Homes of unskilled workers in Eckley were simple plank-and-frame double dwellings with clapboard exterior walls and plastered interiors. The front room served as a bedroom for parents and small children, while the rear kitchen held the dining table. Other family members and boarders, single men who worked for the colliery, lived in the two second-floor bedrooms. Shallow stone cellars stored food grown in the garden. Families extended daily life into back and side yards, first building outhouses and a summer kitchen, where the stove was moved seasonally to keep cooking heat out of the house in summer. Back rooms were later added, and breezeway rooms connected the house to the summer kitchen. Garden sheds, chicken coops, and other small buildings reflected survival strategies as families became stable. Family members canned fruit and produce, raised and slaughtered small farm animals, made their own cheese, butter, and other animal products, and faced constant chores of survival. Selling or bartering extra food, baked goods, animal products, and services was essential.