Hull House facts for kids
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Hull House
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Hull House in the early 20th century
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 Location in Central Chicago
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| Location | 800 S. Halsted, Chicago, Illinois, U.S. |
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| Area | 1 acre (0.40 ha) |
| Built | building built in 1856, institution founded September 18, 1889 |
| Architect | Pond and Pond |
| Architectural style | Italianate |
| NRHP reference No. | 66000315 |
Quick facts for kids Significant dates |
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| Added to NRHP | October 15, 1966 |
| Designated NHL | June 23, 1965 |
Hull House was a special community center in Chicago, Illinois. It was started in 1889 by two amazing women, Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Located in a busy part of Chicago, Hull House aimed to help new immigrants from Europe. It grew quickly! By 1911, it had 13 buildings. It even added a summer camp, the Bowen Country Club, in 1912.
Hull House became a model for other centers across the country. It offered new and creative programs for learning, art, and social support. By 1920, there were about 500 similar centers in the U.S. Most of the original Hull House buildings were torn down in the 1960s to build the University of Illinois Chicago. But the first building and one other building still stand today. They are now a history museum. Hull House is recognized as a U.S. National Historic Landmark and a Chicago Landmark.
Contents
What Was Hull House's Goal?
Jane Addams was inspired by a place called Toynbee Hall in London, England. It was a center where educated people lived and helped poor communities. Addams and Starr opened Hull House on September 18, 1889, with a similar idea.
Helping Women and Communities
In the 1800s, many women wanted more education and careers. They formed groups to help improve society. Hull House was one of these places, located in neighborhoods where working-class people and immigrants lived. It was a place for educated women to create new roles for themselves and help others.
Hull House became a "community of university women." Their main goal was to offer learning and social chances for working people, especially new European immigrants. Volunteers, called "residents," taught classes in many subjects like history, art, and sewing. Famous thinkers like John Dewey and W.E.B. Du Bois even gave talks there. Hull House also had free concerts and clubs for kids and adults.
In 1892, Jane Addams wrote about the main ideas of settlement houses:
- Living in the community: Working closely with neighbors.
- Studying problems: Learning why people were poor and dependent.
- Sharing information: Telling the public what they found.
- Pushing for change: Working to improve laws and society.
Hull House carefully studied the local community, which they called "The Hull House Neighborhood." These studies helped them work with leaders to create programs that improved life for immigrants.
A Place for New Ideas
Hull House became a global center for new ideas. Leaders from many fields came to teach, study, and research. For women who studied society (sociologists), Hull House was as important as universities were for men. The discoveries made at Hull House helped push for new laws to help immigrants and the poor.
Jane Addams didn't plan to be a sociologist. She said Hull House was about helping neighbors, not just studying them. But she ended up becoming one of the first people to take women's social studies seriously. She even helped start the American Sociological Association in 1905.
Hull House was like an experiment that worked! By 1900, nearly 100 similar centers had opened across the U.S. Hull House also inspired women's clubs to focus on community projects like ending child labor and starting public libraries.
Who Lived Near Hull House?
The area around Hull House was home to many different groups of immigrants. Everyone was treated with respect, no matter their background. Early on, many Italian immigrants lived very close to Hull House.
The wider Hull House neighborhood, called Chicago's Near West Side, was a mix of many ethnic groups. Germans, Jews, Greeks, Irish, and French-Canadians all lived there. Italians continued to arrive from southern Italy until 1924.
Over time, many groups moved away, but their businesses, like those in Greektown and Maxwell Street, often stayed. Italian Americans were the only immigrant group that remained a strong community. This area became known as "Little Italy." This neighborhood was like a "laboratory" where Hull House leaders tested their ideas to help people.
The connection between Little Italy and Hull House was very strong. One early Hull House member, Dr. Alice Hamilton, even said that Italian women knew more about caring for babies than her university professors! Many records show that most people who used Hull House services, especially the summer camp, were of Italian heritage.
