Endnotes for African American Family in Park Forest

30 miles south Time, “Planned Brotherhood,” January 18, 1960, 18.

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27,372 U.S. Bureau of the Census, U.S. Census of Population and Housing: 1960 Census Tracts, Final Report PHC(1)-26 (Washington, D.C., 1962). Table P-1: General Characteristics of the Population, By Census Tracts: 1960, 20.

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5-room In 1960, the median number of rooms per housing unit in Park Forest was 5.3. County and City Data Books, Retrieved June 26, 2006, from the University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu.proxy.lib.ohio-state.edu/collections/stats/ccdb/ (2003).

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twenties In 1960, the median age in Park Forest was 21.4. County and City Data Books, Retrieved June 26, 2006, from the University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu.proxy.lib.ohio-state.edu/collections/stats/ccdb/ (2003).

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college In 1960, the median number of school years completed in Park Forest was 13.6. U.S. Bureau of the Census, U.S. Census of Population and Housing: 1960 Census Tracts, Final Report PHC(1)-26 (Washington, D.C., 1962). Table P-1: General Characteristics of the Population, By Census Tracts: 1960, 20.

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$8,943 U.S. Bureau of the Census, U.S. Census of Population and Housing: 1960 Census Tracts, Final Report PHC(1)-26 (Washington, D.C., 1962). Table P-1: General Characteristics of the Population, By Census Tracts: 1960, 20. $8,943 in 2004 dollars is $57,074.23. NASA, Consumer Price Index Inflation Calculator, http://www1.jsc.nasa.gov/bu2/inflateCPI.html

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$17,500 In 1960, the median value of owner occupied single family units was $17,500. County and City Data Books, Retrieved June 26, 2006, from the University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu.proxy.lib.ohio-state.edu/collections/stats/ccdb/ (2003). $17,500 in 2004 dollars is $111,685. NASA, Consumer Price Index Inflation Calculator, http://www1.jsc.nasa.gov/bu2/inflateCPI.html

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two years In 1960, 48.8% of occupied units in Park Forest were moved into less than two years before. In comparison, in 1960, 33.7% of occupied units in Chicago were moved into less than two years before. Like many other suburban communities, Park Forest experienced fairly high rates of turnover as men were promoted and transferred within their companies. County and City Data Books, Retrieved June 26, 2006, from the University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu.proxy.lib.ohio-state.edu/collections/stats/ccdb/ (2003).

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map of Park Forest Thomas A. Auger, "Deerfield, IL." The Electronic Encyclopedia of Chicago. Chicago Historical Society: 2005. Retrieved on June 26, 2006, from http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/369.html

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less expensive A less expensive home requires a lower down payment and lower monthly payments. For example, the FHA-required down payment on a house in Park Forest would be about $1,400 instead of the $2,600 to $4,000 required for a house in Deerfield. Leo Grebler, "Housing Issues in Economic Stabilization Policy," Occasional Paper 72 (Washington, D.C.: National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. 1960). Table 16: Illustration of Minimum Down-Payment Requirements on New 1-and 2-Family Homes Bought with FHA-insured Loans, 1955-1958, 75.

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problems According to Time magazine, "Some of the neighbors dropped in to welcome them, offer assistance, invite Mrs. Wilson to neighborhood coffee klatsches. Ethel Klutznick, wife of Park Forest developer Philip Klutznick, baked a cake with the inscription, "Welcome to the Wilsons to Park Forest. The Klutznicks." Others kept a dignified if haughty distance." Time, "Planned Brotherhood," January 18, 1960, 18.

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cautious Lenders probably considered lending to an African American in Park Forest less of a risk than in Deerfield, but were likely to remain cautious.

