with the situation in an effective way. This was the special Housing Committee of the Chamber of Commerce, headed by Mr. C. J. Hicks, Executive Assistant to the Chairman and to the President of the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey.
Mr. Hicks took a deep interest in the matter from the first. His first care was to survey the housing situation of the Bayonne workers and then to formulate a program of principles, upon which remedial action should be based. This he did, and the most striking thing about his ideas is, that, notwithstanding the critical nature of the local situation and the war emergency confronting him, he made no concession to expediency, but, instead, set the standards to be embodied in the local housing high above the ordinary. He recognized the essential of low cost, but he also insisted that the highest architectural ideal be attained. Specifically, he urged housing of an "open" plan, having all rooms flooded with daylight, and provided with complete sanitary equipment, set in garden surroundings, with sufficient recreation space. The Committee agreed that the restricted amount of land available in Bayonne made necessary the apartment type rather than detached homes or housing of the row type.
The Bayonne Housing Corporation organized
Mr. Hicks and his associates became deeply interested in the problem because they felt that it was a universal one, and they know that the situation in Bayonne existed to a greater or less extent in countless cities and industrial districts throughout the United States. Any experience, therefore, which would be gained in Bayonne was sure to be valuable elsewhere. The Housing Committee determined to proceed along as broad lines as possible and to reach, if they could, the heart of the problem of industrial housing. Their first practical step was to organize the Bayonne Housing Corporation for the purpose of building houses.
The war ended a few months later, and peace brought new economic disturbances. The post-war readjustments blocked the housing program of Mr. Hicks' committee but, notwithstanding every discouragement, after a long effort, financial backing of about $1,000,000 was secured and the first group of houses was completed in the winter of 1924-25.
These first garden apartments of the Bayonne Housing
9
