question: Why are wooden houses more common in the U.S when block/brick houses are more common in Europe?
comment: Wood is really, *really* cheap in the US. It is easily the least expensive and quickest way to build a house. Concrete block houses are more common in hurricane-prone areas that have strict codes.
passages: Section::::History and traditions.:Americas.
  
  Most "haft-timbered" houses existing in Missouri, Pennsylvania, and Texas were built by German settlers. Old Salem North Carolina has fine examples of German fachwerk buildings. Many are still present in Colonia Tovar (Venezuela), Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil), where Germans settled. Later, they chose more suitable building materials for local conditions (most likely because of the great problem of tropical termites.)
  
  Section::::History and traditions.:Americas.:New France.
   Europe is full of timber-framed structures dating back hundreds of years, including manors, castles, homes, and inns, whose architecture and techniques of construction have evolved over the centuries. In Asia, timber-framed structures are found, many of them temples that have stood for centuries.
  
  Some Roman carpentry preserved in anoxic layers of clay at Romano-British villa sites demonstrate that sophisticated Roman carpentry had all the necessary techniques for this construction. The earliest surviving (French) half-timbered buildings date from the 12th century.
  
  Important resources for the study and appreciation of historic building methods are open-air museums.
  
  Section::::History and traditions.:Topping out ceremony.
   BULLET::::- Poland - Zakopane, Polish-Lithuanian wooden synagogues, wooden churches of Southern Lesser Poland, Upper Lusatian house
  
  BULLET::::- Romania - Carpathian vernacular, wooden churches of Maramureș, Chirpici
  
  BULLET::::- Scotland - Medieval turf building in Cronberry, blackhouses
  
  BULLET::::- Slovakia - Wooden churches of the Slovak Carpathians
  
  BULLET::::- Spain - Asturian teito, Asturian hórreo, Gallician palloza
  
  BULLET::::- Ukraine - Wooden churches
  
  BULLET::::- United Kingdom - Dartmoor longhouse, Neolithic long house, palisade church, mid-20th-century system-built houses
  
  BULLET::::- Scotland - Broch, Atlantic roundhouse, crannog, dun
  
  Section::::Vernacular styles.:North American.
  
  BULLET::::- Shotgun house (US)
  
  BULLET::::- Florida Cracker c. 1800+ (Florida, US)
  
  BULLET::::- Tidewater (US)
   Section::::North America.
  
  Wooden homes have always been popular in North America, due to the large quantity of timber available in North America. In the United States, several companies including Sears Catalog Homes began offering mail-order kit homes between 1902 and 1910. In the United Kingdom, more than 156,000 prefabricated homes were built between 1945 and 1948.
  
  After the World War II until 1948, Sell-Fertighaus GmbH built over 5,000 prefabricated houses in Germany for the occupying force of the United States.
  
  Section::::North America.:United States.
   During the 1920s the first American milled log houses appeared on the market, using logs which were pre-cut and shaped rather than hand-hewn. Many log houses today are of the milled variety, mainly because they require less labor-intensive field work than handcrafted houses. There are about 500 companies in North America which build the handcrafted, scribe-fit type of log house.
  
  Section::::Components.
   "For Timber-framed houses in Wales see:" Architecture of Wales
   Handcrafted log houses have been built for centuries in Fennoscandia, Fenno-Ugric areas such as Karelia, Lapland, Eastern parts of Finland. Also in Scandinavia, Russia and Eastern Europe, and were typically built using only an axe and knife. The settlers from the nothern Europe brought the craft to North America in the early 17th century, where it was quickly adopted by other colonists and Native Americans. Possibly the oldest surviving log house in the United States is the C. A. Nothnagle Log House (circa 1640) in New Jersey.
   Section::::History and traditions.:Netherlands.
   In general, bricks were not imported to the American colonies. Probably none were imported to Virginia and Maryland, but in New England there was one possible example in New Haven, and there are records documenting the shipment of 10,000 bricks to Massachusetts Bay in 1628 and several thousand bricks being shipped to New Sweden. It is possible that the terms "Dutch brick" and "English brick" referred to the size of the locally-made bricks, with the Dutch bricks being the smaller. However, in New Netherland there are records of brick being imported from the Netherlands as ballast in 1633, and of continued shipments until the American Revolution (1765–1783). Bricks were being burned in New Amsterdam (New York) by 1628, but the imported bricks were of better quality. At first, the bricks were used only for chimneys, but they were later used to face the lower story of the house, and then the entire house.
   More generally, people often build houses out of the nearest available material, and often tradition or culture govern construction-materials, so whole towns, areas, counties or even states/countries may be built out of one main type of material. For example, a large fraction of American houses use wood, while most British and many European houses use stone or brick or mud.
   BULLET::::- Wooden churches in Ukraine - log buildings are the norm south and east of Germany and many of the churches are recognized world heritage sites.
  
