Volume 20 Issue 2 MAY 2015 FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT WISCONSIN MEMBER NEWSLETTER © Mark Hertzberg © Mark The Jacobs I House, widely considered Wright’s first Usonian Right Man for Wright Design home, has been nominated for James Dennis, steward of the Jacobs I House for over 30 years inclusion among UNESCO’s World by DOUG MOE This article was published February 11 in the Wisconsin State Journal. It is reprinted with permission. Heritage Sites. It is one of the houses featured on this year’s This is a story about an architect, a newspaperman had long been intrigued by the architect. Wright’s Wright and Like tour. and an art history professor, and it starts with a speech. fame was such that anyone even briefly in his orbit never forgot it. One night in the 1970s, the professor—James Dennis—went to the Unitarian Meeting House Dennis, growing up in Ohio, had an aunt who told of in Madison to hear the newspaperman—Herb having confronted Wright after a public appearance in Jacobs—speak about what it was like to engage with which the architect dismissed historical houses. The genius—the architect Frank Lloyd Wright. aunt had a neo-colonial farmhouse. “He was superb,” Dennis said of Jacobs, who spoke that Dennis saw Wright’s contrariness first hand one night night about having approached Wright in the 1930s in the 1950s at the Memorial Union. Dennis had just with the challenge of designing a home that could be arrived on campus as a graduate student. Wright’s built for $5,000. Wright did the design, and Herb and lecture that night dealt with the design of UW– Katherine Jacobs built it at 441 Toepfer Avenue in Madison, which the architect assured the crowd was Madison. They lived in the house for five years before all wrong, backward. The buildings faced away from moving to the country in 1942. the lake! They should be razed, Wright said, though he would spare the Red Gym. Jacobs, a former Capital Times reporter, spoke of that and more in his talk at the Unitarian Meeting House. At some point after Jacobs’ Unitarian Meeting House Afterward, Dennis had a minute with Jacobs to program on Wright, Dennis read Jacobs’ book, Building say how much he enjoyed the presentation. Dennis JACOBS HOUSE CONTINUES ON PAGE 5 President’s Message by LOIS Y. BERG Wright and Like 2015: Frank Lloyd Wright and His Apprentices Our annual Wright and Like tour travels to Madison this year. The weekend will begin on Friday night at the Wisconsin Historical Society for the premiere of a rare collection of Frank Lloyd Wright– produced presentation drawings and brochures on the American System-Built Homes. Attendees © John Paul Croake Paul © John will also be able to view selected artifacts from the Historical Society’s Wright archives, as well as recently The Dr. Marvin F. and Idabelle Stricker House, designed by Edgar Tafel ca. 1941, built 1949, with a 1998–2000 addition and alteration constructed chairs FLLW WI commissioned to furnish by Peter Rott, Taliesin Architects, Ltd. This home will be open during the Wright and Like 2015 Madison tour. our ASB Model B1 house museum in Milwaukee. After guests view the collections, Jack Holzhueter, historian and Wright scholar, will provide an overview of the Wright in Wisconsin is published three times annually in February, May, and September, by Frank Lloyd Wright Wisconsin, scope and importance of the ASBH project while CONTENTS a nonprofit organization designed to promote, protect, and Mike Lilek, Burnham Street Curator, will provide preserve the heritage of Frank Lloyd Wright, his vision and specifics about the homes. The evening continues at his architecture, in his native state of Wisconsin. Membership benefits include discounts at the Monona Terrace Gift Shop and the University Club for cocktails, dinner, and a silent on Wright and Like™ tour tickets, a free tour of the Model B1 auction of Wright- and Arts and Crafts–related items. home in Milwaukee, this newsletter, volunteer opportunities, and more. To join our organization, contact us at the address and The Saturday tour will include a wonderful mix of phone number listed below, or visit www.wrightinwisconsin.org. Guerrero © Pedro ARTICLES private homes and public buildings that highlights Chair, Publications Committee Mark Hertzberg Designer and Editor Scott K. Templeton/Campsite Creative llc Wright’s Usonian houses and Taliesin Fellowship– 01 Right Man for Wright Design The First Unitarian Special thanks to architect/author Randy Henning related architectural gems in the Madison and entirely by volunteers. The glue that holds all of these Meeting House, for contributing the “At Taliesin” column, and Patrick Mahoney Middleton area. programs and volunteers together is our part-time designed by Frank for contributing the vintage postcard. 