When Houses Were Small
THE STANDARDS for what constitutes a normal family house have changed dramatically in recent decades. The average home size in the United States was slightly over 2,400 square feet in 2009. This figure, down slightly from the year before, is more than twice that of the ranches and Cape Cods of the 1950s, such as those built in the Levittown developments of New York and Pennsylvania. Ironically, we have smaller families to fit in our houses.
The suburban house has swelled to the detriment of the family. With bigger houses has come more pressure on women to work. More square footage has meant a loss of family intimacy and less ease in supervising children. Our population growth rate has declined, jeopardizing future prosperity, while our lives have gotten lonelier.
The fifties-style ranch house or Cape Cod is often viewed with sneering derision unless it has undergone a fantastic architectural makeover, complete with granite counter tops and cathedral ceilings. And yet it has much to commend it. (I should know. I have raised my children in one of these houses.) Peter Bacon Hales, of the University of Illinois, wrote of the Levittown Cape Cod house: (more…)