A famous photo from 1924, "Meet the Hull House Kids," showed 20 boys. For a long time, people thought they were Irish. But in 1987, a newspaper proved they were all first-generation Italian-Americans. These boys grew up to be lawyers, mechanics, and even a mob boss!
Because immigrants missed their homelands, Addams started hosting "ethnic evenings" at Hull House. These nights featured traditional food, dancing, music, and talks. There were Italian, Greek, German, and Polish evenings. These gatherings helped people feel connected and proud of their heritage.
What Hull House Achieved
In its early years, Hull House attracted many women who later became important reformers. Addams and Starr sometimes acted as doctors, helping with births, caring for the sick, and preparing the dead. They even sheltered victims of domestic violence. For example, they cared for a baby with a cleft palate whose mother didn't want him.
Hull House also started pushing for changes in laws at the city, state, and national levels. They worked on issues like child labor, women's suffrage (the right to vote), healthcare, and immigration rules. Some people say Hull House's work was the start of what we now call "Social Welfare."
In its neighborhood, Hull House created Chicago's first public playground, bathhouse, and gym in 1893. Jane Addams believed that children needed play to grow up healthy and happy. Her ideas helped start a national movement for playgrounds. A volunteer also started a kindergarten class for children whose mothers worked in factories.
At the city level, Hull House helped create the first juvenile court in the U.S. Their work also influenced city planning and public libraries. At the state level, they helped pass laws about child labor, workplace safety, mandatory schooling, immigrant rights, and pensions. These successes led to national changes, including laws about child labor, women's voting rights, and unemployment benefits.
Jane Addams and other Hull House residents like Florence Kelley and Julia Lathrop inspired many social changes. Hull House also developed a unique way of thinking called "feminist pragmatism." This was a philosophy that focused on real-life experiences, especially women's experiences, and how to solve problems in society. Unlike older philosophies that looked for abstract truths, Hull House focused on practical solutions and social responsibility. In 1897, Dr. Alice Hamilton joined Hull House and started one of the first clinics for children's health.
What Hull House Taught
Hull House offered many services to help people dealing with poverty. It had a clinic that provided healthy food for the sick, a daycare, and public baths. They also taught skills like bookbinding, which was useful for jobs in printing. Hull House was known for helping immigrant youth adapt to American life.
Hull House also promoted hand craftsmanship as a way to improve lives. Their pottery program, the Hull-House Kilns, was very popular. Their theater group, led by Laura Dainty Pelham, performed plays by famous writers and helped start the American Little Theatre Movement. Hull House was so successful that some called its leaders the "Great Ladies of Halsted Street."
The main goal of Hull House was: "To be a center for better community life; to create and support educational and charitable projects, and to study and improve conditions in Chicago's industrial areas."
The Building and Museum Today
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Hull House was named after the Italianate mansion built by Charles Jerald Hull in 1856. By 1889, when Addams was looking for a place, the area had become quite poor due to many immigrants moving in. Charles Hull's cousin, Helen Culver, let Addams use the house for free for 25 years. By 1907, Addams had bought 13 more buildings around the mansion.
In the 1960s, most of the Hull House buildings were torn down to build the University of Illinois Chicago. Only the original mansion and one other building, a dining hall, survived. The dining hall was even moved about 200 yards (182.9 m) to be next to the mansion.
The Haunting of Hull House
Jane Addams once mentioned that the Hull House building had a "half-skeptical reputation for a haunted attic." Over the years, many ghost stories have been told about Hull House, making it a popular stop on Chicago ghost tours. Some say Charles Hull's wife, who died there in 1860, haunts the house. Others think the ghosts might be from the many people who died there in the 1870s when it was used as a home for the elderly.
