"Up until the 1950's wasn't every home built that way?"

No. There were homes built long before then that had no insulation at all.

My mother lived in a house in Las Vegas that was built right after WWII. I moved there in 1989 to fix it up for her so she could get a decent price. This is an area that has temperature extremes of 0ºF to 116ºF (18ºC to 47ºC). There was no insulation anywhere in the house, top, bottom or sides. I made enough tips on the first New Years to call in the blow-in insulation guy to at least get it into the ceiling. The house also had no built-in source of heat, and faced east toward tall trees.

I don't know when the fanaticism about building every house to face the street (instead of the sun) started, but it was over 100 yrs ago. I can't believe that people had never noticed the advantages of solar gain prior to the 1960s (even though it is still ignored by most builders today, if the PNW is any indication).

Cody Lundin was talking about the house he had built in his last book (When All Hell Breaks Loose), and he has no mechanical heating or cooling, and that's Arizona.

My dream: straw bale/passive solar.

Sue