An apartment must have a kitchen. It is this room that distinguishes an apartment from a flat or a boardinghouse. A kitchen also is the perfect room for installing modern conveniences. When apartment building owners realized up-to-date kitchens would attract tenants, they mentioned the amenities in their promotional materials. Advertisements in local newspapers often included phrases such as "the housewife’s dream come true" or "the last word in kitchen design and equipment." In the early years of the 20th century, some Seattle working-class families and those living in rural areas usually lacked the new labor-saving appliances that apartments featured.
Apartments began fronting Seattle streets in 1901. Compared to the East Coast, Seattle was a relative latecomer to apartment living. This delayed entry, however, proved beneficial. Because the city had already introduced home services such as clean water, gas, and electricity, apartment owners were able to offer kitchens with hot and cold running water, electric lights, and gas ranges. With the advancement of technology, architects and builders installed gleaming new electric stoves and porcelain-lined refrigerators that made ice cubes=two pinnacles of American technology. "Every practical feature of modern convenience arranged with a view to the quick dispatch of housework will be found here," trumpeted an advertisement of the Fleur-de-Lis Apartment. By the end of the 1930s, when the number of appliances manufactured in America had already exceeded the total for the preceding century, builders could choose from an assortment of models.
What is more, Seattle apartments made their appearance just when Americans had begun spending money to achieve a more leisurely lifestyle. No longer content with self-denial, consumers challenged the moralistic approach to spending and began a debate on how to "economize in a world where yesterday’s luxuries seemed to become today’s necessities." By the first decades of the 20th-century Americans had "more money and more time to purchase more goods.... Society’s task was, therefore, no longer how to make do with less, as it always had been, but instead how to live with much more," said historian Thomas Schlereth.
Tenants in many of Seattle’s apartments, scattered throughout the city, were among those who desired the accoutrements of a good life. Apartment owners recognized the advantages of having a building with no vacancies and filled their buildings with distinctive furnishings. In fact, a 1927 survey of Seattle apartments showed higher occupancy in the "better class of apartments" and lower occupancy in a lesser class of apartments that "because of obsolescence or location are not as desirable." Examining the advancement of technology in apartment kitchens between 1900 and 1939 is another way of observing the new consumer society.
The increasing array of kitchen appliances, cabinets, and implements that became available in the early 20th century aided in designing attractive kitchens. But architects and builders needed more than a choice of goods. They had to be aware of the arrangement of cabinets and the best place to install a sink and cooler or icebox; they needed to know that women wanted compact, efficient kitchens with little wasted space; and they had to pay attention to the kitchen’s color. Furthermore, the architect and builder had to be familiar with the advice of reformers who stressed scrupulously clean, sanitary surfaces to battle against germs and diseases. "Soap and water should be no enemy to its contents....Dirt should show," said housekeeping expert Elizabeth Gilman.
Seattle builders could find information and ideas in the Apartment Operators Journal. This publication regularly printed helpful recommendations regarding the best paint to apply to kitchen walls, optimal placement of a fan so kitchen smells are eliminated, whether the sink should be near the stove or the refrigerator, and the importance of providing adequate shelf space. An advertisement for the Buckley, an apartment building on Seattle’s Capitol Hill, indicated that apartment owners paid attention to this advice:
Not so many years ago the kitchen was thought a place of drudgery that no beauty nor taste could be connected with, but today this room must be as presentable as any other part of the home. Therefore the floor is covered with inlaid linoleum in attractive design. The walls enameled in a color scheme composed by a capable decorator. The range in white enamel is the latest electric model. Cabinets, drawers and accessories, even to the china closet are in keeping.
When the Buena Vista Apartments opened in 1907, their advertisements announced that each unit had a Hoosier Kitchen Cabinet, a freestanding storage unit. In a list of positive features for each apartment, the Manhattan Flats mentioned a dish cupboard and a flour bin, also freestanding.
Of the many freestanding kitchen cabinets on the market, the Hoosier Cabinet, made by the Hoosier Manufacturing Company of New Castle, Indiana, is the best-known. Beginning around 1899, the first ones were assembled and "built by skilled cabinetmakers." But within a few years, the company standardized parts so they could be replaced and began to manufacture the cabinets on an assembly line. Some of the special features included a sifter mounted on the bottom of the flour bin, places to store potatoes and onions, metal-lined bread drawers, cutlery drawers, spice racks, some of which rotated for easier use, lidded jars for coffee and tea, coffee grinders, and a work table, designed at the optimal height for working while seated. By 1920 the company had made two million Hoosiers and the name became the generic term for the kitchen cabinet. Caught between a market that wanted built-ins and a depression and war that halted the manufacture of consumer goods, the company ceased its business in the early 1940s.
