In 1952, Bucks County farmland became the testing ground for a new way of building America, one that would put a house within reach of nearly anyone, writes JD Mullane for Bucks County Courier Times.

Levittown emerged from the post-World War II housing shortage and went on to become the blueprint for suburban development across the United States.

After World War II, millions of service members were coming home, and the country didn’t have nearly enough houses to put them in.

Builder Bill Levitt saw the problem and borrowed a solution from Henry Ford: the assembly line.

Rather than have one crew build a house start to finish, he sent specialized teams from lot to lot, each repeating a single task over and over.

Between 1952 and 1957, more than 6,000 Levitt and Sons workers raised 17,311 homes, paved 177 miles of streets, dug five Olympic-sized swimming pools, and built two major shopping centers, all in Bucks County.

In addition the speed of the process, Levittown’s planners infused ideas that would shape suburbs for the next 70 years: schools within walking distance, curving streets meant to slow drivers down, utility lines tucked behind houses instead of along the street, greenbelts, and landscaping on every lot.

The press was dazzled. House and Home magazine called it “the free enterprise system at its lustiest,” declaring that “nothing like it has ever happened before.”

However, Levittown’s early days were not all positive. Housing policies shut out Black veterans from homeowning, a legacy that ignited civil rights battles through the 1950s.

Across its complex history, Levittown ultimately became the template, copied block by block in subdivisions across the country.

More than 50,000 people call it home today, in houses that now sell for many times their original price tags, proof that Levitt’s gamble paid off.

Learn more about Levittown and how the Bucks County town’s origins shaped suburbia nationwide in Bucks County Courier Times.

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