A Ten Years’ War: An Account of the Battle with the Slum in New York was published by Houghton Mifflin in 1900, marking the tenth anniversary of How the Other Half Lives with an assessment of what had been accomplished since that book’s publication.
The book traces the reform movement from 1890 to 1900: the formation of the Tenement House Committee, the investigations into housing conditions, the political battles over building codes, the demolition of the worst rookeries, the creation of small parks and playgrounds in the slums, and the continuing resistance of landlords, politicians, and the general public to the costs of reform.
Riis’s account is honest about failures as well as successes. Many of the reforms he championed were passed into law but poorly enforced; new tenements were being built that were barely better than the old ones; and the fundamental problem — the concentration of too many people in too little space, paying too much rent for too little accommodation — remained unsolved. But the book’s tone is one of measured optimism: the direction is right, even if the progress is slow, and the alternative to fighting is accepting conditions that no civilized society should tolerate.
Collecting A Ten Years’ War
First edition (Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1900): Cloth binding.
Market values:
- First edition, good condition: $30–$80
- Later editions: $8–$15