We've Come a Long Way, Baby!
The first manufactured home dates back to 1764 when a two-story panelized frame dwelling was shipped from London to Cape Ann, MA. By the early 1900s, the English were building custom vans; and an American devised a fifth-wheel hitch to attach a travel wagon to his roadster.
Assembly line production began in 1926 in New York; although most mobile homes were used for vacations. The first models had no indoor plumbing.
Campgrounds, or trailer parks, soon began sprouting up on the outskirts of many towns. During Word War II, production increased as the U.S. government purchased mobile homes so workers could live near plants.
By the late 1940s, trailer lengths had increased to more than 30 feet and small bathrooms were added. Some people also began making them their permanent homes.
In the 1960s, two-section mobile homes became popular and a mobile home construction code was developed by the Mobile Home Craftsmen Guild. During the 1970s, one mobile home was built for every three site-built homes. In 1978 the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development established a national building code for manufactured housing, which changed the industry to what we see today... Meeting the demands of todays consumer.