Lenders were often not able to cite a specific policy towards African Americans. A Cleveland banker quoted in The Cleveland Press, September 8, 1956, said: "We do not insist that neighborhoods be 50 percent colored, or insist on any arbitrary statistical line before lending to Negro applicants. Depends on circumstances." Lenders were more likely to lend in areas that were clearly transitioning from white to nonwhite occupancy. One African American family did not indicate that Park Forest was in transition. After gauging the response of the community to the first Negro resident, some lenders might decide to lend to others if it seemed profitable to do so. Despite the apparently benign reaction to the Wilsons, lenders would probably continue to be hesitant about lending to other African Americans--especially lower-income families such as the one in this simulation--in Park Forest until they had a better sense of the community's long-term response to the family. Davis McEntire, Residence and Race: Final and Comprehensive Report to the Commission on Race and Housing (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1960), 225-226.

Within eight years, however, many African Americans were able to find homes in Park Forest. Of 411 black families able to find homes in the suburbs of Chicago from 1959-1968, 180 of these were in Park Forest. Brian Berry, Carole Goodwin, Robert Lake, and Katherine Smith, “Attitudes toward Integration: The Role of Status in Community Response to Racial Change,” in The Changing Face of the Suburbs, ed. Barry Schwarz (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1976), 225.

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Park Forest street Image of single family homes along a street in Park Forest. Park Forest Public Library; scanned from Gregory C. Randall, America's Original GI Town: Park Forest, Illinois (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 161.

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Park Forest homes Image of homes similar to those designed by Levitt for Levittowns. Photo by Gregory C. Randall; scanned from Gregory C. Randall, America's Original GI Town: Park Forest, Illinois (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 174.

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least expensive Philip Klutznick, one of the developers of Park Forest, wanted to offer a variety of houses in a range of prices in order to appeal to the largest market possible, including the market that made too much money to qualify for public housing but not enough money to afford the houses being produced in the private market. Klutznick admitted to borrowing his design for the Eastgate subdivision from Levitt's standard Cape Cod design for Levittowns. Like Levitt's houses, the 750 square foot Cape Cods were originally built with two bedrooms on the ground floor and an unfinished second floor, but owners typically remodeled the second floor to make two additional rooms. Eastgate's 283 homes were the lowest-priced homes ever offered in Park Forest. In 1953, they sold for between $11,000 and $11,500--25 percent lower than anything else in the village. While they sold quickly, they continued to be the cheapest and least desirable houses in Park Forest. Gregory C. Randall, America's Original GI Town: Park Forest, Illinois (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 174-176. For more information on Levittown houses, see Barbara M. Kelley, Expanding the American Dream: Building and Rebuilding Levittown (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993).

$11,000 to $11,500 in 1960 dollars is $12,199 to $12,753.50. NASA, Consumer Price Index Inflation Calculator, http://www1.jsc.nasa.gov/bu2/inflateCPI.html

In The Organization Man, William Whyte argued that the Eastgate area “strain[s] Park Foresters’ pretensions of classlessness” because there were enough differences in the housing for everyone to know that they were the “lower class” of housing. However, Park Foresters did not like to call the people who lived there “working class," so they called them "people who work with their hands" or "blue collar." Even though the homes were well-designed and kept, everyone—including those who lived in them—knew that they were not quite a part of Park Forest as the others were. William H. Whyte, Jr. The Organization Man (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1956), 307-308.

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Park Forest remodel Image of remodeled home scanned from Gregory C. Randall, America's Original GI Town: Park Forest, Illinois (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 179.

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customize Critics of postwar suburban developments pointed out the conformity of their outward appearance. However, remodeling was one way consumers could bring individuality to a mass produced home. In 1960, the New York Times published an article titled "Guide to Remodeling: It Can Provide the Shortest Route to Ideal Quarters." The article suggested that "for many families today, a 'new' home is an old one that they have remodeled...Whatever the remodeling project, families who undertake it seem to fall into two categories: those who need more space than they can afford in a new home, and those who are tired of the stereotyped floor plans prevalent in buildings constructed today." New York Times, "Guide to Remodeling: It Can Provide the Shortest Route to Ideal Quarters," March 30, 1960, SMA4.

Levittown was the quintessential postwar suburban development. In Expanding the American Dream: Building and Rebuilding Levittown (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993), Barbara M. Kelley argues that Levittowners actively reshaped the interiors of their homes, initially through do-it-yourself projects and later through the growing industry of professional remodeling.

