At the beginning of the 1950’s, America was experiencing rapid expansion and growth after WWII. This gave rise to a booming economy and opened the door for many returning G.I.’s to find work in the construction industry among other fields. The West Side Addition in Boise, located between Pleasanton and Jefferson Streets, was an area where this new-found desire to live the American Dream could happen. As expansion took hold of Boise, new practices allowed home ownership to be remarkably feasible. What promised to be a great leap in urbanization continues to leave a lasting impression to a run down neighborhood.
Owning one’s home was a sign of forward progression. It meant that getting other needs met, such as food and clothing, were no longer an issue. Jobs could be found in many fields, but the most abundant occupations were in the construction industry. Homes and businesses were being built at a record pace as the assembly line practices used for war efforts merged into faster construction practices. Prior to the war, homes were built one or two at a time and often took months to finish. This was the case for most of the first homes built in the West Side Addition. But as the first homes were tore down, 50’s style single family homes took over. Maps from the mid 20th century show 80% of homes in The Addition to be built using these practices. These new homes could be manufactured in a fraction of the time, and would be purchased outright, due to legislation allowing people to purchase their home on credit, with a 30-year mortgage.
As mentioned, The Addition was a prime place in the 1950’s to try out these new building techniques. Although effective for rapid expansion, the lack of long-term studies left a lasting negative impression on the neighborhood. By performing onsite analysis and canvassing, only 1/4th of homes in The Addition that were built in that time are still standing.
Quinn-Robbins Co. and Effect on Neighborhood
Many homeowners in the area lived and worked around The Addition. According to Polk’s Boise Directory from 1953, (which specifies owners v. renters) somewhere around 80-90% of people in this area owned their homes. This time frame is also notable for the booming Quinn-Robbins Company, and the Quinn rock quarry located on the southern edge of the river. This company and its workers supplied Boise with crushed gravel, roof gravel, washed sand, and basement excavations, a popular practice in the mid 20th century. This suggests that many of the male residents of The Addition worked in the quarry or as construction workers in the surrounding areas. Quinn-Robbins Co. continued to steadily mine sand and gravel from Quinn’s quarry up into the early 1970’s. Ownership of this company never changed outside the family. President of Operations Mark Quinn passed down the company to his son James between 1963 and 1969. (Polk’s Directory)
A Decline in Home Ownership
The same directory from 1960 showed a sharp decline in home ownership from 90 percent to roughly 50 percent within the decade. This statistic rose slightly in 1970 to around 70 to 75 percent. This 1960s decline in home ownership could have been due to growing interest rates or perhaps a growing unemployment rate, (draw on literature and what other people are saying this is due to, then transition into your alternative hypothesis) but further suggestions will follow.
Zoning, Soil Composition, and Septic Tanks
Environmental ignorance of the 1920’s and 30’s led to a growing need for zoning legislation for each area in town. The Addition, being situated on the river, experienced a larger need for solutions surrounding waste disposal (waste was previously routed to the Boise River). The water table is lower at a river basin making ground water contamination more probable than at higher areas of town. Similarly, larger businesses or commercial districts require larger water use and therefore require larger sewer lines to be run. These costly improvements led many new or developing lands to adopt the use of septic tanks.
According to Boise arts and history “…Residences, especially those remote from the city center continued to use cesspools and privies, or had their own discharge pipe to the Boise River.”
Sewer lines that ran to a central water treatment facility were costly to install and often stinted urban development in the private sector. Builders needed an alternative; septic systems. Each new home was outfitted with a separate drainage field for refuse. This solution, along with new building methods, allowed homes after the war to be built at record paces. The problem with this system is a high failure rate. According to The Bulldozer in the Country Side by historian Adam Rome,
A substantial number of the backyard waste-disposal systems failed in the first two or three years, homebuyers were often faced with foul and unsanitary messes. Many were stuck with steep repair bills, and some lost everything they had invested in their homes.
With this point in mind, one could suggest that this is one of the reasons for a sharp decline in home ownership from 1950 to 1960. The height of the water table would also put strain and wear on the reservoirs and piping, making septic failure even more common and therefore more damaging to the water supply in The Addition. On site research suggests that there are two generations of homes in The Addition. There are those built in the 50’s and those built in the last 20 years.
In this area of town, irrigation lines for backyard farms was common. The picture below is of a 1950’s home that showcases a larger back yard use for agriculture and small livestock holding. This was the norm for many 1950’s homes in the west side.
As the prominent 50’s homes were tore down, duplexes took their place. This was made possible by zoning legislation and the availability of land on each large plot. Many of the newest homes look like the picture shown below taken on Madison Street two blocks from Whitewater Boulevard.
According to the 1980 Soil Survey of Ada County, the prominent soil type in the area (123 and 56 below) is sandy loam. The area labeled “water” is Quinn’s quarry/pond.
This soil is prone to erosion but good for rangeland and agriculture as it has a greater concentration of alluvium from the river. With this in mind, it is no wonder many of the residence chose to farm their acreage as a way to subsidize produce and meat consumption. However, the “seasonal water table severely limits the soils use as septic tank absorption field.” (Soil Survey, 1980) The contaminated water would make agriculture virtually impossible as well as unsanitary.
With these challenges to urbanization in mind, The Addition was in need of new zoning practices, which came to Boise around 1966. The following is a picture from the zoning map of 1966.
These laws put restrictions on the use of plots depending on local standards. The Boise zoning map of 66’ labeled The Addition as either R-2 or R-3. The first restricts use for one family duplex housing. The latter is located near the river, and can be used for 20 apartment units per acre, due to its ability to supply recreation to inhabitants. The zoning has stayed relatively the same over the years, and as 50’s homes were tore down (perhaps due to costly repair bills) duplexes have taken their place.
Zoning Map from 2002
Land Near the River
Near the river, as stated in my first blog, has been relatively uninhabited for the duration of this study. Although the soil is of the same mixture as the surrounding area, the 4-12% slopes make using this land for agriculture difficult. The area is well drained, which puts unnecessary strain on irrigation implements. According to the 1980 survey, “slope is the primary limitation to agriculture.” This is perhaps the reason this land was chosen as an Air Park runway from the 1940’s to 1954 (Freeman, 2015)
Picture of the Boise Air Park
The Addition’s evolution and degradation from 1950 to 1975 is suggested to be very similar to happenings around the country. Although many other factors come into play outside of soil, zoning and the 1950’s housing boom, the use of mass building techniques and septic systems perhaps aided in the continued degradation of the Addition.
Sources
Collett, Russell A. Soil Survey of Ada County area. Washington: The Survey, 1980.
Freeman, Paul. “Abandon & Little-Known Airfields.” 1980. http://www.airfields-freeman.com/ID/Airfields_ID_SW.htm.
Polk, R. L. Boise City Directory. Boise: R.L. Polk & Co., 1953.
Polk, R. L. Boise City Directory. Boise: R.L. Polk & Co., 1960.
Polk, R. L. Boise City Directory. Boise: R.L. Polk & Co., 1969-70.
Rome, Adam. The Bulldozer in the Countryside. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
Goodmiller, Max, and Jack L. Neal. A Petition Against Urban Renewal. 1971.
Urban Environmental Boise 