  BULLET::::- Corner post construction sometimes called post-and-plank - this construction method blurs the line between timber framing and log construction with a frame infilled with logs or planks to form the walls.
  
  BULLET::::- Timber dam - timber crib dams are used to dam rivers.
  
  BULLET::::- Zakopane Style architecture – inspired by the regional art of Poland’s highland region known as Podhale uses log construction.
   When the Europeans settled in North America, they brought their architectural traditions and construction techniques for building. The oldest buildings in America have examples of that. Construction was dependent upon the available resources. Wood and brick are the most common elements of English buildings in New England, the Mid-Atlantic, and coastal South. It had also brought the conquest, destruction, and displacement of the indigenous peoples existing buildings in their homeland, as their dwelling and settlement construction techniques devalued compared to colonial standards. The colonizers appropriated the territories and sites for new forts, dwellings, missions, churches, and agricultural developments.
  
  Section::::Colonial.:Spanish influences.
   Section::::Construction.:Shipbuilding.
  
  One of the most enduring materials is the lumber from virginian southern live oak and white oak, specially live oak is 60% stronger than white oak and more resistant to moisture. As an example, the main component in the structure of battle ship USS Constitution, the world's oldest commissioned naval vessel afloat (launched in 1797) is white oak.
  
  Section::::History of crisis in wood economies.
  
  Section::::History of crisis in wood economies.:Classical Greece.
   A particularly interesting example in the U.S. is the Golden Plough Tavern (c. 1741), York, York County, PA, which has the ground level of corner-post construction with the second floor of fachwerk (half timbered) and was built for a German with other Germanic features.
  
  Settlers in New France also built horizontal log, brick, and stone buildings.
  
  Section::::History and traditions.:Americas.:New Netherland.
  
  Characteristics of traditional timber framing in the parts of the U.S. formerly known as New Netherland are H-framing also known as dropped-tie framing in the U.S. and the similar anchor beam framing as found in the New World Dutch barn.
   BULLET::::- Wood Home for Boys, Mathiston, Mississippi, NRHP-listed in Webster County
  
  BULLET::::- Wood House (Dublin, New Hampshire), NRHP-listed in Cheshire County
  
  BULLET::::- Dr. Granville Wood House, Mimbres, New Mexico, NRHP-listed in Grant County
  
  BULLET::::- Harry Wood House, Huntington, New York, NRHP-listed in Suffolk County
  
  BULLET::::- William Wooden Wood House, Huntington, New York, NRHP-listed in Suffolk County
  
  BULLET::::- John Wood House (Huntington Station, New York), NRHP-listed in Suffolk County
  
  BULLET::::- Wilford Wood House, Mountainville, New York, NRHP-listed in Orange County
  
  BULLET::::- Amos Wood House, North Landing, New York, NRHP-listed in Jefferson County
   Section::::History and traditions.:Sweden.
  
  The Swedish mostly built log houses but they do have traditions of several types of timber framing: Some of the following links are written in Swedish. Most of the half-timbered houses in Sweden were built during the Danish time and are located in what until 1658 used to be Danish territory in southern Sweden, primarily in the province Skåne and secondarily in Blekinge and Halland. In Swedish half-timber is known as "korsvirke".
   Regarding the architecture of the typical seventeenth century home, the structures were on average one-story structures with a loft accessible via a ladder-like stairway. There were often chimneys at both ends of the home, where meals typically were prepared upon an open hearth. The houses averaged between thirty and forty feet in length, and between eighteen and twenty feet in width.
  
  Section::::Colonial era.:Commercial markets.
   Danckaerts and Peter Sluyter, leading members of the Labadist sect of the Netherlands, visited the Delaware in late 1679, going down the river in a boat to New Castle, Delaware. At the falls they stayed overnight with Mahlon Stacy who had erected a mill there. They described the houses of the English along the river as being built mainly of clapboards nailed on the outside of a frame, but "not usually laid so close together as to prevent you from sticking a finger between then." The best people, Danckaerts wrote, plastered them with clay. He called the houses built by the Swedes "block houses," but from the way they were constructed, actually closely resembled the log cabin found on the western frontier at a later date. Some of the more careful people planked the ceilings, and even had glass windows. The chimney was typically in the corner, and the doors were low and wide. Our travelers breakfasted with the Friends at Burlington, whom they denominated as being "the most worldly of men in all their deportment and conversation." Although, elsewhere his descriptions and the relations of the Indians' impressions of the Quakers are not so flattering. They went hence in a shallop to Upland, stopping at Takany (Tacony), a village of Swedes and Finns, where they drank good beer. On Tinicum island they saw a "Quaker prophetess who traveled the country over in order to quake." On their return up the river they stopped overnight on "Alricks' Island" (where the plantation of Peter Aldrichs was situated, on the west side of the river, opposite Matinnaconk Island and Burlington), then in charge of Barent, a Dutchman, who had for housekeeper the Indian wife of an Englishman of Virginia. One of her children was sick with the smallpox, prevalent on the river this year, and mentioned for the first time. Barent consented to pilot them up the river as far as the falls the next day for thirty guilders in zeewant. This was on Friday, 29 December 1679. Landing the canoe on the west side of the Delaware (at or near where Bristol, Pennsylvania, stands), he conducted them by a footpath through the woods in a north-northeast direction until they "came to a plantation, newly begun by a Quaker, where we rested and refreshed ourselves. We agreed with this man, who came into the house while we were there, that he should put us over the river for three guilders in zeewant." They crossed the river about 1 o'clock in the afternoon, and commenced north on a footpath which led to a cart road and took them to the falls where Mahlon Stacy's mill stood. From there they crossed eastward to the Hudson and on to Manhattan.
   In Ukraine, wood church constructions originate from the introduction of Christianity and continued to be widespread, particularly in rural areas, when masonry churches dominated in cities and in Western Europe.
  
