These 202 houses were built between April and October 1936 by Meadville industries and citizens interested in providing decent housing for workers and their families during the Great Depression. Hillcrest is the first privately funded but federally insured housing project in the country. Remarkably, nearly all the original houses survive and are occupied; even the original street designations “A” through “H” remain. Despite the addition of aluminum siding, each of the eight models available at the time of construction is discernible. They range from small, gable-roofed, one-and-one-half-story Cape Cod cottages to gambrel-roofed, two-story houses with dormers. Some of the duplexes that resemble substantial two-story houses with intersecting gable roofs have been turned into single-family homes.