Spring 1988 The Baum-Taft House The Baum-Taft House: A Historiography

Jaync Merkel

The Taft Museum seems to be a perfectly exist, and early documentary evidence is fragmentary. The restored residence from the beginning of the nineteenth first statements made about the house in print, from the century, but it is, in fact, a building that has been enlarged, 183 o's, mention the building itself only in passing. Not until altered, restored, and redefined over a period of 150 years to the beginning of the twentieth century did historians men- serve a series of residential and institutional purposes. Simi- tion its architecture. Soon after that interest centered on the larly the history of the Baum-Taft house—or any version of architect who designed it, even though today it appears it—seems to describe something fixed and certain, but the likely that the original house was the work of a carpenter- study of its history reveals a series of assertions, assumptions, builder and that a number of architects, decorators, crafts- stories, and myths uncovered or invented to explain the men, and other professionals were involved in its design, building that the authors saw or thought they saw. The remodeling, additions, and renovation over the years. historiography of the Baum-Taft residence reveals as much The entry on the Baum-Taft house in G.E. about the writing of architectural history and commentary Kidder Smith's The Architecture of the United States, one of the in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as the fabric of the most reputable guides to American architecture, typifies the house does about the building practices during that time.1 commentary made during most of this century: No original drawings or plans of the house The Taft Museum was built as the residence of Martin Baum,

Jayne Merkel is an art historian Front (west) elevation of the who works as architecture Baum-Taft house (Taft critic of the Enquirer Museum), Cincinnati, Ohio. and WGUC. She also writes Photo by Jeff Friedman, Cin- regularly for Art in America, cinnati, Ohio. The Baum-Taft Inland Architect, and Artforum. house is one of the finest exam- ples of Federal architecture in the state of Ohio. 34 Queen City Heritage with James Hoban of Washington fame thought by some to be its inhabitants and consists almost entirely of literary evidence: architect or at least a consultant. The house also recalls Jeffersonianletters, deeds, articles, papers, and word of mouth. Hardly principles of proportion. (Some attribute the house to Latrobe butanyone actually looked at the building or studied old maps, this is not borne out by Hamlin.)... Its architectural ambitions drawings, and photographs. Most of the researchers were attain elegance, with two-story central block and lower wings atnot art or architectural historians by training, but even those either side, and an unusual play of oval lights in the central section. who were did not conduct a thorough visual analysis—research A positively scaled, well-projected Tuscan portico marks the entry,with a crow bar, literally digging into the walls and under the giving a Greek Revival touch to the Federal Style building. The floors — that Richard Cote, Curator of the of entire house is of white-painted wood.2 the Confederacy, and other scholars have been doing recent- Like most of the people who studied and ly on historic houses in Virginia. wrote about the house, Kidder Smith did not base his attri- Also, most of the people who worked on the bution on visual evidence or connect it with his own descrip- Baum-Taft house in the past did not list their sources. Some tion. When the facade of the Taft Museum is compared to did not even include footnotes or bibliographies so their Hoban's most famous work, the White House in Washing- statements, dates, and attributions cannot be substantiated. ton, it is obvious that the two buildings could not have been When the same date appears again and again, it is impossible designed by the same architect. They are both white houses to determine whether it was repeated because the author with flanking wings and classical colonnades but the resem- found it in a book or article or if he came to the same blance stops there. The roof lines, the window frames, the conclusion on his own. Although much of the existing materials, the scale, the degree of detail—the whole approach research has limited usefulness for further inquiry, it shows to the classical vocabulary—is radically different. But those what the house has meant to previous generations, enriches differences were not noted in the literature on the house the lore of local history, and demonstrates the complexity which showed little interest in the building fabric of the involved in gathering information about even a well-preserved, house, what it looked like, how it was made, how it worked, existing structure. and how it evolved over time. The first document that pertains, even periph- The research on the house that has been done erally, to the Baum-Taft house is the earliest map of the city over the years concentrates mainly on the builders as well as in the collection of The Cincinnati Historical Society: Israel