06 Wright and Like 2015 office coordinator, Sherri Shokler. We appreciate all Lloyd Wright, was constructed Board of Directors (Sites Represented) the work the volunteers both on the board and outside Lois Berg, president (Wingspread); George Hall, vice president; 1947–1951. The original 09 Wasmuth Lithographs on Frank Lloyd Wright Wisconsin the board do for our organization. We would not be Mike Lilek, vice president–facilities; Denise Hice, secretary; Volunteers National Historic Display Kim Mattila-Kasten and Paul Sheahan, co-treasurers; Greg successful without you. Thank you for your time and Landmark building that has influenced Anderegg (SC Johnson); Mary Arnold; V. Terry Boyd; Michael Frank Lloyd Wright Wisconsin is dependent on talents. If you are not currently a volunteer but are Bridgeman; Ken Dahlin; Michael Ditmer (Schwartz House); Gail ecclesiastical Fox; Timothy Frautschi; Andy Gussert (Unitarian Meeting House); volunteers to do the majority of work for our orga- interested in helping with any aspect of the organi- and commercial architecture around Mark Hertzberg; Timothy Hoye; Carol Johnson (Taliesin®); nization. Our accomplishments happen through the zation, please contact Sherri at our Madison office at the country will be REGULAR FEATURES Stewart Macaulay; Bill Martinelli (Seth Peterson Cottage); work of a volunteer board of directors. The annual (608) 287-0339. open during the Mary Ann McKenna (Wyoming Valley School); Margo Melli; Wright and Like tour is staffed by over one hundred Wright and Like 2015 Donna Newgord; Heather Sabin (Monona Terrace Community 03 President’s 12 Faces of Our Madison tour. The and Convention Center); Humberto Sanchez; Ron Scherubel; volunteers to act as house captains and docents for Message Organization 2008 addition will not Traci Schnell; and Scott Templeton. our tour sites. Our ASB Model B1 house museum is Thank You 04 News Briefs 13 “At Taliesin” be available for tours. Frank Lloyd Wright Wisconsin open to the public on the second and fourth Saturday I want to thank you for your continued support of 08 Site Spotlight 14 Tours & Events p.o. Box 6339, Madison, WI 53716-0339 of every month, and also the third Friday from May Frank Lloyd Wright Wisconsin and hope to see you at 10 Wright Thoughts 16 Vintage Postcard Phone (608) 287-0339 to October. The tours are coordinated and staffed our 2015 Wright and Like tour on June 5 and 6. www.wrightinwisconsin.org Glass, wood, and brick detail from Frank Lloyd Wright’s Jacobs I House on the west side of Madison. 02 This home will be open to 2015 Wright and Like tour ticket holders. WRIGHT IN WISCONSIN VOLUME 20 ISSUE 2 MAY 2015 03 © Mark Hertzberg © Mark NEWS JACOBS HOUSE BRIEFS CONTINUED FROM FRONT PAGE with Frank Lloyd Wright: An Illustrated Memoir. The The Improbable Story of an Iconic story of the house on Toepfer—widely known as the 1886 Painting of Labor Protest. “Jacobs House,” although there were numerous owner- ship changes over the years—stayed with Dennis. Koehler was a Milwaukee artist whose 9-foot-long painting Courtesy of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Wright Lloyd the Frank of Courtesy One day in 1982, Dennis was chatting with a student, became a symbol of late-1800s Brad Lynch, a young man interested in architecture. labor protests, but then spent In Memoriam: Frances Nemtin decades in storage and obscurity The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation reports that “Have you seen the Jacobs House?” Dennis asked. before being rediscovered. Taliesin Fellow Frances Nemtin died April 7 in Hertzberg © Mark Paul Kruty, retired Scottsdale. Nemtin, 96, had been a member of the Lynch had not. They drove over to Toepfer. Dennis— Something of the same could associate professor Taliesin Fellowship since 1946. Prior to that she distin- Sandra Wicker tells Terry Parsons and her children who had actually seen the home only once, years be said for the Jacobs House. of architecture at guished herself notably as director of the Milwaukee Jayden, 12 (left), and Jeffrey, 9, about the American before—was dismayed by its condition, at least what When Dennis bought it in the University of Art Institute, where she presented an exhibit featuring System-Built Homes Model B1 Saturday, February 28. he could see through the overgrown trees and shrubs. 1982, he engaged his student Illinois, has donated a Jeffrey was doing research for a school project about model of Frank Lloyd Frank Lloyd Wright. She worked on three large Taliesin Frank Lloyd Wright. He is a fourth-grade student in Brad Lynch—today a successful Wright’s unrealized Architects projects in Iran for three years in the early Kenosha. “It was a mess,” he said. The signature carport was architect in Chicago—as well Abram Esbenshade House (1911–1912) to 1970s. Nemtin was instrumental in developing flower sagging badly. There was also a sign, staked in the yard: as a preservation architect, John Frank Lloyd Wright gardens and restoring prairie habitat at Taliesin in FOR SALE.