Built-in wood cabinets eventually replaced the freestanding ones. A number of apartments stressed "ample or abundant cabinet space" in the kitchen or mentioned special items such as a "metal cupboard counter top at the side of each where hot dishes may be set without fear of marring the woodwork." Built-in wooden cupboards, such as those in the Sovereign and Charlesgate, had cutlery drawers, bins for flour and sugar, and a pull-out dough board.
Apartment builders made a point of mentioning that their apartments used local lumber for cabinets, doors, and windows, and credited the company. Washington’s abundant timber led to a well-developed lumber industry. In 1907 the O. B. Williams Company sold glass china closet doors and cupboard closet doors at prices from $1.00 to $1.25 each. By 1919 lumber manufacturing was Seattle’s "chief industry" and was "keyed to the local market, requiring construction lumber and finished products."
For women used to hauling wood or coal to feed their wood- or coal-burning ranges, and spending hours "blacking" the stove to prevent rust, the gas range must have seemed like a miraculous appliance, heaven-sent to lighten housework. Besides producing a quicker source of heat, it required neither bulky fuel nor excessive elbow grease to keep lit and clean.
Gas ranges benefited from the development of manufacturing processes that produced lightweight steel. "Easier to transport, rolled steel conformed better to turn-of-the-century systems of centralized production and national distribution, making for a general switchover from locally produced cast iron to centrally produced rolled steel in American industry, " wrote Susan Strasser. In 1905 gas companies around the country joined with the National Commercial Gas Association to introduce these ranges and campaign for the use of gas as a cooking fuel. They trained personnel to service gas systems and set up showrooms to demonstrate how best to use gas appliances.
To increase its market share of the gas appliance business, the Seattle Lighting Company ran a series of advertisements extolling the virtues of gas and promised to help install their newly gas ranges. In one ad, entitled "A Talk on Gas Ranges," the company asked women to call for a company representative "to tell you about our many styles and their various advantages." Other announcements told of gas’s economy and convenience. "Every up-to-date Architect, Builder and Property owner now realizes this fact and thoroughly provides every apartment house, residence, business Block and factory with thorough equipment of gas piping," said a 1907 advertisement.
Seattle furniture stores also made a pitch for gas ranges. The Century Furniture Company trumpeted the popular "Jewel" gas range, which had "one giant burner, a simmer burner, and three single burners" that "suffice for every necessity and contingency." To further ensure purchases, the furniture store promised to connect the gas ranges for free and said it would accept the old range or stove as partial payment for the new Jewel.
Just the THING for a small flat
The Bachelor Girl’s Friend
And the Young Bride’s SAVIOR
Quick to start-Quick to cook, Quick to put out
A valve, a match, dinner.
The 1912 annual report for Seattle City Light noted that the year "has brought forward another important field for the use of electrical energy, that of heating and cooking with electricity." It was a message that inspired J. D. Ross, Seattle City Light’s superintendent of lighting, to promote the installation of electric ranges in Seattle homes and apartments. To implement his plan, Ross recalled in a 1937 Seattle Star article, he told his staff to "order a carload of those ranges and advertise that we’ll wire them in free.... Those early ranges had to be installed and wired correctly to give any service at all, and our boys knew how to do it."
Still, even with Ross’s interest and drive, customers did not rush out to purchase electric ranges. Furthermore, Seattle City Light had a difficult time acquiring parts and key materials during World War I. The big boom for electric cooking came after the war when an improved range came on the market and appliance companies collaborated with City Light to promote electric appliances. For example, the Hughes Company, a division of Edison Electric Appliance Company, suggested in a letter to the Seattle Municipal Light and Power Plant, City of Seattle Engineering Department, that they join together to promote the sale of electric ranges. "Do you realize that in the very near future your greatest means of revenue is going to come from the electric range and other electrical cooking devices.... We are in a position to answer any questions pertaining to this subject [cooking with electricity], and to give you assistance in building up this load." Eight years later Edison Electric Appliance Company allocated money for advertising electric ranges and provided lecturers for a cooking school. Between 1924 and 1927 the number of ranges in Seattle homes jumped from under 3,000 to over 11,000.
During the 1920s various business and civic groups vigorously promoted the sale of electric appliances. In 1923 the Seattle Electric Club, which had as its members businesses concerned with any and every aspect of electricity, celebrated an Electric Week. The exhibit, held in a large tent in Bothell, a suburb of Seattle, showcased cooking demonstrations and promoted the idea that "the work is done by the most willing of servants, electricity harnessed to push buttons.... Let Electric Mary do your work.... [She] will take a big load off the shoulders of any housewife".