Kelly chides critics for their static view of postwar housing and advocates a dynamic view instead. Standardization was necessary to meet the enormous demand for housing after World War II. However, once the basic structures were built, owners modified and customized their living space to suit their own personal needs. The original design of the houses reinforced a value system that was desirable and acceptable to the target market of the builders—lower middle class and upper working class families. Kelley argues that these families were included but not coerced into the middle class by well-intentioned builders.

However, families often found that the idealized upper-middle class design did not suit the reality of their lower-middle class lives. Tension existed between lower-income residents who wanted to expand the kitchen and other working areas, and the developers, who sought to provide scaled-down versions of a thoroughly middle class house where leisure areas such as living rooms were larger. Producers designed the kitchen to accomodate the middle-class value of a “nonworking” wife. However, the 1956 Women’s Congress on Housing determined that the domestic workspace was too small. Homeowners responded to this problem with the concept of the squared kitchen, which provided women with more work space. Kelley argues that the status of the home may have declined, but consumers exerted agency in their inclusion into the middle class. They negotiated the extent to which they adapted middle class values in the arrangement of their physical space.

At first, remodeling projects were largely a do-it-yourself affair, but a professionalized and standardized remodeling industry quickly sprang up to meet the demand for customized housing. Families sought to make the most of their living space as they went through the various stages of the life cycle. The professional remodeling industry reclaimed some of consumers' agency in that it only offered so many options as were profitable. However, there were enough choices available that consumers could still have something relatively individualized if they were unable or unwilling to do an entire remodeling project by themselves. Like the remodeling industry, developers were driven by the profit motive to respond to consumers’ wishes. Levitt altered floor plans as well as exterior details to provide consumers with some choice, although exteriors were generally kept the same to maintain an outward appearance of conformity and aesthetic cohesion.

Kelly concludes that “although the deliverers had neglected to consult the homeowners prior to construction, the homeowners, far from being passive, were more than willing to answer their own needs” (100). A realistic representation of the suburban experience must take into account the dynamic changes that occur over time, rather than the typically static image of the suburbs as they were in the immediate postwar period.

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bedrooms Gregory C. Randall does not explicitly state this in America's Original GI Town: Park Forest, Illinois (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000); however, he does compare Eastgate to Levittown, and in Expanding the American Dream: Building and Rebuilding Levittown (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993), Barbara Kelley shows that finishing the second floor was one of the most popular alterations made to Levittown houses. I have inferred that it is likely that some Eastgate residents would have finished the second floor of their homes by 1960.

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Rich High School Image of Rich High School in 1953, electronically enhanced photo from the Lagoon yearbook, 1954, from http://www.brownlee.org/RichHS1956/index.html

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ultramodern Time, "Planned Brotherhood," January 18, 1960, 18.

In 1954, Park Forest was named an All-American City by the National Municipal League for its efforts to build Rich Township High School. The high school's physical structure was a $1,600,000 "learning laboratory." Its curriculum was based on the "life adjustment" concept that stressed vocational skills as well as academic subjects. Parents occasionally complained about the curriculum, demanding that more traditional academic subjects be offered. However, when asked what they wanted students to learn from their high school experience, most parents replied that they wanted their children to learn how to get along with other people.

Some parents felt that teachers at the six elementary schools were too “permissive” because they allowed children's curiosity to determine some of what they learned. Parents also questioned the flexibility of grading. Instead of assigning traditional letter grades and percentages, teachers used a checklist of criteria to rate student performance. William H. Whyte, Jr. The Organization Man (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1956), 382-390.

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educated An above-average number of teachers in Park Forest had M.S. or Ph.D. degrees. Their average salary was $4,500. Whyte notes that this was much lower than the average salary of the lowest-salaried junior executive in the community, making these highly qualified professionals a bargain for tax payers. Teachers faced high turnover rates in the student body as families traded up for more prestigious communities. William H. Whyte, Jr. The Organization Man (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1956), 382-390.

