Trafford City Model Home
The following model home, The Trafford City, appeared in a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette advertisement in April 1925. It was one of 200 house plans prepared by the Retail Lumber Dealer’s Association of Pennsylvania for distribution to encourage home building in Pittsburgh. An exhibit was set up inside the Motor Square Garden – also known today as the East Liberty Market, the historic landmark building on Baum Blvd in East Liberty.
The article reads as follows:
THE TRAFFORD CITY
SMALL HOUSE DEMAND EXCEEDS BUILDING ABILITY
Exposition to Illustrate Economic Possibilities in Home Erection
Demands for small houses in Pittsburgh which rent for $40 to $60 a month are so great that they cannot be constructed fast enough, members of the "Own-a-Home" Exposition committee said yesterday in announcing that the event will be held in Motor Square Garden May 6 to 16 by the Pittsburgh Builders' Exchange. As a result, the association has adopted the slogan, "Build in 1925." According to officials, the old saying. "Wait and you will build cheaper" is a fallacy and they will have experts at the exposition to explain costs and present figures showing the increased costs in building during the last decade. Another feature of the exhibition will be the erection of a five-room bungalow in Motor Square Garden, so constructed as to represent the most economical and substantial home that can be built for moderate sums.
Frank L. Stulen of the building show committee yesterday pointed out "the cheaper day has failed to materialize. Not in the last 30 years have wages been lowered once the building scale among the tradesmen was fixed. The cost of construction is 70 percent labor and that tells the whole story. My personal opinion is that wages will not be lowered, because we are living in a different economic age than we were in 1905. Going back 20 years for instance, you will find that carpenters received only one-third the wage they do today. On the other hand, the average wage-earner, the man who wants to build a home has received nearly a proportionate increase in wages, although perhaps the majority of workers have not been boosted to the same extent as the building tradesmen. But the fact remains that men and women in all walks of life earn more today than ever before, only some do not want to admit it.”
“Say a man decides he will wait five years to build. If he pays $60 a month rent, at the end of five years he will have paid the landlord $3,600, and all he will have to show for it will be receipts. That amount of money put into a home will go a long way towards providing one for the man with nerve enough to build, work and pay for it. We have heard lots of persons say it does not pay to own property, but developments have shown that it does pay, as thousands well know who built 10 or 15 years ago." Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 12 Apr 1925, Pg 44
Pennsylvania homes retail lumber dealers' association of Pennsylvania catalog c 1922.
Motor Square Garden, also known as East Liberty Market, photo from Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository; Author: Acsaladino 3 March 2007
