The Mutual Ownership Defense Housing Division of the Federal Works Agency part of the United States government, operating from about 1940 to 1942 under the leadership of Colonel Lawrence Westbrook, was an attempt by the United States Government, late in the New Deal, to respond to the housing needs facing defense workers and develop housing projects for middle-income families utilizing the cooperative/mutual housing ownership concept. Under pressure by entrenched real estate interests and intense and competing resource needs caused by World War II, the Division lasted for only two years. As stated in the Second Annual Report of the Federal Works Agency:
"As a group, defense workers were also poor candidates for individual home ownership because the duration of their employment was uncertain, and because few of them had savings adequate to finance the downpayment on new homes. Recognizing these characteristics, attention was given early to some special form of housing to meet squarely the economic problem of the defense worker and one which, at the same time, might lead to an ultimate solution of the housing problems of millions of other American families of similar economic status."
Limited staffing resources within the Division also resulted in poor management practices, and a number of the projects were investigated for cost overruns and poor construction standards. Although only eight projects were ever built by the Division, all but one were eventually purchased from their government by their residents and continue to operate as mutual home corporations as of 2009. The Mutual Ownership Defense Housing Division projects can be considered a rare but important example of successful public housing within the United States.
During its very brief existence - from the autumn of 1940 to the winter of 1942 - the Mutual Ownership Defense Housing Division built the following eight projects.
| Project | Location | Dwelling Units |
Development Cost |
Year Purchased from Government |
Current Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Audubon Park | Audubon, New Jersey | 500 | $2,321,000 | 1947 | Owned and Maint. Audubon Mutual Housing Corp. |
| Avion Village | Grand Prairie, Texas | 300 | $920,000 | 1948 | Owned and Maint. Avion Village Housing Corp. |
| Bellmawr Park | Bellmawr, New Jersey | 500 | $2,321,000 | 1953 | Owned and Maint. Bellmawr Mutual Housing Corp. |
| Dallas Park | Dallas, Texas | 300 | $972,000 | 1948 | Mutual Ownership Corp. dissolved |
| Pennypack Woods | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | 1,000 | $4,367,000 | 1952 | Owned and Maint. Pennypack Woods Home Ownership Assoc. |
| Greenmont Village | Dayton, Ohio | 500 | $2,385,000 | 1947 | Owned and Maint. Greenmont Village Mutual Housing Corp. |
| Walnut Grove | South Bend, Indiana | 250 | $1,149,000 | 1947 | Owned and Maint. Walnut Grove Mutual Housing Corp. |
| Winfield Park | Winfield Township, New Jersey | 700 | $3,704,000 | 1950 | Owned and Maint. Winfield Park Mutual Housing Corp. |
Additional projects were planned but never built as Mutual Ownership Defense Housing project in Alcoa, Tennessee (250 Units), Long Beach, California (600 Units), Beaumont, Texas (600 Units), Buffalo, New York (1,050 Units), Coatsville, Pennsylvania (300 Units), Coatesville, Pennsylvania (100 Units).
Read more about Mutual Ownership Defense Housing Division: Late New Deal Public Housing, Defense Housing Programs, Mutual Home Ownership Concept, Advantages of The Mutual Housing Plan, Supporters, Critics, The Demise of The Mutual Ownership Defense Housing Division, The Mutual Housing Projects After The Second World War
Famous quotes containing the words mutual, ownership, defense, housing and/or division:
“Nature’s law says that the strong must prevent the weak from living, but only in a newspaper article or textbook can this be packaged into a comprehensible thought. In the soup of everyday life, in the mixture of minutia from which human relations are woven, it is not a law. It is a logical incongruity when both strong and weak fall victim to their mutual relations, unconsciously subservient to some unknown guiding power that stands outside of life, irrelevant to man.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“They had their fortunes to make, everything to gain and nothing to lose. They were schooled in and anxious for debates; forcible in argument; reckless and brilliant. For them it was but a short and natural step from swaying juries in courtroom battles over the ownership of land to swaying constituents in contests for office. For the lawyer, oratory was the escalator that could lift a political candidate to higher ground.”
—Federal Writers’ Project Of The Wor, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“Hence that general is skilful in attack whose opponent does not know what to defend; and he is skilful in defense whose opponent does not know what to attack.”
—Sun Tzu (6th–5th century B.C.)
“We have been weakened in our resistance to the professional anti-Communists because we know in our hearts that our so-called democracy has excluded millions of citizens from a normal life and the normal American privileges of health, housing and education.”
—Agnes E. Meyer (1887–1970)
“Affection, indulgence, and humor alike are powerless against the instinct of children to rebel. It is essential to their minds and their wills as exercise is to their bodies. If they have no reasons, they will invent them, like nations bound on war. It is hard to imagine families limp enough always to be at peace. Wherever there is character there will be conflict. The best that children and parents can hope for is that the wounds of their conflict may not be too deep or too lasting.”
—New York State Division of Youth Newsletter (20th century)