chicago Commons (both in Chicago in 1894), Hiram House in Cleveland in 1896, Hudson Guild in New York City in 1897, and Greenwich House in New York in 1902.
What was the purpose of the settlement house?
The settlement house, an approach to social reform with roots in the late 19th century and the Progressive Movement, was a method for serving the poor in urban areas by living among them and serving them directly. As the residents of settlement houses learned effective methods of helping, they then worked to transfer long-term responsibility for the programs to government agencies. Settlement house workers, in their work to find more effective solutions to poverty and injustice, also pioneered the profession of social work. Philanthropists funded the settlement houses. Often, organizers like Jane Addams made their funding appeals to the wives of the wealthy businessmen. Through their connections, the women and men who ran the settlement houses were also able to influence political and economic reforms.
What did Lucy Flower of Hull House do?
Lucy Flower of Hull House was involved in a variety of movements . Mary Parker Follett used what she learned in settlement house work in Boston to write about human relations, organization, and management theory, inspiring many later management writers, including Peter Drucker.
What were the roots of the settlement house movement?
Community organizing and group work both have roots in the settlement house movement's ideas and practices. The settlement houses tended to be founded with secular goals, but many who were involved were religious progressives, often influenced by the social gospel ideals.
What did settlement houses serve?
Some settlement houses served whatever ethnic groups were in the area. Others, such as those directed towards African Americans or Jews, served groups that weren't always welcome in other community institutions.
How many settlement houses were there in 1910?
By 1910, there were more than 400 settlement houses in more than 30 states in America. At the peak in the 1920s, there were almost 500 of these organizations. The United Neighborhood Houses of New York today encompasses 35 settlement houses in New York City.
What was the settlement house movement?
What was the settlement house movement? The settlement house movement was a social movement that supported the idea of creating large housing projects to provide mobility for the working class. It grew out of a desire for reform that had already had effects in several other areas, such as the creation of numerous charities to help people in poverty. Widespread support for this idea began in Great Britain in the 1860s and quickly spread to other Western countries such as the United States and Canada. The Industrial Revolution and its social effects, such as long working hours, the safety hazards of the factory system, and the self-absorption of industrialists, alarmed the idealistic Christian Socialists who desired to help the poor rise above their condition through education and moral improvement.
How successful were settlement houses?
Settlement houses were successful in some ways but not in others. They failed to eliminate poverty and all of its causes, but they were able to alleviate some of them.
How did settlement houses help the poor?
How did settlement houses help the poor? Settlement houses provided the environment for the poor tenants to create social clubs, community groups, and cultural events. This promoted fellowship between the residents. Education programs were also conducted under the auspices of the houses. For example, the kindergarten program initiated at Hull House served up to 24 students. Adults and youth attended lecture series from community leaders and university graduates and educators.
What was settlement work?
Settlement work was concerned with helping the poor as a social class rather than on an individual basis. It was theorized that if members of the poor working class lived in proximity to educated, refined people, their work morale and education status would improve as well. To aid this, half of the tenants of these houses were ''refined'' graduates of upper-class colleges who lived there to aid the working class by association. House organizers hoped that the sub-culture of higher education would elevate the paradigm of the poor and help them to rise out of their situation.
What were some examples of settlement houses?
In Cleveland, Ohio, for example, different settlement houses served different immigrant populations. Hiram House, for example, mostly worked with Jews, Italian immigrants, and African Americans. East End Neighborhood House and Goodrich House served east European immigrants.
Who founded the first settlement house in Great Britain?
Samuel and Henrietta Barnett founded the first Settlement House, Toynbee Hall, in Great Britain.
Who was the main proponent of the settlement house movement?
Jane Addams was a major proponent of the settlement house movement, co-founding the Hull House in 1889.
What were the settlement houses in Cleveland?
SETTLEMENT HOUSES. Cleveland, along with Chicago, Boston, and New York , was one of the centers of the U.S. settlement-house movement. Local settlement work began in the late 1890s, and within a decade a half-dozen settlements operated in Cleveland neighborhoods. Several of the city's settlement houses achieved national recognition; for example, KARAMU HOUSE, one of the centers of African-American theater in the U.S., and the CLEVELAND MUSIC SCHOOL SETTLEMENT, with its model music training programs. The settlement movement began in England in 1884 when a group of Oxford Univ. students established Toynbee Hall, a residence in a London slum. Sharing knowledge and skills with area residents, they strove to understand and solve urban problems. The urban village concept was foremost, attempting to replicate in city neighborhoods the network of mutual aid common to a small village. New York City's Neighborhood Guild (1885) and Jane Addams' Hull House (Chicago, 1888) marked the importation of settlement houses to the U.S.; over 100 existed in America by 1900. The settlement movement grew in response to the overcrowding, impoverishment, corruption, and disease caused by rapid industrialization and urbanization. One of the most enduring reform movements, it uniquely attempted to change problem neighborhoods from within.
What were the first settlements in Cleveland?
