Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 79, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 April 1912 — POOR MAN’S HOTEL [ARTICLE]

POOR MAN’S HOTEL

Budapest Has Hostelry With Rooms for 14 Cents. Guests Served With Breakfast for Three Cents—Building a- Beauty of Architecture Equipped With Modern Appliances. Budapest.—Rooms, including steam heat and electric light, for 14 cents a day, breakfast of coffee and rolls for S cents and dinner for 14 cents are provided at the new Municipal People’s hotel which has just been opened here for people whose earnings are not more than S4OO a year, says a Budapest correspondent. Budapest has for some time suffered because of a lack of dwelling houses and reasonably priced hotels for the working classes. This need was particularly keen among the petty “Beamten,” as all persons employed by the city or state are known, whose Income Is small but who by reason of their position must keep up an appearanoe. Some time since a large number of houses were built by the city for its small officials who were married. The rental, while low, was well, within the means of the class of people for whom they were Intended, and at the same time Insured thp return to the city of the money expended. It was a happy experiment. - Next, the municipal authorities considered the matter of providing a' hotel for the transients of little means, workingmen, clerks, small merchants and petty officials, who could not afford to stop at even the cheapest hotels when they vistteff The unmarried of small wage or income, who might want permanent quarters, also were to be provided for. With this In view the municipal authorities built the new People’s hotel, which has just been thrown open. I was shown a large handsome fourstory structure covering a corner of a block. The exterior was as architecturally beautiful as the interior was modern, comfortable and homelike. Many of the hotels in Vienna, Berlin, London and New York where you pay more In tips than you do here for

your room are not half as inviting in appointments. The corridors and halls are tastefully decorated; the rooms are .of fair size, have large windows and are light and airy. The furniture Is Bimple but serviceable. Each room has electric light, cold and warm water and steam heat, which many higher priced hotels In Budapest, Vienna and other continental cities do not have. A bath in most European hotels costs from 25 to 50 cents. Coffee and rolls for breakfast may be had at the People’s hotel for 8 cents. A plain, substantial hungersatisfying dinner, which here as all over Europe Is eaten at midday, is served for 14 cents. Should the management of the People’s hotel, appointed by the municipal authorities, find that these prices are Insufficient to make the enterprise self-sustaining, the deficit will be charged pro rata to the rooms and meals and the prices raised accordingly. It was explained to me that the project was in no sense a charity but a place where any self-respecting workingman, clerk or member of the small official class may stay for a day or two or make his permanent home

at a cost within his reach and that without taking all his earnings. In order that those whose Income enables them shall go to a public hostelry, those who wish to take advantage of the low rates must produce reasonable proof that they do not earn more than S4OO a year. This may seem very small In America, but in Austria, Hungary and other continental countries there are hundreds of thousands of men whose Income is considerably less than that. Education and recreation have not been forgotten in the People’s hotel. There is a large Smoking room and a reading room where the leading newspapers are on file.