UNIVERSIT Y SETTLEMENTS, houses in the poor districts of cities where educated men and women live and come in contact with the working classes for social, educational, and civic pur poses. These settlements provide clubs, and offer a home and recreation for wage-earners.
The idea of the university settlement grew out of the London establishment of the Working Men's College in 1860. An Oxford graduate, Edward Denison, in 1867, was the first to make a real home among the poor. He lived but a short time, leaving his work when it was still an experiment; but out of his idea of the social elevation of the poor grew a great work—resulting in the establishment of TOYNBEE HALL (q. v.), so called after Arnold Toynbee, who in 1875 worked among the poor of Whitechapel. A memorial was built to him, due to the influence of Samuel A. Barnett. Various settlements were started in London and in several cities in Scotland.
The first settlement in the United States was founded in New York City, Sept. 1, 1889, by the graduates of several women's colleges. It was located in one
of the most crowded tenement districts of the East Side. In the same month a settlement called Hull House was opened in Chicago. On May 14, 1891, another settlement was organized in New York by the graduates of Yale, Columbia, Princeton, and other universities. In October of the same year the graduates of Andover Theological Seminary and other ex-collegians began a similar work in the tenement district of Boston. There are settlements, besides those mentioned, in Brooklyn, Buffalo, Jersey City, Hart ford, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, San Francisco, and many other cities; numbering altogether nearly 100. In 1891 the College Settle ments Association was formed, with the purpose of uniting all college women and their friends, who were interested in set tlement work. Hull House, in Chicago, under the leadership of Jane Addams, is one of the most widely known of Uni versity Settlements.