Around the same time, they put forward a proposal for a group of model homes for the poor in Washington, D.C., to be known as the Ellen Wilson Memorial Homes after the late wife of then-President Woodrow Wilson. The plan was ambitious, comprising a playground, day nursery, laundry, small emergency hospital, communal kitchen, library, and club rooms, alongside 130 individual residences. On April 29, 1915, just a few months after the firm won the Chicago competition, Schenck died of pneumonia. Mead continued to use the firm's name for several years while establishing a solo practice. One large 1917–18 project for which Mead was the lead architect was in Bridgeport, Connecticut, which had a shortage of affordable housing as a consequence of the rapid development of war-related industries like shipbuilding during World War I. A local firm, Bridgeport Housing Company, financed construction of a group of 87 one- and two-family row houses designed by Mead. The development occupied a city block and was laid out around a central playground, keeping the children away from automobile traffic. Unusually for the time, about half of the houses had a hot water system supplied from a nearby powerhouse. In discussing her design for this community housing, Mead stressed the importance of cross-ventilation and windows for light, and she paid close attention to the structure of a housewife's day since "the work of taking care of the home falls to her lot." During this project, for example, she managed to get the local standards for sink and washtub heights changed to be higher, using live demonstrations to convince officials that basins set too low strained women's backs. In 1918, Mead became the fourth woman member of the American Institute of Architects, and in 1929 she was made a Life Member. In 1923–24, the Canadian architect Esther Hill worked for Mead as an apprentice. Mead died in 1967. Since 1983, Barnard College has had the Marcia Mead Design Award for undergraduate excellence in architectural design.