Illustration of the front (west) ing and the 1857 lithograph on elevation of the Baum-Taft page two of this publication. house (TaftMuseum) published in Harper's Weekly, July, 1858. Please note the architectural differences between this draw- Spring 1988 The Baum-Taft House 3 5 Ludlow's Plan of the Town of Cincinnati in 1802, which is Society for the Promotion of Agriculture, Manufacturing, hand-drawn in ink. Since it does not take in the area where and the Domestic Economy he served as a trustee of the the house is located, it provides only a kind of negative Select Council of the corporation of the city but declined an evidence. It suggests that the area east of the public landing offer to represent the district in the United States Congress.7 and Fort Washington had not yet been platted and developed. Visual evidence exists to support Baum's acqui- On September 1, 1812, Martin Baum pur- sition of the land where the Taft Museum is located. It chased the site of the Taft Museum from Daniel Symmes, suggests that if not by 1812, then by 181 5, the city had and the transfer of the land is on file in the Hamilton County grown to encompass the site. A Plan of Cincinnati, Including Courthouse.3 Baum had come to Cincinnati during the All the Later Additions and Subdivisions Engraved for Daniel mid-1790's. Marilyn Ott, a former Taft Museum docent, Drake's Statistical View of 1 815, in the collection of The found his name in the church records of the First Presbyteri- Cincinnati Historical Society, extends about five blocks east an Church of Cincinnati as early as June 11, 1794, and in the of Broadway along the river. The land in the newly incorpo- birth and baptismal registry of the Salem Reformed Church rated eastern area is subdivided, and a big green space appears (now the United Church of Christ) in Hagerstown, Mary- on the side of the eventual site of the Baum-Taft house, land, where Baum was born on June 15, 1765.4 Other located between Symmes and Congress (later Fourth and sources, such as H.A. Ratterman's Der Deutsche Pionier ofThird) streets east of Pike Street. And, in the memoirs of 1 878s and a 1954 Literary Club paper, "Benjamin Latrobe, John Hough James, who lived in Cincinnati from 181 3 to Was he the Architect (?) of the Taft Museum," by librarian 1826, there is a reference to a garden planted for Baum on Carl Vitz6 maintain that Baum was born in Hagenau, Alsace, the west side of Deer Creek by a gardener named Schnetz Germany. The City Directory of 182 5 lists his place of birth assome time around i8i6or 1817.8 Pennsylvania. On another map of Cincinnati which is next When Baum arrived, Cincinnati was a village in a chronological sequence, the Plan of Cincinnati, Including of 500 with ninety-four cabins and ten frame houses. He All the late Additions & Subdivisions Engraved for Oliver Earnsworth built a two-story frame structure across the street from in 1 819, the green space is not shown. There are no lot lines Yeatman's Tavern (the center of the city's social, political, around the Baum property. But there is a house in the and economic life at the time) on the northwest corner of vicinity, one of the five large and imposing ones in the city Front and Sycamore streets, opened a general store, and that were illustrated on the map. It is probably the William soon became one of the city's wealthiest citizens. In 1804 he Lytle house which stood in what is now Lytle Park. married Ann Sommerville Wallace and eventually became Documents from the next year indicate that a the brother-in-law of several prominent early citizens such as house was under construction on the Baum property. There Judge Jacob Burnet, Nehemiah Wade, Samuel Perry, and was a financial "panic" in 1820 when the Cincinnati Branch Matthew Wallace, the pastor of the First Presbyterian Church. of the U.S. Bank sent some notes to Washington that had After his marriage, he built a brick residence next to the store been issued against land and other collateral, and the central at Front and Sycamore streets. He expanded his business U.S. Bank sent them back. A number of Cincinnati's most interests, becoming a partner in as many as seven separate prominent citizens lost their fortunes and their houses in the firms including Cincinnati's first sugar refinery, the first iron economic destabilization that followed. Martin Baum was foundry in the West, and the first steam mill where flour, one of them.9 wool, cotton, and whiskey were made. In 1 803 he helped Evidence of Baum's difficulties is recorded in form the Miami Exporting Company "to try to develop the papers of William Lytle at The Cincinnati Historical facilities for shipping goods," briefly became involved with Society. They contain an undated list of twenty properties, canal building and steamboats, and then turned to banking. which Baum offered to sell him with the owner's estimates The Miami Exporting Company became the first bank in of their value, including: the West. Baum was its first president, and when the United States Bank opened a branch in Cincinnati in 1817, he ... Three lots and the house where I live 8000.00 became a director. He was also involved with the first sub- (presumably at Pike and Congress streets) scription library, the Lancastrian School, Cincinnati Col- .. .Nine acresland this side ofT)eerCreek andNew House 30000.00 lege, the Western Museum, the Cincinnati Literary Society, (presumably the Taft Museum) the Gesangverein, and the Apollonian Society. Active in the Fifty acres or thereabouts adjoining the above 2 5 000.00 Queen City Heritage his wife deeded the house, its land, and other property