Here on this Levittown and Sons construction site,

在莱维特父子公司的工地上

they're building houses almost as fast as babies are born.

建房速度几乎能赶得上婴儿出生的速度

One every 16 minutes.8:00 am, trucks unload.

每16分钟建成一栋，早上8时 卡车卸货

9:30, bathrooms arrive.11:00, floors are laid.

9时30分 浴室运到了，11时 地板已经铺好

300 windows a day.30 baths a day.

一天能装300个窗户，30个浴室

These techniques are inspired by the industrial age.

这些技术是受工业时代的启发

1840, Lowell Mills Massachusetts,

1840年马萨诸塞州洛威尔的纺织厂

the manufacture of cotton is transformed by mechanized looms.

机械化的织布机改变了棉布的生产方式

1918, Henry Ford's Detroit production line.

1918年亨利·福特的底特律工厂的生产线

The automobile revolution.

掀起了一场汽车革命

Now in the 1950s

如今 到了20世纪50年代

America is mass producing family homes.

美国开始批量建造住房

Levitt and Sons call it the Ford production line of house building.

莱维特父子公司称之为房屋建筑的福特流水线

This is human enterprise.Human ingenuity.

这是人的进取心 人的独创性

Putting these buildings there they were put there by free men and women making their own free decisions.

这些房屋是由自由的美国人 按自己意愿建造的

By 1951, Levittown New York has 17,000 identical new homes.

截至1951年 纽约莱维特镇新建了一万七千栋一模一样的房屋

A second Levittown is built in Philadelphia.

随后又在费城建立了第二个莱维特镇

A third in New Jersey.

在新泽西建立了第三个

My father grew up very poor during the Depression.

我父亲孩提时代正逢经济大萧条 家中十分拮据

He fought in World War II.

他参加了二战

It was a big deal for him to get out of a poor neighborhood

很难得 他后来摆脱贫穷的生活环境

and buy a 50x100 lot in Franklin Square Long Island,where I grew up.

在长岛富兰克林广场买了一块长100宽50的地 我就在那长大

There was a feeling the country now has regained prosperity.

人们确实感觉到 美国重新开始繁荣起来

After the long decade of the Great Depression

经过大萧条那漫长的十年

which had made many people think the prosperity might never return.

人们都认为繁荣一去不返了

A family home for less than $8,000.

一间不到八千美元的住宅

That's $71,000 in today's money.

相当于当下的七万一千美元

Down to the eve of World War II, down to 1940 or so

二战后期 20世纪40年代

only about 40% of Americans owned their own homes.

仅约四成美国人拥有自己的住房

By 1960, one short generation later,

到1960年 仅仅过了一代

60% of Americans owned their own homes.

已经有六成美国人拥有自己的房子

That's just one way to quantify

窥一斑而见全豹

the spread of affluence and prosperity

可见当时富足与繁荣传播有多迅速

and all that came with that in terms of self-confidence and enthusiasm for the future.

以及随之而来的自信，以及对美好未来的热忱

The American home has developed since the Pilgrims,into, really, the center of the family.

自清教徒时代开始家逐渐成为美国家庭真正的中心

The family is the most important social unit in the United States.

家庭是美国最重要的社会组成单元

And it should be.

理应如此