Two years later the Seattle Times backed the Progressive Seattle Exhibition. Though it did not focus exclusively on electricity, the exhibition’s spotlight shone on electric appliances, including radios. To entice customers, merchants showcased electric appliances during daily demonstrations. At the Puget Sound Power and Light booth, company representatives told visitors they would receive assistance in selecting the appropriate range as well as prompt service after the installation. "Our facilities and success in equipping thousands of Seattle homes and apartment houses with electric ranges and service enable us to demonstrate the best in electrical cookery," said a spokesman for the company. Between January and September of 1927, Puget Power announced, "more ELECTRIC RANGES have been installed on our lines than there were in the entire state of Washington only six years ago!" The utility company sold Westinghouse, Hotpoint, and Crawford electric ranges and offered very low time payments.
Before refrigerators became popular and necessary kitchen equipment, apartment houses installed coolers as a way to extend the life of perishables. The cooler, sometimes referred to as a cooling closet, can best be described as a cupboard, often made of wood, with one to three shelves. The back side, set against an outside kitchen or dining area wall, had a three- to five-inch opening covered with perforated tin or wire screen. This allowed air to flow in while keeping insects out. Standing in mute testimony to the past, these small openings, usually located below or at the side of a window, are still visible on many early Seattle apartments.
Coolers sufficed in Seattle’s moderate climate. Though not cold enough to keep perishable food such as meat from spoiling, they worked well for the short-term storage of fruits and vegetables, jars of jam and preserves, and cheeses. A cooler was comparable to having a small cellar in the kitchen. Owners and tenants considered them an important apartment amenity.
Real estate promotional material for apartments indicates that in addition to, or in place of coolers, buildings furnished refrigerators. Until the 1920s, these were actually iceboxes. The icebox usually had a finished ash, pine, or oak shell that was lined with zinc, slate, porcelain, or galvanized metal. Iceboxes came in a variety of sizes and shapes and had doors that opened to reveal adjustable shelves, with a separate compartment for ice. A pan set in the bottom held melting ice water, which had to be emptied frequently. Tenants eagerly awaited the weekly delivery of ice. "The ‘ice man’ would break up the large blocks into sections for ease in carrying up the stairs to the waiting iceboxes. The neighborhood kids would gather around the wagon to get an ice sliver to suck on," recalled Al Wilding who lived in several Seattle apartments during the 1930s.
Because the ice melted and iceboxes leaked, these "refrigerators" could be exceedingly messy. Whenever possible, they were placed on a back porch. This was a most convenient place for the apartment that had back steps-the renter did not have to be home when the ice man delivered. He could just bring the ice to the porch, open the icebox door, and insert the block of ice. As late as 1924 the Roy Vue apartments, in Seattle’s Capitol Hill district, bragged that each apartment would have outside porches, "containing a large refrigerator." In apartments without porches the icebox would frequently be housed on a wall with an opening onto the apartment corridor or in the entrance hall of individual apartments. Bernice Ovadia, who lived in the Monmouth Apartments, recalled that their icebox was in the front hall. "Sometimes we had to get up at night to empty the water from the melting ice. That was a very unpleasant task."
Once manufacturers figured out the mechanism for electric refrigerators to make ice cubes and freeze food, that technological wonder became one of the new appliance’s most important selling points. Apartments promising true refrigerators reminded prospective tenants that each apartment had its own, enabling tenants to make "their own ice and frozen dainties." The ice cube trays of the 1920s and 1930s were made of tin or nickel-plated copper with plated brass dividers, and required a dunking under warm water to remove the ice. Many an anxious homemaker ruined her elegant frozen dessert by dousing the tray with very hot water in order to speed the process.
In the mid 1930s, when engineers finally solved the choice of coolants and other design dilemmas, the refrigerator was well on its way to becoming an indispensable machine. Along the way, companies tested many improvements. One, the Electro-Kold, employed a single machine, located in a basement or other out-of-the-way place, to operate 20 kitchen refrigerators in individual apartments. Another system converted the older iceboxes into refrigerators operated by electricity. The president of Modern Appliances for Frigidaire distributors explained how it worked, but because the process was rather complicated, he reminded people that the company would happily sell them a new electrical refrigerator, "complete, with the mechanism in its own cabinet." Most apartments chose that option.
Although modern amenities were most evident in the kitchen, the entire apartment benefited from technological advancements. Bathrooms acquired built-in tubs with showers, telephones became common, rooms were wired for radio aerials, and garages became a necessity. Aware of the importance of appealing to the middle class, apartment owners hired decorators to choose specially designed wallpaper and select fabric for lobby furniture. Clearly, owners paid attention to the wants and needs of prospective tenants. That so many Seattle apartments, built so long ago, are still fronting Seattle streets is testimony to their role in the urban landscape.
Jacqueline B. Williams is author of Wagon Wheel Kitchens: Food on the Oregon Trail (University Press of Kansas) and The Way We Ate: Pacific Northwest Cooking, 1843-1900 (Washington State University Press). Diana James is at heart, and by training, a preservationist. She and Williams are currently researching early (1900-1939) Seattle apartments. Research for this article was partially funded by a grant from 4Culture.