in the city, the county, and the state to the Bank of the U.S. on November 12, 1825, in payment of a debt to the bank of $50,000 plus court expenses.15 The property is described in the deed as including about four and one-half acres instead of the nine Baum had offered to Lytle earlier and is said to include the area between Third and Fifth streets, Pike, and a street laid out at the back of the Baum property, which is now known as Butler Street. While the house belonged to the bank, it appears to have been leased to a Mrs. Anne Wood who operated a "school for young ladies." Charles Greve's Centen- nial History of Cincinnati of 1904 mentions a reference in the City Directory of 18 29 to "a respectable female school kept by Mrs. Wood on Pike between Symmes and Fifth streets;" and an undated interview with Mr. Davis L. James, Sr., of the James Book Store in the museum archives notes: "The Taft In a letter of August 22, 1820, Baum offered to sell Lytle his house was used as a school for girls by his grandmother, Mrs. Broadway property for $ 31,400 and "my Deercreek land, Anne Wood, and was known as Belmont House. She occu- including the new House and all the materials thereon for pied it for only a short time and then the Longworths $ 30,600, or both properties for a total of $62,000." The next bought it."16 day, in another letter, Lytle made a counter-offer of $62,000 Indeed, , a prominent for the two properties and seven additional ones which Cincinnati businessman like Baum, purchased the house Baum had valued at $155,733.33. A deal was never struck from the Bank of the U.S. on September 10, 1829, for even though more letters followed, and in one Baum said, $28,000.17 Contemporary accounts suggest that the house "... I must have $ 1000 or thereabouts in advance because returned to the kind of existence for which it had been built, without some money I & my Family must starve."10 but, like those from Baum's time, the accounts reveal more They did not starve, and in 1825 they appear about the life within (and outside) the walls than the walls to have been living in the "new House" (the Baum-Taft themselves. In a "Retrospect of Western Travel," Harriet house). They are listed in the City Directory as residing at Martineau described the people she met and the things she Pike and Symmes (Fourth) streets, instead of Pike and saw in this "splendid house" when she was in America in Congress as before, and there are several references to parties 18 34 and 1835: given by Baum in the house. Henry Howe notes: "His The proprietor has a passion for gardening, and his ruling taste hospitable home was open to all intellectually great men seems likely to be a blessing to the city. He employs four gardeners, who visited Cincinnati, and German literary men were and toils in his grounds with his own hands. His garden is on a especially welcome."11 Charles Frederick Goss refers to a terrace which overlooks the canal [now Eggelston Avenue], and the garden party in the house during the summer of 1 82 5 }2 An mostparklike eminences form the background of the view. Between account written after Mrs. Baum's death in 1864 says: "[it the garden and the hills extend his vineyards, from the produce of was] for those days quite a splendid mansion. When it was which he has succeeded in making twelve kinds of wine, some of finished he gave a party, which assembled before sunset, and which are highly praised by good judges. .. .In this house is West's separated before the present time for assembling parties. preposterous picture of Ophelia, the sight of which amazed me after There were present a large number of old pioneers (now all I had heard of it. ... The party at this house was the largest and residing with the dead). .. ,"13 most elegant of any that I attended in Cincinnati. Among many Curiously, there is a similar account of a party other guests we met one of the judges of the Supreme Court, a given by the next owner of the house, Nicholas Longworth, member of Congress and his lady, two Catholic priests, Judge Hall, during the 1830's.14 The Baum-Taft house seems to have the popular writer, with divines, physicians, lawyers, merchants, been the site of great social events in the city, as it is today, and their families. The spirit and superiority of the conversation but it did not remain for long in Baum's possession. He and were worthy of the people assembled.18

The Malta Gray Room, looking artifact during the occupancy southwest, the Baum-Taft of the Tafts; they lived in it com- house, c. 1925 during the fortably, in the style of the day. residency of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Phelps Taft. No par- ticular attempt was made to treat the house as a historic Spring 1988 The Baum-Taft House 3 7 Like other writers from the early years, she The second half of the nineteenth century, does not mention the architecture. There are contemporary however, produced some visual documentation. A rare hand- references to Longworth's philanthropy and to his art col- colored insurance map in the collection of The Cincinnati lection, which accounts for the Robert Duncanson murals, Historical Society, the Martin Insurance Map of 1 8 5 5, depicts though they are not mentioned either. the plan of the house and its outbuildings.20 Since it shows The murals do not seem to have been the only the house with wings, the wings must have been in place change