Octavia Hill Association (Philadelphia, Pa.) Records

Collection ID: 
URB 46 (Acc. 203), PC-10, PC-11, PC-12, PC-13
Date: 
1880-1970
Collecting Area: 
Urban Archives

Subjects:

 

HISTORICAL NOTE


The Octavia Hill Association was incorporated in 1896 to improve working class housing conditions through the sympathetic management of dwellings which it purchased and renovated. The Association's activities were modeled after the work in London of Octavia Hill, with whom one of its founders, Helen Parrish, had studied. The founders wished to demonstrate that the housing business and charitable works could be combined. They wanted to manage clean, sanitary, safe houses for their black and immigrant tenants and make a profit at the same time; their motto being "Philanthropy and Four Per Cent."

The Association bought rundown properties, usually row houses, improved them and rented them to persons they thought could maintain them. It also rented houses for other owners, and eventually built a limited number of houses under the aegis of the Model Homes Company. By 1916 the Association owned or managed over 400 houses. This amount remained relatively stable for several decades and then began a long decline after World War II. The Octavia Hill Association's major period as a growing and pioneering reform organization ended in the 1920's, largely as a result of financial pressures (the stockholders wanted their 4% return) and changes in the housing market.

A key feature of the Association's work from the beginning was the "Friendly Rent Collector" who was to insure regular payments, inspect the premises, and instruct the tenants in cleanliness, sanitation and good housekeeping. In its early years the Association's efforts led to block cleanups, new kindergartens and new playgrounds in the area of its most intensive work, the old Southwark black and immigrant neighborhood stretching from Lombard Street to Washington Avenue, and Seventh Street to Front Street. It also had worked properties in Germantown, Kensington and Manayunk. The Association worked with neighborhood agencies, lobbied in Harrisburg for various housing bills, and participated in the drafting of the Philadelphia Housing Code (passed in 1913). In 1909 it took the initiative in organizing the Housing Association.

 
COLLECTION OVERVIEW
 
These records contain the personal diaries, correspondence, and notes of Helen Parrish (1888-1943); as well as reports, legislative files, correspondence, publications, and clippings of the Octavia Hill Association (1880-1970). Also included are glass lantern slides, negatives, and photographic reprints relating to the Association's properties and community activities, and depicting  housing interiors and exteriors before and after renovations, court yards, and street scenes around Philadelphia. 

 

 

ORGANIZATION AND ARRANGEMENT
 
The records are divided into four series: 
 
Series 1. Helen Parrish Papers
Series 2. Octavia Hill Association Records
Series 3. Photographs
Series 4. Lantern Slides

 

RELATED MATERIAL

Housing Association of Delaware Valley Records.

To assist researchers the Special Collections Research Center has prepared the Housing Association of Delaware Valley and Octavia Hill Association Photograph Collections Streets and Other Locations Index. This index provides access to identified photographs by Philadelphia street name or number, Philadelphia non-street locations, and non-Philadelphia locations. Other indexes to the Numbered Housing Association Collection are available by subject, date, and zip code. These indexes are only available in on site in the SCRC reading room until such time as they are converted to html and made available online. 

 

ALTERNATE FORM AVAILABLE
 
Photographs from this collection have been digitized and are available online on the Temple University Digital Collections website.
 

ACQUISITION INFORMATION

Deposited through the Octavia Hill Association, by Mr. William Jeanes, Executive Director, January 1975. Accession 203.

 

INVENTORY

Series 1. Helen Parrish Papers

Box 1

URB 46/I/1 Diaries, 1888
URB 46/I/2 Correspondence with England, 1889-1931
URB 46/I/3-6 General Correspondence, 1896-1943
URB 46/I/7-9 Notes and Speeches, 1899-1942 and undated


Series 2. Octavia Hill Association Records

URB 46/II/1-4 Annual Reports, 1897-1970
URB 46/II/5 Legislative File - Tenement House Legislation, 1902-1905

Box 2

URB 46/II/6 Legislative File - Tenement House Law, 1907
URB 46/II/7 Legislative File - Water Supply Bill, 1911
URB 46/II/8 Legislative File - Fight Against Tenement Law Repeal, 1914-1915
URB 46/II/9 Pamphlets, 1902-1917
URB 46/II/10 Properties, 1897-1924
URB 46/II/11 Publications and Publicity, 1898-1938
URB 46/II/12 Report by Carol Arnovici, 1917
URB 46/II/13-14 Speeches, Conferences, Reports, etc.
URB 46/II/15 Octavia Hill Biographical Material, 1880-1939
URB 46/II/16 Clippings, 1911-1927 and undated

 

Series 3. Photographs
 
No inventory available
 
Series 4. Lantern Slides
 
1 Ms. Octavia Hill. [Portrait]

2 613 Lombard Street, Office.
3 613-15 Lombard Street.
4 Front and League Streets.
5-6 League and Water Streets.
7 Court Rear, 235 Queen Street.
8 Court Rear, 234 Monroe Street.
9 1326-28 N. Front Street.
10 Rear, 1328 N. Front, Hamilton Court.
11 948 N. 3rd Street, Plan.
12 Court in Rear of 948-52 N. 3rd Street.
13 Court, N. 3rd Street After Improvements.
14 Court, Other Side - Before Alterations.
15 Court, Other Side - After Alterations.
16 Rear, 427 Montrose Street.
17 Front, 429 Montrose Street.
18 Plan of Kensington Houses.
19 Gaul Street Houses, Corner Cambria Street.
20 2423-29 Cambria Street.
21 Rear, 2900 Gaul Street.
22 Kitchen or Living Room, 2900 Gaul.
23 Rear of Kensington Houses.
24 Germantown Yard Before Improvements.
25-28 Germantown Before Improvements (Various Views).
29 Germantown Yard Before Improvements.
30 Germantown Wooden Toilets Before Improvements.
31 Germantown After Improvements.
32 Germantown After Improvements. No. 545-47.
33 Germantown Playshed.
34-36 Rear, Front and Pemberton Streets.
37 Old Houses, Pemberton Street 1746.
38-39 Yard Houses, Workman Place.
40 Delegates to National Convention in 1912.
41 Playshed at Workman Place.
42 Goncher Place, Rodman Below 6th. 1906.
43 Room with Quilt over Window. 508 S. 7th Street. 1903.
44 Lot on which Kensington Houses Built.
45 702-06 Lombard Street.
46 Casa Ravello - 7th and Catherine.
47 Rear, 1632 Naudain Street.
48 17th and Shunk Streets.
49 18th and Shunk Streets.
50 701-21 N. Marshall Street. [NOT IN SET] 50A Cellar. 508 S. 7th Street. 1903.