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Park Forest faculty Image of Rich Township High School Faculty in 1953-1954, courtesy Diane Pettingell Staes, from http://www.brownlee.org/RichHS1956/faculty52/firstfaculty.html

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Park Forest churches Image of the Hope Lutheran Church in Park Forest. Park Forest Public Library; scanned from Gregory C. Randall, America's Original GI Town: Park Forest, Illinois (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 136.

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religions The developers of Park Forest set aside church sites that would be free to any denomination as long as certain architectural standards were met. Catholics built St. Irenaeus; Jews built the Temple Beth Sholom on Western Avenue. Protestants built the United Protestant Church. Gregory C. Randall, America's Original GI Town: Park Forest, Illinois (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 136-138.

As of December 1955, 49.2% of homeowners in Park Forest were Protestants of some denomination, 30.7% were Roman Catholic, and 11.0% were Jewish. William H. Whyte, Jr. The Organization Man (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1956), 368.

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Park Forest shopping center Image of the Plaza in 1955. Park Forest Public Library; scanned from Gregory C. Randall, America's Original GI Town: Park Forest, Illinois (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 148.

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Plaza The Plaza was anchored by a Goldblatt's department store (1953) and a Marshall Field's department store (1955). A Sears opened in 1963. The Plaza was very successful throughout the 1950s and early 1960s. During the recession of 1957 and 1958, the Plaza's retail sales increased by 17 percent while the country's retail sales fell by almost 4 percent. However, the development of the River Oaks shopping center twelve miles from Park Forest in 1962 and Lincoln Mall in 1972 detracted from the Plaza's sales, and the shopping center began to gradually decline over the next four decades, losing Goldblatt's and Marshall Field's and undergoing several changes in ownership. Gregory C. Randall, America's Original GI Town: Park Forest, Illinois (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 140-156.

The Plaza contained 60 stores in 700,000 square feet of space, with parking for 3,000 cars. David Young, Chicago Transit: An Illustrated History (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 1998), 165.

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parking garage Image of a parking garage at State and Wacker Drive, viewed west from the twentieth floor of Executive House in 1959. Photograph by Don Honick, courtesy of the Chicago Historical Society, scanned from Harold M. Mayer and Richard C. Wade, Chicago: Growth of a Metropolis (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1969), 447.

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Chicago traffic jam Image of traffic jam on the Congress Expressway, Chicago, June 24, 1959, 6:55 p.m. National Museum of American History, America on the Move, http://americanhistory.si.edu/onthemove/exhibition/exhibition_15_4.html

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Public transportation In 1960, 30.2% of Park Forest residents used public transportation to get to work. Chicago had a slightly higher percentage (39.5%) of residents using public transportation to get to work. County and City Data Books, Retrieved June 26, 2006, from the University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu.proxy.lib.ohio-state.edu/collections/stats/ccdb/ (2003).

In 1957, the Chicago Transit Authority fares were 25 cents for surface, 25 cents for rapid transit, and no cost for a transfer. In 1961, the price of a transfer increased to 5 cents. David Young, Chicago Transit: An Illustrated History (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 1998), 175.

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traffic jams National Museum of American History, America on the Move, http://americanhistory.si.edu/onthemove/exhibition/exhibition_15_5.html and National Museum of American History, America on the Move, http://americanhistory.si.edu/onthemove/exhibition/exhibition_15_6.html

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drive Many families purchased a second automobile so the mother could perform errands and transport children while the father was at work. In Park Forest in 1960, 74.4% of occupied units had one automobile, and 23.1% had one or more automobile. In comparison, in 1960 only 51.6% of occupied units in Chicago had one automobile, and only 8.5% of occupied units had one or more automobile. County and City Data Books, Retrieved June 26, 2006, from the University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu.proxy.lib.ohio-state.edu/collections/stats/ccdb/ (2003).