The first settlement house established in Cleveland was HIRAM HOUSE (1896). By WORLD WAR I, many other settlements served Cleveland neighborhoods. While Hiram House served JEWS (later ITALIANS and then AFRICAN AMERICANS) along lower Woodland Ave., ALTA HOUSE (1900) served the Italians of LITTLE ITALY. EAST END NEIGHBORHOOD HOUSE (1907) worked with HUNGARIANS and SLOVAKS in the BUCKEYE-WOODLAND -Woodhill district, and Goodrich House (1897, see GOODRICH-GANNETT NEIGHBORHOOD CTR.) served South Slavic groups residing along St. Clair Ave. By the 1920s, other local settlements included the WEST SIDE COMMUNITY HOUSE (1922), MERRICK HOUSE (1919), the RAINEY INSTITUTE (1904), UNIV. SOCIAL SETTLEMENT (1922), the Playhouse Settlement (1915, later Karamu House), the Council Educational Alliance (1899, forerunner of the JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTER ), the FRIENDLY INN (1897), and the Cleveland Music School Settlement (1912). The 1920s and 1930s saw tremendous nationwide changes in settlement operation, especially the hiring of trained social workers and the emphasis on a more scientific methodology and program. National and local organizations, such as the National Federation of Settlements (est. 1911), the Cleveland Settlement Union, and, later, the GREATER CLEVELAND NEIGHBORHOOD CENTERS ASSN., fostered such change.
What were the concerns of the Progressive Era?
Social settlements addressed Progressive Era concerns: education (with adult classes, kindergartens, and vocational training); citizenship; recreation; health (with visiting-nurse networks and health inspections); labor, unions, and working standards; and living conditions (establishing housing codes). Many programs became standard to education and government. Early settlement house support came through an independent board of directors or a particular religious or educational affiliation. While supporters and settlement workers were generally native-born, Protestant and middle- or upper-middle-class, clients in the early years were mostly Catholic or Jewish working-class immigrants. This difference between the settlement worker and neighborhood resident clearly distinguished the American settlement movement.
What were settlement houses in the 1900s?
Settlement houses offered social, educational, and welfare services to migrant and impoverished communities. They were generally founded and run by women in industrial cities.
Where is Branch Settlement House?
Branch Settlement House near Old Commons, Chicago. The content for this article was researched and written by Jade Ryerson, an intern with the Cultural Resources Office of Interpretation and Education. In 1889, Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr founded the Hull House in Chicago ’s near west side. [1] . Inspired by London’s Toynbee Hall, the Hull ...
What was the Frederick Douglass Center?
Under Elizabeth Lindsay Davis’s leadership, the Center served as the Second Ward’s war office during World War I. Women maintained an exemption board for drafted men, a Red Cross support office, and a post office. During the 1918 influenza pandemic, the Frederick Douglass Center served as a relief station. The Center merged with the Chicago Urban League in 1918. During the 1960s, League headquarters moved nearby to the Swift House, which was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.
What did Emanuel do after the Chicago house closed?
After the house closed in 1912, Emanuel enrolled at the Chicago Hospital-College of Medicine. She graduated as a medical doctor in 1915 and opened a private practice for children and women.
Where is the Phyllis Wheatley home?
Founded in 1926, the last Phyllis Wheatley Home is still standing on South Michigan Avenue near 51st Street.
What is the Hull House?
Discover more history and culture by visiting the Chicago travel itinerary. Notes: [1] The Hull House was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965 and listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1966. [2] Some African American settlement houses were founded with the help of white activists.
Who was the first African American woman to open a Phyllis Wheatley home?
Elizabeth Lindsay Davis opened the first Phyllis Wheatley Home for Girls in 1908. Davis was a national organizer for the National Association of Colored Women (NACW) and a leader of the Ida B. Wells and Phyllis Wheatley Woman’s Clubs. She created the Phyllis Wheatley Home Association because African American women were excluded from services offered at the YWCA. Named after the first African American woman to publish a book of poems, the Phyllis Wheatley Home provided “housing, health, vocational guidance, recreation, and religious education” for Black women and girls.#N#Founded in 1926, the last Phyllis Wheatley Home is still standing on South Michigan Avenue near 51st Street. This property is listed in the Illinois Preservation Services Division’s Historic and Architectural Resources Geographic Information Systems database of historic sites and structures.

First Settlement Houses
Famous Settlement Houses
- The best-known settlement house is perhaps Hull House in Chicago, founded in 1889 by Jane Addams with her friend Ellen Gates Starr. Lillian Wald and the Henry Street Settlement in New York is also well known. Both of these houses were staffed primarily by women and both resulted in many reforms with long-lasting effects and many programs that exist today.
The Movement Spreads
- Other notable early settlement houses were the East Side House in 1891 in New York City, Boston's South End House in 1892, the University of Chicago Settlement and the Chicago Commons (both in Chicago in 1894), Hiram House in Cleveland in 1896, Hudson Guild in New York City in 1897, and Greenwich House in New York in 1902. By 1910, there were more than 40…
More House Residents and Leaders
- Edith Abbott, a pioneer in social work and social service administration, was a Hull House resident with her sister Grace Abbott, New Deal chief of the federal Children's Bureau.
- Emily Greene Balch, later a Nobel Peace Prize winner, worked in and for some time headed Boston's Denison House.
- George Bellamy founded Hiram House in Cleveland in 1896.
- Edith Abbott, a pioneer in social work and social service administration, was a Hull House resident with her sister Grace Abbott, New Deal chief of the federal Children's Bureau.
- Emily Greene Balch, later a Nobel Peace Prize winner, worked in and for some time headed Boston's Denison House.
- George Bellamy founded Hiram House in Cleveland in 1896.
- Sophonisba Breckinridge from Kentucky was another Hull House resident who went on to contribute to the field of professional social work.