University Settlement Society of New York is located at 184 Eldridge Street (corner of Rivington and Eldridge streets) on New York's Lower East Side

Lower East Side

The Lower East Side, LES, is a neighborhood in the southeastern part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is roughly bounded by Allen Street, East Houston Street, Essex Street, Canal Street, Eldridge Street, East Broadway, and Grand Street....

. It provides myriad services for the mostly immigrant population of the neighborhood and has since 1886, when it was established as the first settlement house in the United States.

History

University Settlement was found by Stanton Coit in 1886 as The Neighborhood Guild.

Historically the settlement house, much like other settlement houses like Hull House

Hull House

Hull House is a settlement house in the United States that was co-founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Located in the Near West Side of , Hull House opened its doors to the recently arrived European immigrants. By 1911, Hull House had grown to 13 buildings. In 1912 the Hull...

 in Chicago and the Henry Street Settlement

Henry Street Settlement

The Henry Street Settlement is a not-for-profit social service agency in the Lower East Side neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City that provides social services, arts programs and health care services to New Yorkers of all ages. It was founded in 1893 by Progressive reformer Lillian Wald.The...

 (also on the Lower East Side), served as a homes for hundreds of thousands of immigrants who arrived in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th century. They provided courses for new immigrants on everything from politics to the English language to basketball. The University Settlement House also included a library, kindergarten and bath house. These settlements were also loci of Progressive reform.

When founded, the resident workers at the University Settlement were all male and recent graduates of colleges. Several of these men were writers in addition to settlement house workers and used their writing as social protest and a means of reform. Residents from 1900-1907 included: socialist writer William English Walling

William English Walling

William English Walling was an American labor reformer and socialist born in Louisville, Kentucky. He was the grandson of William Hayden English, the Democratic candidate for vice president in 1880, and was born into wealth. He was educated at the University of Chicago and at Harvard Law School...

 (a founder of the NAACP); Pulitzer Prize winner Ernest Poole

Ernest Poole

Ernest Cook Poole was an American novelist.He was born in Chicago, Illinois on January 23, 1880, and graduated from Princeton University in 1902...

; Howard Brubaker

Howard Brubaker

Howard Brubaker was an editor of Success and Liberator and a contributor to the New Yorker, Collier's Weekly, The New Republic, Saturday Evening Post, Country Gentleman, and many other magazines. He published over 100 short stories and a number of non-fiction pieces on contemporary affairs,...

, who later became a columnist for The New Yorker

The New Yorker

The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...

; writer Arthur Bullard; journalist Hamilton Holt

Hamilton Holt

Hamilton Holt was an American educator, editor, author and politician.-Editor:...

; and author Walter Weyl

Walter Weyl

Walter Weyl was an intellectual leader of the Progressive movement in the United States. his most influential book, The New Democracy was a classic statement of democratic meliorism, revealing his path to a future of progress and modernization based on middle class values, aspirations and brain...

, a founding editor of The New Republic

The New Republic

The magazine has also published two articles concerning income inequality, largely criticizing conservative economists for their attempts to deny the existence or negative effect increasing income inequality is having on the United States...

. Their interest in reform led to several articles and books on the housing and employment situation of workers on the Lower East Side, particularly women and children.

One issue that captured the imagination of many of the University Settlement writers was revolution in Russia. Many of the immigrants they met on the Lower East Side were Jews from the Russian empire

Russian Empire

The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...

 who were typically severely repressed under Nicholas II of Russia

Nicholas II of Russia

Nicholas II was the last Emperor of Russia, Grand Prince of Finland, and titular King of Poland. His official short title was Nicholas II, Emperor and Autocrat of All the Russias and he is known as Saint Nicholas the Passion-Bearer by the Russian Orthodox Church.Nicholas II ruled from 1894 until...

. Through their interaction with these immigrants several of the residents became vocal advocates of reform in Russia. In 1905-1906, Poole, Walling and Bullard traveled to Russia to cover the abortive 1905 Revolution. They established contacts and helped establish a connection between radical writers in the United States and Russian revolutionaries.
During his presidency, Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...

 described University Settlement as "a landmark in the social history of the nation."

Legacy

University Settlement continues to provide support services to residents of the Lower East Side, and now offers programs in 21 locations across Manhattan and Brooklyn. Programs serve New Yorkers of all ages and include child care, pre-school, housing assistance, mental health services, college and career preparation, crisis intervention, activities for seniors, arts events, English classes, after-school programs and summer camps.

Notable University Settlement Alumni and Staff

Howard Brubaker

Howard Brubaker

Howard Brubaker was an editor of Success and Liberator and a contributor to the New Yorker, Collier's Weekly, The New Republic, Saturday Evening Post, Country Gentleman, and many other magazines. He published over 100 short stories and a number of non-fiction pieces on contemporary affairs,...

