ABSTRACT
Charles Buddensiek went to prison in 1886 for manslaughter after a worker died in the collapse of tenements Buddensiek was building in New York. While there is no question that Buddensiek regularly built unsafe tenements of poor quality construction, he did so in a context of poor-quality speculative building and poor governmental regulation. He was used for decades as an example of the evils of corrupt building practice even as regulation to stop such practices lagged. In short, it is easier to blame individuals than the system in which they operate.
