Distinctly Montana Magazine

S U M M E R 2 0 2 1 S P E C I A L S E C T I O N 8 5 The Sears Modern Homes Catalog launched in 1908, offer- ing 22 floor plans that ranged from $650 to $2,500, including all 30,000 pieces and a booklet of blueprints, instructions, and materials list. These first houses could not be properly called "kit homes," because the timber was not pre-cut. Sears provided the lumber, but the customer had to cut it themselves. Aladdin was a Michigan-based mail-order company who sold pre-cut framing boards from the start in 1906, and Sears ended up adopting their competitor's "ready-cut" model in 1916. Between 1908 and 1940, Sears sold about 100,000 kit homes to Americans across the country. The other three national compa- nies—Aladdin, Montgomery Ward, and Gordon Van-Tine, along with a slew of smaller regional companies—account for maybe a couple hundred thousand more. Considering the population of the United States and the overall number of homes getting built, this doesn't sound like a whole lot. It's estimated that kit homes account for only 2-5% of all American homes built in the 1920s. Pamela Attardo, the heritage preservation officer for the Lewis & Clark County Heritage Tourism Council, knows of only one definitive Sears home in her jurisdiction, a Modern Home No. 115, built before 1912 in York. Despite these modest numbers, kit homes have left an outsized imprint upon the American imagination, as the revitalized interest in their history over the last few decades attests to. Why is this? What is it about mail-order homes that we find so alluring? Could it be nos- talgia for a bygone era? The undying romance of the DIY lifestyle? Or is it simply the most American aspect of the whole phenomenon, the seduction of consumer convenience? THE HEYDAY OF MAIL-ORDER HOMES Different companies dominated the market in different parts of the country. Sears, Lewis, Sterling, and Harris Brothers served the East Coast, South, and Midwest. The West Coast was dominated by Pacific Homes, Montgomery Ward, and Gordon Van-Tine. Aladdin had its fingers in all these markets, as well as in Cana- da, thanks to eventual production facilities in Oregon, North Carolina, and Mississippi. Even more companies operated at smaller regional and local levels. The market for mail-order homes peaked in the 1920s, in the reprieve years between World War I and the Great Depression. The relative affordability of kit homes was one factor in their success. Kits ranged anywhere from $400 to $3,500 and helped members of the working class and burgeoning middle class achieve homeownership, a key element of the mythological American Dream. What's more, a few companies including Sears and Montgomery Ward even offered mortgage financing with their kits, making it even more affordable for people of color and single wom- en to secure financing when they were legally or illegally barred from doing so through banks. Another factor that sealed the deal was convenience: the mail-order company shipped by freight or boat everything you needed to build a home, and would even provide plumbing, kitchen and electrical fixtures at an extra cost. All you had to do was put it together, which catalog testimonials claimed was unbelievably easy to do in under 90 days, or at worst, hire a contractor to do it for you. According to architectural historian Rebecca Hunter, most peo- ple did end up hiring contractors. The testimonials exaggerated the ease of product assembly, just like all good marketing ploys do. You still had to know something about carpentry to put your house together, especially before the invention of power tools. MARKETING TO THE CONFORMIST Marketing strategies centered around the consumer desire for a house that was both cheap and would pass as a custom-built home. Aesthetic innovations were not a priority in kit homes, which is largely why they can be so hard to identify walking around your neighborhood: they were purposefully designed to look like the most popular styles of the day. Some of the commonly occurring descriptions in the Modern Homes Catalogs are "harmoni- ous," "convenient," "practical," and "econom- ically constructed." The consumer's desire for conformity was catered to with such phrases as "a touch of individuality" and "not too extreme." Many companies, though, offered customizable options, like reversed floor plans, add-on porches or sunrooms, and choice of paint and trim colors. While most early designs were known only by their model number, companies eventually start- ed naming their products. Many had women's names like the Chelsea and the Betsy Ross, but the Starlight, the Sunbeam, the Fairy, and the Americus were some of the more fantastical monikers at Sears. LOCAL PUSHBACK IN MONTANA Not everyone was thrilled with the burgeoning popularity of kit homes. Local businesses routinely ran advertisements decrying the export of local dollars to mail-order companies based out of state who didn't have to pay local taxes. Sound familiar? all the materials delivered to you!

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