  Section::::Regional church architecture.
  
  Church architecture varies depending on both the sect of the faith, as well as the geographical location and the influences acting upon it. Variances from the typical church architecture as well as unique characteristics can be seen in many areas around the globe.
  
  Section::::Regional church architecture.:American church architecture.
   Log construction was the most common building technique in large regions of Sweden, Finland, Norway, the Baltic states and Russia, where straight and tall coniferous trees, such as pine and spruce, are readily available. It was also widely used for vernacular buildings in Eastern Central Europe, the Alps, the Balkans and parts of Asia, where similar climatic conditions prevail. In warmer and more westerly regions of Europe, where deciduous trees predominate, timber framing was favoured instead.
  
  BULLET::::- "Sawn logs", logs sawn to a standard width, but with their original heights
   Nowadays, timber framing is primarily found in the provinces of Limburg, Liège, and Luxemburg. In urban areas, the ground floor was formerly built in stone and the upper floors in timber framing. Also, as timber framing was seen as a cheaper way of building, often the visible structures of noble houses were in stone and bricks, and the invisible or lateral walls in timber framing. The open-air museums of Bokrijk and Saint-Hubert (Fourneau Saint-Michel) show many examples of Belgian timber framing. Many post-and-beam houses can be found in cities and villages, but, unlike France, the United Kingdom, and Germany, there are few fully timber framed cityscapes.
   Imported Dutch brick was often used in buildings in England in the 17th and 18th centuries. In Dartmouth, a house built in 1664 for mariner Robert Plumleigh had traditional timber-framed architecture but included elaborate star-shaped chimney stacks made from imported Dutch brick. Houses in Topsham, Devon, also used Dutch brick for chimneys, window heads and dressing. One house from the late 17th century in Dutch Court in Topsham is built entirely of Dutch brick. The ports of Exeter and Topsham both shipped wool to the Netherlands, and the returning ships brought bricks as ballast from Amsterdam or Rotterdam.
   BULLET::::- Germany - Black Forest house, Swiss chalet style, Gulf house (aka East Frisian house), Geestharden house (aka Cimbrian house, Schleswig house), Haubarg, Low German house (aka Low Saxon house), Middle German house, Reed house, Seaside resort house, Ständerhaus, Uthland-Frisian house
  
  BULLET::::- Holland - Frisian farmhouse, Old Frisian longhouse, Bildts farmhouse
  
  BULLET::::- Iceland - Turf houses
  
  BULLET::::- Italy - Trullo
  
  BULLET::::- Lithuania - Polish-Lithuanian wooden synagogues
  
  BULLET::::- Norway - Architecture of Norway: Post church, Palisade church, Stave church, Norwegian Turf house, Vernacular architecture in Norway, Rorbu, Dragestil, also National Romantic style, Swiss chalet style and Nordic Classicism buildings
   Some medieval Basque tower houses (dorretxeak) feature an overhanged upper floor in half-timbering.
  
  To a lesser extent timbered houses are also found in villages and towns as row houses, as the photo from the Uztaritz village shows.
  
  Currently, it has again become popular to build houses resembling old Basque farmsteads, with more or less respect for the principles of traditional half-timbered building.
  
  Section::::History and traditions.:Switzerland.
  
  Switzerland has many styles of timber framing which overlap with its neighboring countries.
  
  Section::::History and traditions.:Belgium.
   While the use of timber frames for the construction of 1-2 story buildings is typical in many countries (see: timber framing), antiquated building codes in the United States discouraged wood frame construction in 5-floor buildings or higher for many years. With the advancement of science, construction technologies and innovation have led to the use of engineered wood products that have load capacities stronger than steel, and fire resilience beyond those required to meet US building code standards. These improved qualities, alongside the historical construction of tall wood buildings in Europe., have led to an acceptance of wood in US construction and new building codes are being proposed to adjust for this
  