Longworth made. The building itself suggests that by this time. Since the house occupies a green space in the substantial alterations were made around 1830. The wings middle of a rather intensely developed area—a different kind may even have been added as they are awkwardly attached to of place than Harriet Martineau described—the neighbor- the central block. The windows in the wing and in the hood must have changed between 1835 and 1855. And central block are of different sizes and do not line up. The because it faces Pike Street, rather than the river as does the woodwork on the interior has a slightly sharper profile in Kilgour house shown on the next page of the Martin Insur- the wings than in the central portion and seems to date from ance Map, it seems to be a hybrid type—part town house, part 1 830-1 840 instead of 1 820-1 830. And some of the base-country house. It has outbuildings, indicated with the boards are not aligned with the plinths supporting the door Roman numerals XV, which mean "frame sheds, stables or frames. Longworth had a large family for whom he said he outhouses." The stable is on the southeast corner of the lot, bought the house, so the additions may have been made to and there are other houses on the property nearby. The accommodate their needs. However, the same kind of ceil- .Martin Insurance Map, like its successors published by the ing joists appear in the attic over the wings as over the central Sanborn Map Company, is color-coded. Yellow indicates block, and the basic configuration of the house (a tall central frame construction; pink indicates brick. Many of the other block with smaller flanking wings) is similar to that of a few fine houses of the time, such as the Kilgour house, the other houses of the period in the area. The wings on the Literary Club, and the ones near the Taft Museum, were brick. The Baum-Taft house is inscribed with an eight (VIII), which means "dwellings part brick and part frame," pre- sumably because of the foundation which is stone with some brick arches and walls. The porch is frame (XV). And there is a plus sign (+) on the house indicating a shingle roof. Does that mean that the standing seam roof was not original to the house, or is the reference to shingle a mistake? Maps of this kind are usually accurate, especially about materials, since they were made for fire insurance purposes. A rare color lithograph of The Longworth House in 1857 from "The Memorial of the Golden Wedding of Nicholas Longworth and Susan Longworth, Celebrated in Cincinnati on Christmas Eve, 1857" provides the earliest dated image of the Baum-Taft house.21 Since it was made from a drawing, the artist may have simplified or altered the actual appearance of the house. No roof is shown over the Baum-Taft house may have been planned from the begin- central block, perhaps because it was not visible from the ning, only executed later. Certainly major interior alter- artist's perspective. The entrance door is simply a plain ations occurred. Hairline cracks in the plaster indicate that semi-circular arch, different in both style and character from doorways once led from the main corridor to the Gray and the elaborate Victorian entrance which appears in later pho- Malta Gray galleries, and the woodwork in the central hall tographs and the entrance to the museum today, which is and corridor appears to have been rearranged. There are shown in the architects' drawings from the 1930's. This one enough inconsistencies in the physical fabric of the house is narrower and has no windows around it. How then was that we know that it was changed in some way, several times, the lighted? Gaslight, which was instituted in but there is no written documentary evidence of the alter- the 1840's, was available by the time this lithograph was ations from the 1 8 30's and 1 840's.19 made; but since some kind of natural lighting would have

W.H. Martin, Map of Cincinnati collection of The Cincinnati for Insurance Companies and Historical Society. This hand- les/ Estate Agencies Con- colored insurance map depicts taining Every Lot and House the Baum-Taft house with its with Its Number Classified original outbuildings. According to the Reference Below, 1855, Vol. II, p. 9, Queen City Heritage been required earlier, this was either an alteration of the lights is now in place. The front staircase is hidden behind original entrance or a fabrication of the artist. In the litho- bushes, and the ironwork is barely visible. graph, the portico and window sills are painted off-white, A drawing labeled "Sinton Residence, Cincin- and the window entablatures are not bracketed. The stone nati" by E.A. Lloyd and dated 1890 presents a somewhat and brick arched openings beneath the portico extend to the cleaner image, with less prominent chimneys, no awnings, ground, and the stair railings are straight instead of splayed shutters on the windows in the wings, bracketed entabla- with plain ironwork evident. The sash windows in the wings tures over those in the central block, and the light fixtures as have small nine-over-nine panes. Those in the central block well as ornamental fencing that survive today, separating the are larger with six-over-six panes, and thinner than the ones grounds from Pike Street. A standing seam roof is clearly in in place today. The grilles over the ground-story windows place in this frontal view, as it is in the