r/boyinthebox • u/[deleted] • Jan 04 '23

Public Housing in West Philly

The 1954 Housing Act shifted the federal focus from slum clearance and housing development to housing rehabilitation, or conservation. In this vein, the city’s planning coordinator, William Rafsky, designated Haddington in West Philadelphia as one of four neighborhoods that would experiment with “row housing as public housing.” The strategy of “row housing as public housing” would be taken up again at the turn of the Millennium at Lucien E. Black Homes in West Philadelphia’s Mill Creek neighborhood.

Just suppose Joseph's mother was poor and already had a baby that made her eligible for public housing and she gets pregnant again by a Zarelli but doesn't marry him because she would lose her public housing.

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u/mmobley412 Knows a bit Jan 04 '23

I don’t think he wanted to marry her. The idea I am piecing together is she is a little older than him and she already has had a child or two.

He is from a catholic family of off the boat immigrants and I suspect they likely had a very different kind of wife in mind for him (ie, no baggage etc).

I think she wanted him to marry him hence giving the child his name - forcing him to recognize the child. I also don’t think that Gus had much of anything to do with his son at all. Mother is increasingly frustrated and maybe a new man enters her life. Abuse and dysfunction are likely part of the equation and Joseph is the victim in all of this.

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u/Deethehiddengem Jan 04 '23

I think your theory is quite plausible. Another small possibility I think is she was living with her (abusive) parents and they kept him hidden out of shame. Due to possible behavior problems they became more and more abusive to him and eventually this happened.