Analysis Of Twenty Years At Hull House By Jane Addams

Jane Addam’s book, Twenty Years at Hull House, describes the work her and her colleagues did in their Settlement house on the West Side of Chicago. Jane Addams was a pioneer of social work who focused much of her efforts in working with immigrant populations and those in need, along with working to make change at the micro, mezzo, and macro levels. This paper will address the ways she went about creating change, the American values that guided her social work, along with ways that the principles and values of her work are still ones used today in social work. Jane Addams and Ellen Star opened Hull house on September 18, 1889. Her inspiration for Hull house was spawned by her visit to the London settlement house, Toynbee Hall. She felt deeply

For example, the improper collection of garbage was found to be correlated with the high death rate of the ward, attributable to “filth diseases” (Addams, 1912, p. 174). Addams pressed for garbage collection and after its implementation the death rate of the ward went down. Another mezzo-level impact of Hull house includes the public baths for their neighborhood. First, there were three baths in the basement of Hull house, then the residents helped to have a public bathhouse built. These baths gave neighbors a place to properly clean themselves and were popular amongst the

For example, an investigation into the long hours and unsanitary conditions of children’s’ places of employment led to Addams urging legislation for child labor laws. She was successful in her endeavor and the first factory laws of Illinois were enacted that mandated children had to be 14 years old to work and that certain sanitary requirements were upheld. Another law Hull house helped to create was the law regarding a woman’s workweek. Hull house found that women were being overworked and from there the first law regarding the maximum hours women could work was enacted, limiting it to 48 hours a week. Addams helped to improve the lives of her neighbors, but also residents of the state with the legislations she helped to