By 1960 more than half of Park Forest's downtown commuters traveled to work by car. National Museum of American History, America on the Move, http://americanhistory.si.edu/onthemove/exhibition/exhibition_15_2.html

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parking garages The city built 74 parking garages for 14,000 cars during the 1950s. By 1972, congestion was extensive and the city banned further development of parking garages in order to discourage commuters from driving downtown. National Museum of American History, America on the Move, http://americanhistory.si.edu/onthemove/exhibition/exhibition_15_4.html

In 1976, John D. Kasarda observed that manufacturing activity had begun to drift out of the cities and into the suburbs; between 1947 and 1967, the central cities of the 23 largest and oldest Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas (SMSAs) lost an average of 17,370 manufacturing positions, while suburban rings gained an average of 85,000 manufacturing positions. Jobs requiring higher levels of education were accumulating in the city, but low-income residents who lived in the city because it was less expensive were not qualified for these jobs, nor could they afford to commute to the manufacturing jobs in the suburbs or afford to purchase a home in the suburbs. On the other hand, higher-income residents who could afford to live in the suburbs did so and commuted to the city for jobs. John D. Kasarda, ““The Changing Occupational Structure of the American Metropolis: Apropos the Urban Problem,” in The Changing Face of the Suburbs, ed. Barry Schwarz (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1976), 113-115.

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Commission on Human Relations The Social Action Committee of the Park Forest Unitarian Church also canvassed the neighborhood to gauge neighbors' response to new African American families. National Museum of American History, America on the Move, http://americanhistory.si.edu/onthemove/exhibition/exhibition_15_2.html

According to Time, "as soon as it became known that Charles Wilson intended to move in, he was met by a seven-man Commission on Human Relations and questioned about his job, the size of his family, whether or not he was a member of any active pressure groups (he was not). Then two-man teams moved through a two-block radius of Wilson's new house to acquaint each household with the facts about the new neighbors. In a few cases, the family clergyman had to be called in to soothe unduly ruffled householders. Press, radio and TV were told about the move, asked to say nothing about it to avoid attracting crackpots. They agreed." Time, "Planned Brotherhood," January 18, 1960, 18.

Time also notes the contrast between Park Forest and Deerfield's approach to integration, highlighted by a quote by Village President Robert Dinerstein: "The principal reason we've been successful is that the people of Park Forest are intelligent, responsible Americans who realize a person's rights under law. They may not be happy about a Negro living in Park Forest, but given the facts, they respect his rights under the law." Time, "Planned Brotherhood," January 18, 1960, 18.

Despite the celebratory tone of the Time piece, the motives of Park Foresters were probably not entirely altruistic towards African Americans. Given the national coverage of the incident in Deerfield, the leaders of Park Forest were likely as motivated by a fear of bad press as they were a true belief in integration, particularly in 1960 as fair housing was becoming politicized as a civil rights issue.

The Commission on Human Relations was apparently formed specifically to manage integration. Whites did not have to answer the Commission's questions, although the first (white) tenants to move into the village in 1948 had to apply and were screened according to income level, education, veteran status, and need. It appears that the Commission did not have any legal force to prevent African American families from moving in, but African Americans who complied with the interview were probably more welcomed than those who didn't. This simulation takes the view that while African Americans theoretically had the option of refusing to answer the questions, for practical purposes they did not. Additional research conducted on families who refused to answer the questions could alter the design of the simulation. Park Forest's response to the growing issue of fair housing as a civil right, while perhaps not the response we would expect today, seemed at the time to be fairly progressive.

African American perception of the Commission on Human Relations certainly varied individually, but the Wilsons (the first African American family to move into Park Forest) and the Robinsons (another African American family that moved into Park Forest in 1963) apparently accepted the practice of the Commission. Yvonne and Leonard Robinson, who moved into Park Forest in 1963, appreciated the community involvement because in 1962 protestors had burned down Yvonne's brother’s house in another suburb. National Museum of American History, America on the Move, http://americanhistory.si.edu/onthemove/exhibition/exhibition_15_2.html

Whether the Wilsons appreciated the idea of a Commission on Human Relations or whether they simply tolerated it in order to move into the home they wanted to is unknown. Nevertheless, of 411 black families able to find homes in the suburbs of Chicago from 1959-1968, 180 of these were in Park Forest. Brian Berry, Carole Goodwin, Robert Lake, and Katherine Smith, “Attitudes toward Integration: The Role of Status in Community Response to Racial Change,” in The Changing Face of the Suburbs, ed. Barry Schwarz (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1976), 225.

