{"id":411,"date":"2024-04-26T20:11:53","date_gmt":"2024-04-26T20:11:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/?p=411"},"modified":"2026-04-06T18:12:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T18:12:07","slug":"womens-coops","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/womens-coops\/","title":{"rendered":"The Women\u2019s Cooperative Houses (1936–1956)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Enrollment at Michigan State grew stratospherically during the era 1920\u20131950. Especially fulsome was the growth in number of female students, as the Division of Home Economics (established 1896 and commonly called the \u201cWomen\u2019s Course\u201d) reached maturity. A dedicated Home Economics building<\/a> in 1924 improved the classroom and laboratory plant, which contributed to increased enrollment: from 537 female students in 1925, the total rose to 1,003 by 1930, and over 2,600 by 1940. In the decade that followed (1940\u20131950) women\u2019s enrollment grew by an average of 275 students every year.1<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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218 Albert Street looked like an ordinary foursquare from the front, but was uncommonly deep. After more than a decade as the \u201cCollege Residence\u201d dormitory annex, it was home to Phi Chi Alpha (a local society<\/a>), as seen here circa 1930. It was the original location of Elsworth cooperative house, which owned it 1940\u201350. It was demolished for a parking lot. Image source: Wolverine<\/em> (1930), p. 264.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Housing stock to satisfy this growth was slow in coming, and without it the College was unable to accept as many students as wanted to enroll. Several options were pursued, none of them very satisfactory. The instructors\u2019 residence Howard Terrace<\/a> was reassigned as a women\u2019s dormitory in 1914 but only stood until 1922. As early as 1915, several off-campus houses including the Dickson house<\/a> were rented as women\u2019s dormitory annexes, with College-employed matrons living at each. Most of these houses lacked in-house dining options, so the students instead had to take their meals at one of the boarding clubs, either in Morrill Hall<\/a> or in \u201cCollege Residence,\u201d one of the annexes that housed sixteen students at 218 Albert Street. In 1920, women returned to Abbot Hall<\/a>, kicking the men out and igniting a major exodus of male students to off-campus housing.2<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Board\u2019s decision in 1923 to allow sororities to establish off-campus houses\u2014and the chartering of several new sororities during the mid-1920s\u2014helped somewhat, but \u201cwomen could only live off campus at a sorority house if it was their second term and they had a C average or better.\u201d The former Woodbury<\/a> and Hagadorn<\/a> houses, known by then as \u201cEldon House\u201d and \u201cWaterbury House,\u201d were used as dormitory annexes for a few years, but these held barely two dozen each. A few Faculty Row<\/a> houses were converted as well, usually as Home Economics practice houses. Meanwhile students from Lansing, East Lansing, and other nearby towns were required to commute from home, rather than live in closer proximity to their classmates, to save room for those who came from farther away.3<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, new campus dormitories were constructed, a total of six between 1931 and 1947. The first new dormitory since Morrill Hall<\/a> in 1900, Mary Mayo Hall was completed in 1931 and housed 246 women\u2014of the 1,029 that were enrolled. This was not nearly enough, and even as the College worked for funding to build \u201cDormitory #2\u201d (Sarah Langdon Williams Hall, completed 1937) it looked for alternative housing solutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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North Hall dormitory in winter, circa 1940. Image source: Wolverine<\/em> (1940), p. 376.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

One alternative was found in 1936, when the College purchased the Campus Hotel at 215\u2013217 Louis Court from Curtis Beachum (M.S.C. ’31). Also known as the Campus Apartments, it had been built by local developer and businesswoman Mary E. Champe<\/a> and opened in 1924 as a \u201cmodern apartment house, arranged to care for transients as well as family trade.\u201d The College renamed it \u201cNorth Hall Dormitory\u201d and housed ninety-two women there, and retained Beachum and his wife Margie as commons manager and house mother respectively. North Hall remained in operation until 1950, when it was sold. It is no longer standing.4<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Union Memorial Building<\/a> had a dormitory for a while. In 1936, it was planned to co-opt the classroom spaces of the new WPA-funded addition to house seventy students. This notion seems to have been discarded, but some form of a dormitory did exist on the second, third, and fourth floors. Whether it was in the original building\u2019s upstairs living spaces, built to welcome returning alumni and distinguished guests, or elsewhere is not clear. What is certain is that Stella McDaniel was appointed as \u201cHostess in the Union Dormitory\u201d from September 1937 until she was transferred to Louise Hathaway Campbell Hall (\u201cDormitory #3\u201d) upon its opening two years later, when the Union ceased to be used \u201cfor girls\u2019 dormitory purposes.\u201d5<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, with funding for dormitory construction at a premium and requiring a legislative appropriation, with no nearby apartment buildings to rent or buy, and with the Works Progress Administration keeping at least as close a watch on its grants as the Legislature did its appropriations, the Board of Agriculture was running out of options. After all, they could not simply allow women to live off-campus in unsanctioned, unchaperoned rental housing. This was the era of in loco parentis<\/em>. That freedom was still decades away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition, the dormitory annexes had an economic shortcoming. Where a handful of College employees could operate a dormitory to shelter two hundred or more, it was simply not economical to provide the same level of staffing in a house of no more than two dozen. Hence the reason for the boarding clubs that aggregated meal service in a few locations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With all of this in mind, in April 1936 the Board of Agriculture formed a Dormitory Committee which recommended a solution that provided more housing without new construction, with a minimum of strings attached, and without the overhead of a dormitory annex: a \u201ccooperative house for girls.