A strange story started in 1913 about a "devil baby." The legend said a man didn't want a picture of the Virgin Mary in his house, and his baby was born with horns and a tail. The mother supposedly brought the baby to Hull House, and Addams was said to have locked it in the attic. Addams was annoyed by the untrue story at first, but then she became interested in how it affected the neighborhood women. She even wrote about it in her book The Long Road of Woman's Memory.
Addams herself did talk about one of the front bedrooms on the second floor being haunted. She and a friend once thought they saw a "woman in white" ghost there. While Addams called it "haunted," she seemed more amused than scared by it.
Hull House Theater
Addams believed that theater could benefit the community, so she started an amateur theater at Hull House in 1899. Immigrants performed classic plays in their own languages, and children performed Shakespeare. The theater was a place where people from different backgrounds could come together and enjoy performances. The audience was always very excited and paid close attention.
America's improvisational theatre (improv) scene actually has its roots in Hull House! Viola Spolin, a famous improv teacher, developed her techniques while teaching classes there. Later, the Hull House Theater continued to support Chicago theater companies, helping young talent grow.
From the 1930s to 2012
Jane Addams led Hull House until she passed away in 1935. The Hull House Association continued to serve the community in Chicago at different locations until 2012. The original Hull House building is now a museum, part of the University of Illinois Chicago. It is open to the public.
The Jane Addams Hull-House Museum remembers Addams and other social reformers. Their work helped immigrants and influenced important policies both in the U.S. and worldwide. The museum connects the history of Hull House to today's social issues. It has over 1,100 historical items and more than 100 interviews with people who shared their stories about Hull House.
Hull House Association Closes
The Jane Addams Hull House Association was one of Chicago's largest non-profit groups helping people. It relied heavily on government funding. On January 19, 2012, it was announced that the Hull House Association would close due to money problems after almost 122 years. On January 27, 2012, it closed suddenly. Employees did not receive severance pay or earned vacation pay. However, the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum (which is separate from the Association) remains open.
Important People at Hull House
Here are some of the people who worked or lived at Hull House:
- Edith Abbott, social worker
- Grace Abbott, social worker
- Jane Addams, co-founder
- Ethel Percy Andrus, volunteer
- Enella Benedict, founder and director of the Art School
- Neva Boyd, founded the Recreational Training School
- Sophonisba Breckinridge, social scientist
- Charlotte E. Carr, head resident (1937-1942)
- Cornelia De Bey, worker
- Dorothy Detzer, activist for social issues, peace, and youth
- Emily Edwards (de Cantabrana), art teacher
- Julia I. Felsenthal, social worker
- Myrtle Merritt French, art teacher
- Alice Hamilton, artist, worker, and resident
- Florence Kelley, started a Bureau of Women's Labor there
- Julia Lathrop, children's rights activist
- Dorothy Loeb, artist, teacher, and resident
- Mary McDowell, teacher and social reformer
- Ernest Carroll Moore, teacher, later a founder of UCLA
- Willard Motley, a founder of Hull House Magazine
- Mary Kenney O'Sullivan, trade union activist
- Frances Perkins, labor rights advocate, later U.S. Secretary of Labor
- Adena Miller Rich, head resident (1935-1937)
- Pauline Gibling Schindler, taught piano
- Charles Phineas Schwartz, legal counsel and trustee
- Eleanor Clarke Slagle, started a workroom for handicapped people
- Ida Mott Smith, aide to Jane Addams, and her husband Robert Morss Lovett were residents (1921-1937)
- Viola Spolin, teacher, Recreational Training School
- Ellen Gates Starr, co-founder
- Alzina Stevens, labor leader and social reformer
- Anne Swainson, taught textiles (1915-1919)
Famous People Who Visited or Were Helped
- Henry Standing Bear, resident
- Benny Goodman, joined the boys club band
- Gerard Swope, resident who later worked for General Electric Company
See also
- Jane Addams Burial Site
- History of social work
- Hull House Music School
- Settlement and community houses in the United States
- List of settlement houses in Chicago
