This "home with or without a dining room" is a precursor to repurposing unused rooms in your house.  As Bob Vila said in "Why 7 Families Ditched the Dining Room," "Formal dining rooms are starting to go the way of the formal living room—out of service.  While many homes have dining rooms, the square footage devoted to them often isn't justified by the little use most families get out of them."  Our illustration is from Popular Mechanics, 1931.