Most of us like to believe we have choices when it comes to our living space. We have choices regarding what the inside of our space looks like. Sometimes we can choose furniture, paint colors, knickknacks, rugs, and other details. Where the apartment or house is located perhaps, or how large of a space you want to rent or purchase. In most cases, these things are determined by the amount of cash you can afford to spend on your space. But what if it had nothing to do with buying power at all? What if the living space you were allocated was entirely dependent upon how valuable you were as an employee?
Los Alamos in the 1950s and 1960s was a very different place to live. Not only were you renting a home, but you had almost no choice in which home you rented. Your housing was assigned. There was very little opportunity to change that assignment. And the dream of home ownership was practically unattainable. In wasn’t until the tail end of 1956 that any of the powers-that-be in Los Alamos even addressed the idea that some of their employees might want to own their own home and permanently settle in Los Alamos. By the end of 1956 the AEC was considering releasing land in order to promote the building of privatized housing in Los Alamos. In December of 1958 the first deed to a lot on Barranca Mesa was finalized and by the early 1960s, homes were being built in this “new subdivision”.
Again, it’s very difficult to wrap a modern mind around what was happening. Let’s say you and your family of six were living in a three bedroom duplex somewhere in town. You and your spouse both worked for LASL or Zia Company. You have four kids and you’d love to have a larger home for your growing family. What were your options? Could you apply to the housing office for a four bedroom home? What if you and your spouse decided you’d rather purchase your own home? Could you simply apply to the housing office to purchase a lot and build a new home on Barranca Mesa?
The answer is mostly likely, no! There were very few four bedroom homes in Los Alamos at that time. And even if you wanted to purchase a home, your options were limited by the same factors.
In order to qualify for the right to even be placed in the lottery to be drawn to purchase a private home lot on Barranca Mesa, you had to have enough “points”. The point system is something that completely governed housing in Los Alamos. It’s something we struggle to understand now, but at the time it was created, it was considered a fair way to distribute resources. And here in Los Alamos, housing has always been one of the most limited resources!
According to Craig Martin, “the first version of the point system boiled a complex problem down to mathematical efficiency: One point was given for each dollar of monthly salary and two points were awarded for each month of tenure the worker had with the employer.”
After the first year the point system was in effect, it was tweaked to cap the number of points per year that could be accumulated at 24. Everyone’s points were recalculated each year on February 2. (What an interesting Groundhog Day tradition, right?) So how did having lots of points get you a better housing situation?
There were dozens of housing waiting lists at any given moment. Each home in town was categorized by type and size and those categories then maintained a waiting list. A family could put their name on as many waiting lists as they qualified for. If a house in any category became vacant, the list for that type and size of home would be consulted and the next person on a list was notified. Certain homes had more exclusive waiting lists, which required a family to have a minimum point value in order to be added to that waiting list. This minimum point value also came into play when the lottery for privatized housing was created. In addition, only “project connected personnel” were allowed to apply to purchase a lot on Barranca Mesa in February of 1958.
Sounds a bit frustrating, doesn’t it? That means if you were that six person family desperately wanting to move into a larger home, you were probably going to wait on one of those lists for a very long time. Statistics from the original construction suggest that there were 157 four bedroom units in all of Los Alamos and only 24 of those were single family homes. The rest were Group 12 Duplexes. 21 of those duplexes had a two bedroom unit on one side and a four bedroom on the other side. There were 56 Group 12 duplexes with a four bedroom unit on both sides. If you consider that there were a lot of families with more than two children in the 1960s, it wouldn’t take long for those larger units to be in high demand. Especially since homes in the 1950s and 60s did generally not boast multiple bathrooms, living rooms, entertainment areas, or dens. That meant your family of five or six would pretty much be on top of each other all the time!
If you look at Los Alamos today, there’s no getting around the fact that trying to find and maintain living space when you’re not at all connected to a LANL is difficult! So how on earth did teachers, nurses, trash collectors, and the guy who runs the sandwich shop find a place to live back in the “old days”? Well, they were all employed by Zia Company and therefore had points. Their rent was also based on their salary. This was the only way that Los Alamos could function.
A grade school teacher might be critical to the mission since no self respecting physicist would move their children to a town without a school, but teachers don’t generally make a salary anywhere near that of a physicist. Therefore, your point value determined which housing you were offered. But the rent was entirely based on your wages. In a previous post, I talked a little more about rent in Los Alamos. You can check it out here.
When it comes to privatized housing, we’ve come a long way here in town! If you’re ready to buy or sell your private residence here in Los Alamos, give me a call! I’m a hometown girl who enjoys chatting about housing in Los Alamos and I’d love to talk about your housing needs!
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