WOW, THIS IS AN AMAZING TREASURE TROVE: An online archive of 46 years of Aladdin Home Sales Catalogs, courtesy of Central Michigan University and its Clarke Historical Library. I’m serious: Complete catalogs: Page through for hours and watch the history of middle-class housing styles in the first half of the American 20th century unfold. The catalogs were the principal marketing method for the houses…. So also you get all kinds of little detail that paints a picture of how people lived, what they considered when looking for a house… See the dramatic shifts during the Depression and wartimes, for example. They are little social history books. Aladdin’s were kit houses… manufactured houses like the famous Sears’ models. These kinds of homes are EVERYWHERE across America.
The series starts in 1908, with cottages and $98 hunting lodges and one house, at about $600. As the years progress we see bungalows, capes and Dutch Colonials…barracks during WWII…on into the 50s. The images here are from ’54, the last year for catalogs posted, but the bio says Aladdin, which was based in Bay City, Mich., manufactured homes until 1981.
Here’s some history about the firm:
- Begun in 1906 by two brothers, Otto and William Sovereign, the family-owned firm continued to manufacture houses until 1981. Over the firm’s long history it sold over 75,000 homes to both individual and corporate customers.
- The records of the Aladdin Company were donated to the Clarke Historical Library in 1996. The almost complete run of company catalogs, full set of sales records, over 15,000 post-World War II architectural drawings, and various other company records create an extraordinary historical resource.
- The Aladdin Company records are open for use by the public, having been arranged and described through a grant made by the National Endowment for the Humanities. (Mount Pleasant, by the way, is on the far western side of the state, just north of I-94 where it starts to bend around the Lake. Full-text copies of the annual sales catalogs were scanned through a grant by the Michigan Council for the Arts and Cultural Affairs.
Many thanks to all these great folks! I for one cannot wait to start wading through every single catalog. I love love love this every-person kind of house…I am so excited! My guilty secret, though: I seriously thought about not posting this story, afraid I’d never get you back, like, you’ll be Alice fallen down the rabbit hole into retro-wonderland. But there. I’ve gone and done it anyway.
View the website and catalogs here. … I’ll miss you all. Come back soon!
Elaine says
Ooops, a correction about the location of Mt. Pleasant, Michigan. It is actually in the central lower peninsula, about an hour north of Lansing at the junction of US 27 and M 20.
The directions given above go to South Haven, a lovely town to visit with a popularly pictured lighthouse.
Off to become lost in Aladdin neighborhood!
tailfin says
When I was a teenager in 1981, my Dad came across an Aladdin catalog from 1917 that he’d found while helping my great-aunt move out of her bungalow. I used to spend hours looking through that catalog & sketching floor plans from it on graph paper, altering the plans as I saw fit.
I occasionally will see a home from that era that I recognize as being one of the houses from that catalog. I’m sure I still have it somewhere buried deep in one of my many boxes.
Thanks Pam for posting that link!
ThePetersens says
Hey Pam, very cool resource and I am almost sure that my home and the homes on our street are Aladdin. Do you have any leads on a place to get those cool window awnings? They would be really nice to have in the summertime and would look awesome.
pam kueber says
Hi Petersens, I’ve done a bit of research on awnings. This is of great interest to me. But I was only dabbling. I need to get serious. They are around — and they apparently can really dramatically improve energy efficiency, cutting down on your a/c bill. Okay, it’s on my list.
Magnarama says
Wow, what a trove! Interesting that right up into the ’40s, indoor bathrooms were optional… they must have done a big business in -er- “rustic” areas.
And in 1954: pink bathrooms and pink metal kitchens with giant aphorisms painted on the
soffitts.
pam kueber says
magnarama, i admit that i have not had time to go through these. i can’t wait – to find out little details like the ones you mention. yes: indoor bathrooms. i really tend to believe that something like 50% of american homes did not have indoor bathrooms til after wwII. my mom in coal mining town pennsylvania didn’t. my dad in farm country north dakota didn’t. i think i even read it somewhere. amazing to consider….
then – there’s the whole issue 2nd bathrooms — i don’t really think we started to see these start up until the mid 50s.
BIG FAMILIES: one very basic bathroom = big progress.
Elaine says
Clarke Library is a fantastic resource. Every time I go over there I get lost for hours and hours. Now there are house plans to wander through! Thanks for showing these.
Kristin says
The single small bathroom is an issue with almost everyone I know who lives in my neighborhood; some of the (slightly) larger homes seem to have half baths off the master bedroom, but most don’t. As we don’t have (human) children–we have cats and dogs–this isn’t THAT big of a deal for us…but my friends that have kids are constantly fighting the urge to buy outside of the neighborhood they love or to add on extra rooms just to stay here!
sablemable says
I’m getting light-headed! A treasure trove of home plans to swoon over!!!!!!!!!!!
Well, I know what I’ll be doing all day long.
Good job, Pam!
pam kueber says
sablemable, i *knew* you would like these, especially 🙂
pam kueber says
Oh yes, and I forget to mention – all your floor-plan aficionados will fun with these too! Send me your “winners” – we are always on the lookout for THE PERFECT small house floor plan!
Kristin says
If I didn’t have to do a group session this morning, I’d allow myself to get sunk in these for the morning!
I looked in the 1953 book (the year our home was built) and found The Plaza, which is a similar one to ours, except we don’t have a garage, just a carport and the Plaza has a square kitchen rather than a galley one (we have 3 bedrooms rather than 2 also).
However, both that one, the Pasadena and a few others have the shingles on them which were on our house originally (I have photos of it being built given to me by the original owner/builder)…and it is making me wanna go home and rip that new siding they covered the shingles with off today!!!!
Femme1 says
I am lovin’ that Flamingo! Pink siding and a green roof…man-oh-man.