\u201d The plan made a lot of sense. Residents would share a division of labor in cooking, cleaning, and management of the house. They would budget, plan, and cook all their meals, keep the kitchen and rooms tidy, and perform routine maintenance. In return they would receive a moderate discount on their room and board fees, as well as a daily practicum in home economics (although by the 1930s only about half of women students were majoring in that division). Like a dormitory annex, the College would cover the cost of leasing the property, but its staffing cost would be limited to the salary for one resident hostess. It was a win-win for the students and the College.6<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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129 Division Street in 1930, its final year as the Sigma Kappa sorority house. Six years later it would become Concord House. One of the houses in the background, 419 Albert Street, is still standing; the rest in this photo are all gone. Image source: Wolverine<\/em> (1930), p. 304.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The first cooperative house opened for the 1936\u201337 school year and was named \u201cConcord House.\u201d (This author likes to think this was in honor of Concordia, the Roman goddess of harmony and social agreement.) It stood at 129 Division Street and was leased from Leon and Pauline Meriam for a term of three years at $1,320 per year. The Meriams soon offered to sell the property to the College but were rebuffed. While other houses in the program would come and go, Concord House would continue\u2014with one relocation\u2014throughout the co-op era.7<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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An M.S.C. Record<\/em> article from February 1937 illustrates life at Concord House, with (to modern eyes) a dismissively sexist tone that is all too typical of the era. Image source: MSU Archives<\/a><\/span>, which has a scan of the complete issue<\/a><\/span>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

One factor of the cooperative houses, previously alluded to, was that each was appointed with a resident Hostess. These were generally older women, usually married and quite often widowed, and they were there\u2014at least in part\u2014to act as constant chaperones. (Although \u201chostess\u201d soon became the standard\u2014if euphemistic\u2014job title, in the early years of off-campus housing that term was used interchangeably with matron, housemother, or chaperone.) Della C. Lamb was the first \u201cchaperone\u201d of Concord House, but she was replaced within a couple of months by \u201chostess\u201d Mollie H. Cole. The College provided them with room and board within the houses, and paid their salaries which were a meager $10 per month. It employed similar staffers in the dormitories, sorority houses, and even the fraternities.8<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Concord House was the prototype for the experiment, and a second test house was added for the 1937\u201338 year: \u201cRochdale House,\u201d named for the Rochdale Society of Equitable Pioneers, a consumer cooperative founded in England in 1844 that was the basis for the modern cooperative movement. Rochdale stands at 406 M.A.C. Avenue and was owned by O. J. Ayrs<\/a>, who leased it on a three year term at $800 per year. Rochdale also remained in the co-op system for the duration, is still standing and is (apparently) completely intact.9<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Cowles House, formerly Faculty Row \u2116 1, c. 1940s. Image source: MSU Archives<\/a><\/span>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Concord and Rochdale were complete successes\u2014so much so that even as Sarah Williams Hall added space for 260 occupants in 1937 (much of it, however, in replacement for the conversion of Morrill Hall<\/a> to academic use), the co-op housing system ramped up quickly, adding five more houses for the 1938\u201339 school year, making seven total. The following year the College added another co-op house to replace one that had closed, but did not need to lease it: after the College Hospital<\/a> vacated Faculty Row \u2116 1<\/a> for the new Olin Health Center, the old president\u2019s house was converted to become \u201cCowles House.\u201d This co-op was named for Alice B. Cowles, daughter of Albert Cowles (one of the College\u2019s first students in 1857) and mother of Frederick Cowles Jenison (M.A.C. w\/\u201907) who had recently died having bequeathed his sizable estate to the College. \u2116 1 had housed female students previously, as a dormitory annex from 1915 to 1924. (The \u201cCowles House\u201d name has since been reapplied to Faculty Row \u2116 7<\/a>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On a side note, 1939 was also the year that Hedrick House, a men\u2019s independent student cooperative named for Professor Wilbur Hedrick<\/a>, was founded at M.S.C. and rented a property at 405 Abbot Road. The fact that the College was in the vanguard of the cooperative movement, ahead of independent progressives, is seen by this author as an indication of how desperate the College was to increase its housing capacity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The last house to enter the co-op system, 118 Albert Street became the Catherine Black House in 1945. This photo is from 1925, when it was the Alpha Phi sorority house and its owner, Mrs. Black, was the house matron. Image source: Wolverine<\/em> (1925), p. 188.