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questions The questions used in this simulation are based on the information given in Time, "Planned Brotherhood," January 18, 1960, 18. According to Time, Mr. Wilson was "questioned about his job, the size of his family, whether or not he was a member of any active pressure groups (he was not)."

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civil rights organizations I have interpreted "active pressure groups" from Time, "Planned Brotherhood," January 18, 1960, 18, to mean civil rights organizations.

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mortgage The median family income of nonwhite families with FHA loans in 1956 was $5,319. $5,319 in 1960 dollars is $5,787. Even with the inclusion of the wife's income, the African American family in this simulation makes almost $2,000 less than this amount, making it unlikely that they would be able to secure an FHA loan. Davis McEntire, Residence and Race: Final and Comprehensive Report to the Commission on Race and Housing (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1960), 220; NASA, Consumer Price Index Inflation Calculator, http://www1.jsc.nasa.gov/bu2/inflateCPI.html

Although the low interest rates associated with VA and FHA loans benefited borrowers, the higher interest rates on conventional mortgages benefited lenders, making them more attractive to them. Saul B. Klaman explains, “in the face of generally rising interest rates and yields, federally underwritten mortgages with less flexible rates became unattractive to investors with alternative uses of funds.” Federally underwritten mortgages suffered a competitive interest rate disadvantage compared to conventional mortgages. The FHA was legally able to increase the permitted maximum interest rate on FHA loans to make them more competitive with conventional loans (as it did for example in December of 1956 when it increased the interest rate from 4 ½ to 5 per cent. However, the VA had no authority to increase the interest rate on VA loans, which was at 4 ½ percent as 1956 ended. Federally-underwritten mortgages, although advantageous to borrowers, could be difficult to obtain depending on the status of the market at any given time. See Saul B. Klaman, The Postwar Residential Mortgage Market: A Study by the National Bureau of Economic Research (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1961), 63 and 73.

The median family income of nonwhite families with conventional mortgages in 1956 was $3,835. $3,835 in 1960 dollars is $4,172.48. The African American family in this simulation makes close to this amount if the wife's income is included, but it is not (see working below). Although houses in Park Forest cost less than houses in Deerfield, a family would still probably have to make more than the median to be approved for a loan. Davis McEntire, Residence and Race: Final and Comprehensive Report to the Commission on Race and Housing (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1960), 220; NASA, Consumer Price Index Inflation Calculator, http://www1.jsc.nasa.gov/bu2/inflateCPI.html

The median family income of nonwhite families with no mortgages in 1956 was $2,238. $2,238 in 1960 dollars is $2,435. Families without mortgages could usually only afford the least expensive housing available, which was typically overcrowded and often in slum areas. Davis McEntire, Residence and Race: Final and Comprehensive Report to the Commission on Race and Housing (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1960), 220; NASA, Consumer Price Index Inflation Calculator, http://www1.jsc.nasa.gov/bu2/inflateCPI.html

The African American family in this simulation has an income between the median for a conventional mortgage and no mortgage. It is feasible to suggest that this family might be approved for a conventional mortgage at a higher interest rate than a government-underwritten mortgage in an area where many African Americans already lived and where relatively inexpensive housing could be found.

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The 1968 Fair Housing Act prohibited discrimination in the sale, rental, and financing of housing on account of race, color, religion, and national origin, but discrimination on the basis of sex was not prohibited. Not until the passage of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act in 1973 prohibited discrimination on account of sex or marital status, and a 1974 companion bill prohibited discrimination on account of sex under the Fair Housing Act, were women's incomes regularly considered in lending decisions (before the laws were passed, women's incomes were considered in limited cases where her husband could not qualify on the basis of his income alone and where the woman was in the later part of her childbearing years or had already had two or more children). Emily Card, "Women, Housing Access, and Mortgage Credit," Signs, Vol. 5, No. 3, Supplement: Women and the American City (Spring, 1980), S216-S218.

