“Where We Lived” by Jack Larkin

I borrowed this book from the library a few months ago, in an effort to learn more about everyday life in 18th century America. It’s a incredibly fascinating coffee-table style book, with lots of photos from the Historic American Buildings Survey of the Library of Congress. The architecture of the time, naturally, mirrored the practical needs of the time. Central chimneys in colder places to heat the whole house. “Plain” houses where Quakers settled. Outdoor kitchens and porches in the South, where the climate was warmer. The whole chapter on the South was eye-opening, it described how the quality of life was much worse there — despite the fertile soil and warmer weather — because of slavery. The institution of slavery dragged everyone down with it except for the “1%”.

The homes and buildings of a people are wonderful anthropological artifacts. It’s fortunate someone made a record of these places in the early 20th century, before they were probably all bulldozed to create highways and housing developments.