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The year 1941 saw the co-op system reach its peak, with eleven houses active: nine off-campus rentals and two Faculty Row conversions including \u2116 2, known as \u201cShaw House\u201d for May Travis Shaw; she, her husband Robert and daughter Sarah had lived there during Robert Shaw<\/a>\u2019s tenure as College President. Among the nine rental properties were three houses that the East Lansing Historic Commission later rated as Significant Structures<\/a> (albeit for reasons other than having been co-op houses): Taft House<\/a>, Potter House<\/a>, and Sanford House<\/a>. This high-water mark held steady for about five years, with a few houses opened to replace others that were closed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then in 1945\u201346 Cowles House and Shaw House, along with their neighbors on Faculty Row\u2014\u2116 3, \u2116 4, and \u2116 5\u2014were torn down to make room for Dormitories #4, #5, and #6 (Linda Landon<\/a> Hall, Elida Yakeley Hall, and Maude Gilchrist Hall respectively). Taft House on Grove Street was closed. Presumably in the expectation that dormitory accommodations would soon expand, these co-ops were not replaced, beginning the gradual decline of the system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Ewing House, its bones gradually being picked clean, during its demolition in 1953. It had been designed by Edwyn Bowd<\/a> in 1899 for J. D. Towar<\/a>, who proudly stated in his 1933 history that it \u201cstands as the oldest modern residence in East Lansing north of Grand River Avenue.\u201d†<\/a><\/sup> The house, previously owned by Ella Gale Kedzie<\/a>, was removed to extend Albert Street west of Abbot Road. Image source: Miller<\/a>, p. 81.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Potter House closed in 1949 when Mrs. Potter \u201cnotified the College that she [did] not desire to renew the lease.\u201d In 1950, Concord House relocated one block north to 225 Division Street, and its original home was demolished for a parking lot. Benson House on M.A.C. Avenue seems to have closed around 1951, to be replaced by St. John Catholic Church. Ewing House and Catherine Black House both closed in 1953 and were demolished. The last four houses\u2014the pioneering Concord, its early sibling Rochdale, Robinson, and Sanford\u2014finally closed at the end of the 1955\u201356 school year. (Concord and Robinson are no longer standing, but Rochdale and Sanford<\/a> remain.)10<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet the cooperative housing system did not completely end. In June 1956, the Board convened a committee to \u201cdevelop more detailed information about a possible type of housing for women students to take the place of the cooperative houses that have now been discontinued.\u201d The result was an on-campus cooperative housing unit boasting thirty-six apartment-style residences, opened in 1957 and named Van Hoosen Hall in honor of the family of Sarah Van Hoosen Jones, former two-term member of the Board who had generously bequeathed her family\u2019s 385-acre Centennial farm in Oakland County to Michigan State.11<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For twenty years, the women\u2019s cooperative project served to alleviate, in a small way, some of the housing deficit of a rapidly expanding institution. From a fiscal standpoint it was a decent success, as it proved to be cost-effective and economical, especially in comparison with some of its alternatives. However, this tends to elide over the larger picture of the co-ops\u2019 place in campus life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many women in the houses felt that they lacked an adequate voice in campus affairs, especially when compared to the sororities and the much larger dormitories. By the 1940s, the \u2018Greek\u2019 system of fraternities and sororities dominated not just the college social scene, but also campus affairs and student governance. To a lesser extent\u2014yet far more so than in later decades\u2014the dormitories acted as unified groups as well, with each hall having its own representation in collegiate life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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W.C.L. Council for the 1946\u201347 school year. Image source: Wolverine<\/em> yearbook (1947), p. 450.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The women\u2019s co-ops found themselves on the outside looking in. Each house was too small\u2014generally between twelve and twenty residents\u2014to have much influence on its own. As a result the Women\u2019s Cooperative League was formed in 1945 to provide unified representation in campus affairs. Every co-op resident was automatically made a member of the league, and each house elected a representative to the W.C.L. Council. The league provided functional coordination to the houses, gave cooperative women a voice in student government, and sponsored social activities such as intra-house dinners and term parties. In this way \u201cthe W.C.L. has taken its place beside other groups in campus responsibilities and social life.\u201d12<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet despite its utility as a unified voice for women in the cooperative houses, the W.C.L. was late to the party, appearing nearly a decade after the project\u2019s onset as it was starting its decline in size, and likely only lasting until its end in 1956. By the time of the 1955 Wolverine<\/em> yearbook, with the number of houses down to four, the league must have been on the wane. Indicative of this, the yearbook writer 1) omits the official Women\u2019s Cooperative League name; 2) states the age of the entire co-op project as that of the league alone; and 3) misrepresents even the most basic information about the co-op system.13<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At any rate, with the completion of Van Hoosen Hall, the Cooperative Housing program was no longer needed by the mid-1950s. A fraction of that cooperative spirit carried over into Van Hoosen, apparently, although it is also unclear how long that residence hall was operated as a true cooperative, as opposed to becoming simply an apartment-style dormitory. That early designation seems to be quietly forgotten both in the Minutes of the Board and in anything other than passing when discussing the hall\u2019s history. Otherwise this successful twenty-year-long economic expedient was allowed to fade quietly away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n