The Coops, Allerton
United Workers Cooperative Colony (1926–27)
Architect: Springsteen & Goldhammer
2700–58 Bronx Park East
Allerton, Bronx
The project was established as a non-profit trade union cooperative by the United Workers’ Association. Union members were mostly involved in the needle trades. Most were non-religious Jews and many were Communists. (Jewish holidays and traditional ceremonies were not celebrated.) There were a sprinkling of non-Jewish and black or inter-racial families. Residents were called "coopniks". The complex housed 339 families in the first section and 328 in the second. The raised basements featured classrooms, recreational facilities, a restaurant, a day-care center and a library. Shops in the neighborhood were sponsored by the organization. When completed, it was the largest cooperative housing complex in the U.S. Unlike private ownership cooperatives, in the Coops, tenants bought a single share in the cooperative. When they moved, the coop bought back the share at the same price originally paid. There was no profit to be made in selling apartments. By 1943, the Coop was bankrupt and became a rental property.
The United Workers' Association was founded in East Harlem in 1918. They first established a cooperative apartment building at 1815 Madison Ave. In 1922, they opened Camp Nitgedaeget ("Camp Don't Worry" in Yiddish) in Beacon, New York. Advertised as "the first proletarian camp for workers", it was the largest cooperative camp in America. Out of the organization grew the United Workers' Cooperative Association, founded in 1925. They bought property to the east of the New York Botanical Gardens. At the time, the East Bronx was being developed by speculators eager to entice upwardly mobile workers from the slums of Manhattan. Unfortunately, the onset of the Great Depression brought the cooperative movement to a grinding halt.
“The Coops” [pronounced coops, not co-ops] were the subject of the Independent Lens film AT HOME IN UTOPIA (2009).
© Matthew X. Kiernan
NYBAI14-3969
The Coops, Allerton
United Workers Cooperative Colony (1926–27)
Architect: Springsteen & Goldhammer
2700–58 Bronx Park East
Allerton, Bronx
The project was established as a non-profit trade union cooperative by the United Workers’ Association. Union members were mostly involved in the needle trades. Most were non-religious Jews and many were Communists. (Jewish holidays and traditional ceremonies were not celebrated.) There were a sprinkling of non-Jewish and black or inter-racial families. Residents were called "coopniks". The complex housed 339 families in the first section and 328 in the second. The raised basements featured classrooms, recreational facilities, a restaurant, a day-care center and a library. Shops in the neighborhood were sponsored by the organization. When completed, it was the largest cooperative housing complex in the U.S. Unlike private ownership cooperatives, in the Coops, tenants bought a single share in the cooperative. When they moved, the coop bought back the share at the same price originally paid. There was no profit to be made in selling apartments. By 1943, the Coop was bankrupt and became a rental property.
The United Workers' Association was founded in East Harlem in 1918. They first established a cooperative apartment building at 1815 Madison Ave. In 1922, they opened Camp Nitgedaeget ("Camp Don't Worry" in Yiddish) in Beacon, New York. Advertised as "the first proletarian camp for workers", it was the largest cooperative camp in America. Out of the organization grew the United Workers' Cooperative Association, founded in 1925. They bought property to the east of the New York Botanical Gardens. At the time, the East Bronx was being developed by speculators eager to entice upwardly mobile workers from the slums of Manhattan. Unfortunately, the onset of the Great Depression brought the cooperative movement to a grinding halt.
“The Coops” [pronounced coops, not co-ops] were the subject of the Independent Lens film AT HOME IN UTOPIA (2009).
© Matthew X. Kiernan
NYBAI14-3969