A woman had a better chance of her income being counted if she was employed in a professional occupation. The wife in this simulation is not. Policies varied among and even within institutions. Some lenders would count some, but not all, of a wife's income. Some lenders required a "baby letter" attesting to the husband or wife's sterility, use of approved birth control methods, or willingness to terminate a pregnancy in order to count the wife's income. U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, Mortgage Money: Who Gets It? A Case Study in Mortgage Lending Discrimination in Hartford, Connecticut, (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1974), 18-29.

In 1960, the median income of female private household workers (white and nonwhite) working full-time and year round (35 hours or more for 50 weeks or more) was $1,224. The wife in this simulation works only part-time, but the (approximately) $600 dollars she contributes to the family income could make the difference between qualifying for a home or not. However, even if the wife's income were included in this case, $3,900 a year would still not be enough to buy a $23,000 house. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Statistical Abstract of the United States: 1962, Eighty-third edition (Washington, D.C., 1962). Table No. 454: Money Income of Persons--Recipients and Median Income, By Major Occupation Group and Sex: 1960, 336.

The figures for the median income of female private household workers include both white and nonwhite females; however, in Residence and Race: Final and Comprehensive Report to the Commission on Race and Housing (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1960), Davis McEntire suggests that the gap between the incomes of white and nonwhite females is significantly smaller than the gap between the incomes of white and nonwhite males, perhaps because nonwhite women tend to complete more education and are able to obtain better-paying jobs as a result, because nonwhite women are perceived as less of a threat than nonwhite men, or because sex is the primary form of discrimination faced by all women regardless of race.

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Lenders were often not able to cite a specific policy towards African Americans. A Cleveland banker quoted in The Cleveland Press, September 8, 1956, said: "We do not insist that neighborhoods be 50 percent colored, or insist on any arbitrary statistical line before lending to Negro applicants. Depends on circumstances." Lenders were more likely to lend in areas that were clearly transitioning from white to nonwhite occupancy. One African American family did not indicate that Park Forest was in transition. After gauging the response of the community to the first African American resident, some lenders might decide to lend to others if it seemed profitable to do so. Despite the apparently benign reaction to the Wilsons, lenders would probably continue to be hesitant about lending to other African Americans in Park Forest until they had a better sense of the community's long-term response to the family. Davis McEntire, Residence and Race: Final and Comprehensive Report to the Commission on Race and Housing (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1960), 225-226.

Within eight years, however, many African Americans were able to find homes in Park Forest. Of 411 black families able to find homes in the suburbs of Chicago from 1959-1968, 180 of these were in Park Forest. Brian Berry, Carole Goodwin, Robert Lake, and Katherine Smith, “Attitudes toward Integration: The Role of Status in Community Response to Racial Change,” in The Changing Face of the Suburbs, ed. Barry Schwarz (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1976), 225.

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Negro subdivision Time, "A Lift in Living," September 21, 1959, 28.

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$13,000 In 2000, the median value of owner-occupied housing units in Markham was $75,200 according to census data cited on http://www.trulia.com/city/IL/Markham/ $75,200 in 1960 dollars is $12,934.40. NASA, Consumer Price Index Inflation Calculator, http://www1.jsc.nasa.gov/bu2/inflateCPI.html

Comparable communities listed in Time suggest that $13,000 is a reasonable estimate of the price of a house in Markham in 1960. "Blooming on the outskirts of dozens of cities are hundreds of new communities such as Park Terrace: Crestwood Forest (150 homes, $12,000-$60,000) near Atlanta; Lakeview Gardens (614 homes, $9,000-$19,000) near Memphis; Pontchartrain Park (725 homes, $14,300-$25,000) near New Orleans; Dunbar Estates' Westbury Houses (200 homes, $14,000-$20,000) in Long Island; University Park (400 homes, $11,000-$15,000) near Charlotte, N.C.; integrated (53% white, 47% Negro) Concord Park (139 homes, $12,700-$14,350) near Philadelphia." Time, "A Lift in Living," September 21, 1959, 28.

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installments Time, "A Lift in Living," September 21, 1959, 28.

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