 (former columnist for The New Yorker

The New Yorker

The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...

)

Arthur Bullard (writer)

Nicholas Murray Butler (Nobel Peace Prize recipient)

Andrew Carnegie

Andrew Carnegie

Andrew Carnegie was a Scottish-American industrialist, businessman, and entrepreneur who led the enormous expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century...

 (industrialist and businessman)

George Gershwin

George Gershwin

George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known...

 (musician)

Ira Gershwin

Ira Gershwin

Ira Gershwin was an American lyricist who collaborated with his younger brother, composer George Gershwin, to create some of the most memorable songs of the 20th century....

 (musician)

Joseph Benson Gilder

Joseph Benson Gilder

Joseph Benson Gilder was an American editor, brother of Richard Watson Gilder and Jeannette Leonard Gilder and the explorer William Henry Gilder....

 (former editor of The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

 "Review of Books")

Samuel Halpert

Samuel Halpert

Samuel Halpert was born in 1884 in Białystok, Russia and he died in 1930 in Detroit, Michigan. He was an American painter.-Early days:Samuel Halpert was born on December 25, 1884 in Białystok, Russia, where his friend Max Weber had been born three years earlier. His family immigrated to New York...

 (artist)

Hamilton Holt

Hamilton Holt

Hamilton Holt was an American educator, editor, author and politician.-Editor:...

 (journalist)

Henry Holt (publisher) 

Seth Low

Seth Low

Seth Low , born in Brooklyn, New York, was an American educator and political figure who served as mayor of Brooklyn, as President of Columbia University, as diplomatic representative of the United States, and as Mayor of New York City...

 (former Mayor of New York City)

Gifford Pinchot

Gifford Pinchot

Gifford Pinchot was the first Chief of the United States Forest Service and the 28th Governor of Pennsylvania...

 (former Governor of Pennsylvania)

Ernest Poole

Ernest Poole

Ernest Cook Poole was an American novelist.He was born in Chicago, Illinois on January 23, 1880, and graduated from Princeton University in 1902...

 (Pulitzer Prize winner)

Peter Riegert

Peter Riegert

Peter Riegert is an American actor, screenwriter, and film director, best known for his role as Boon from Animal House and crooked New Jersey State Assemblyman Ronald Zellman on the HBO original series The Sopranos.-Early life:...

 (actor)

Elihu Root

Elihu Root

Elihu Root was an American lawyer and statesman and the 1912 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He was the prototype of the 20th century "wise man", who shuttled between high-level government positions in Washington, D.C...

 (Nobel Peace Prize recipient)

Carl Schurz

Carl Schurz

Carl Christian Schurz was a German revolutionary, American statesman and reformer, and Union Army General in the American Civil War. He was also an accomplished journalist, newspaper editor and orator, who in 1869 became the first German-born American elected to the United States Senate.His wife,...

 (former US Senator and Cabinet member)

Jacob Schiff

Jacob Schiff

Jacob Henry Schiff, born Jakob Heinrich Schiff was a German-born Jewish American banker and philanthropist, who helped finance, among many other things, the Japanese military efforts against Tsarist Russia in the Russo-Japanese War.From his base on Wall Street, he was the foremost Jewish leader...

 (banker and philanthropist)

Barney Sedran

Barney Sedran

Barney Sedran was one of the great early pro basketball players in the 1910s and 1920s.-Career:Nicknamed "Mighty Mite", the New York City native who grew up on the Lower East Side, Sedran was a member of the well-known New York Whirlwinds and Cleveland Rosenblums, among many other teams in New...

 (Basketball Hall of Fame)

Charles Bunstein Stover

Charles Bunstein Stover

Charles Bunstein Stover was the Parks Commissioner for New York City.-Biography:He was born in Riegelsville, Pennsylvania, on July 14, 1861. He attended Lafayette College and graduated in 1881. He was trained as a Presbyterian minister at the Union Theological Seminary and graduated in 1884...

 (former New York City Parks Commissioner)

William English Walling

William English Walling

William English Walling was an American labor reformer and socialist born in Louisville, Kentucky. He was the grandson of William Hayden English, the Democratic candidate for vice president in 1880, and was born into wealth. He was educated at the University of Chicago and at Harvard Law School...

 (NAACP founder)

Walter Weyl

Walter Weyl

Walter Weyl was an intellectual leader of the Progressive movement in the United States. his most influential book, The New Democracy was a classic statement of democratic meliorism, revealing his path to a future of progress and modernization based on middle class values, aspirations and brain...

 (author and founding editor of The New Republic

The New Republic

The magazine has also published two articles concerning income inequality, largely criticizing conservative economists for their attempts to deny the existence or negative effect increasing income inequality is having on the United States...

)

External links

• http://www.universitysettlement.org/