Between the 1930s and 1950s, the Depression and its lingering effects ensured a large influx of job-seeking poor individuals, while the development of American suburbs led to an outmigration of the wealthier clientele to whom residential hotels like Lawrence House appealed. Chicago, like other early industrial hubs, always had SROs—such as boarding houses—to cater to a transient working class made up largely of single people. More modern SROs offer single rooms with a stove and a bed. Many larger Uptown buildings were converted into SROs— with apartments partitioned into smaller housing units, catering to the poorest of the poor. Often, these accommodations were barely habitable with poor ventilation and minimal maintenance.

As a “retirement hotel,” for many years Lawrence House was not an SRO but a luxury senior home—it only transitioned to an SRO after many years as a building for the elderly. The retirement hotel was a phenomenon during the late 1960s through the early 1980s. A few blocks away from Lawrence House, the same developer had, during the late 1960s, converted the Chelsea Hotel—another relic of Uptown’s pre-automobile boom period—into a luxury old folks home. The Chelsea Hotel would later become home to Jesus People USA, a religious communal organization that operates numerous businesses out of the hotel at 920 W. Wilson.

As urban industrial work dried up in the 1960s, SROs came to be seen as attracting poverty and social misfits, making them antithetical to the idea of urban renewal. In the early 1980s, Lawrence House and other retirement hotels were becoming increasingly less profitable—in part because of cuts to federal social spending during the late Carter presidency and through the Reagan years. The hotels were sold, corners were cut, and the tenants soon came to comprise the elderly poor, who, in general, comprised around 50% of all SRO populations.

SROs are a crucial form of low-income housing to any city—they keep homelessness in check and accommodate the basic right to shelter for the poorest of the poor. For organizations like Intercommunal Survival Committee (ISC) and Voice of the People in Uptown, and later, for alderwoman Helen Shiller, retaining SROs was a crucial aspect of making sure that urban renewal did not simply displace poorer residents who had the same right to benefit from development as wealthier residents.

Slumlord politics and arson for profit schemes affected SRO tenants the worst and Uptown was at the center of these issues. See the clips below from the February 1980 issue of Keep Strong, magazine of the ISC, where they discuss the frequent fires at the buildings of a certain group of landlords. SRO buildings like the Ellis Hotel (pictured at right) were frequent sites of these fires.

A 2012 Chicago Tribune article focuses on the story of Iris Delgado, one of Lawrence House’s residents when it was facing foreclosure:

Even when the heat and hot water were shut off during a stretch of cold weather this spring, Iris Delgado chose to stay in her modest, one-room apartment because she didn't want to leave her two pet canaries. For more than a week, Delgado buried herself under layers of blankets on her couch and walked around her one-room studio wearing two pairs of pants, three sweaters and her heavy coat. She ate dry foods and frozen dinners cooked in the microwave. When she absolutely needed hot water, she heated it in her microwave too. "I got very sick. I developed bronchitis. ... I was stuck in here for 4 days," she said. "Dealing with this stuff is a lot depressing."

For more than 12 years, Delgado has lived in Lawrence House, a troubled high-rise in Chicago's Uptown community….In May, Peoples Energy disconnected the gas to the building, leaving residents without heat and hot water for more than a week. Now, the building is in foreclosure and has been put up for sale….Because of the mounting problems and possible sale, residents like Delgado constantly worry that they could lose their homes. "Ideally we'd like to see the building repaired, improved and preserved as low-income housing," said Mary Lynch-Dungy, of the Organization of the NorthEast, who has been working to coordinate the tenants so they can have a voice in the foreclosure and sale process….Many Lawrence House residents can't afford to live elsewhere. They want to live in this particular neighborhood because of its proximity to social services and health care. Many can walk to see their therapists and doctors. "I love my apartment," Delgado said. "I don't want to move. I love the people here."

In 2014, despite protests, Lawrence House was purchased by Cedar Street (Flats), a private developer that also bought up several other SRO buildings in Uptown. The tenants were evicted with no arrangements made for humane relocation—with many becoming homeless and joining Uptown’s Tent City.

When Lawrence House was purchased by Cedar Street (Flats), Organization of the North East (ONE) fought with the tenants against eviction. Despite failing to preserve the building as affordable housing, ONE helped some residents find new low income lodgings, and their clash with the developer helped publicize the plight of SRO tenants in a hot real estate climate. Furthermore, ONE was able to get new legislation passed in the Chicago city council that aimed at preventing further displacement. The SRO Ordinance was adopted in 2014 and would play a critical role in future fights over SRO evictions—such as the battle for the Wilson Men’s Hotel in 2018.

Many of those who were pushed out from Lawrence House and other SROs became part of Uptown’s Tent City, a large agglomeration of unhoused folks living in tents. Listen to Tom Gordon talk about the SRO crisis and Lawrence House. We will learn more about the Tent City struggles in our section on Uptown’s houselessness crisis.