Elzner sketch, but the are not punctuated with rosettes, and the ones on the oval ends of the house where the north and south elevations and windows in the attic are not shown at all. Clearly a lot of the bay windows are located are not visible. However, the changes have been made. As the earliest visual resource, the welcoming curved staircase and the depiction of the door lithograph was used in the 19 30's as a source of information itself is very clear. It has small panels of glass in the lunette, for restoration, which seems to have been based on a general Gothic tracery on the door, and is flanked by arched side but incomplete knowledge of the Federal Style.22 lights. The doorway looks wider and plainer in photographs Why was restoration necessary? Nicholas presumed to have been taken around that time. One of them Longworth died in 1863, and the house passed to his son shows a bedroom wing on the north side, an addition which Joseph Longworth who decided not to move in. Some time was made in 1890 by David Sinton. around 1866, Francis E. Suire signed a ninety-nine year lease Sinton, another Cincinnati industrialist, pur- and began occupation of the residence. Since the Duncanson chased the house from Joseph Longworth in 1869, accord- murals, commissioned by Longworth, were covered with ing to historians Goss and Greve, though some sources say wallpaper when the next owner took occupancy around 1870 or 1 871.24 Sinton lived in the house during the 1 870's 1870, it is assumed that the redecorating was done under and remained there even after his daughter, Anna, married Suire's tenancy. Around this time, the original wooden man- Charles Phelps Taft in 1 87 3 in the Music Room. Sinton died tels were replaced with elaborate Victorian ones of marble on August 31, 1900.25 For obvious reasons, the Sinton and or hand-carved oak, pine flooring in the major reception Taft reigns run together. The Tafts remained in the house areas was overlaid with parquetry, a large central arched until they died, Charles in 1929 and Anna in 19 3 1, at which opening was cut into the west wall of the Music Room, the point it became a museum. As stipulated in the Tafts' deed of principal entrance on the facade was altered, the exterior gift, the Cincinnati Institute of Fine Arts was created in staircases at the ends of the corridor were removed, and bay 1927 to administer the museum, and matching funds were windows were added to the ends of the house.23 raised by the citizens of Cincinnati during the next year to A number of images describing the house in help fund its operation. The museum opened to the public the late nineteenth century survive. Unfortunately, very few on November 29, 1932.26 of them are dated, and some are highly interpretive. A sketch The addition of a series of north bedrooms by by A.O. Elzner, a prominent Cincinnati architect who, with Sinton was in place by 1 8 91, and probably by the time of his partner, later designed the addition of a dining room for Lloyd's drawing, because the residence is clearly shown on the Tafts, shows the house in a rather disheveled state, the Insurance Maps of Cincinnati of 1 891 with the bedroom presumably intended to make it appear romantic. The plant- wing.27 In the Atlas of Cincinnati of 1883-1884, the bay ings on the grounds are overgrown with dying trees and windows are shown but the addition is not.28 In some old dead branches are strewn among them. A door beneath the notes in the files of the museum, Louis Belmont was said to bay window on the north elevation seems to be sinking into be the architect of the bedroom addition. But he was also the ground. The windows have no shutters (they were in place listed as the architect of the dining room extension, and in the 1857 lithograph), but some of them are covered with he was certainly not since the drawings for that project are striped awnings which are folded back, half-opened, and in the museum archives. pulled down. Two-over-two double hung windows have The dining room was enlarged by the Tafts in replaced the multi-paned windows shown in the earlier 191 o by the architects Elzner & Anderson. They had designed rendering, and an elaborate decorative arched entrance with a number of innovative early concrete buildings in Cincin- Spring 1988 The Baum-Taft House nati including the Ingalls Building at Fourth and Vine streets, The historians' statements prove even more the first concrete frame skyscraper in the world; the Ele- conclusively that during the early twentieth century, the phant House at the Cincinnati Zoological Gardens; and the architecture of the house was noticed and appreciated. Charles American Book Company Building, located next door to Theodore Greve described the house in stylistic terms: the Taft Museum. They were responsible for a number of Later Colonial or rather of a transition period from the square very handsome Georgian and Greek Revival houses in East house without the door porch to the pseudo-classic when the facade Walnut Hills, Clifton, and Avondale. Elzner & Anderson was in evolution before the stucco Greek temple was used to mask an added a colonnaded niche, classicizing plaster work, and an ordinary two-story dwelling, square windows, balconies and all.... The extension to the Taft dining room; and they may have added main porch or center has grown half a story, lighted by two oval decoration to the ceiling of the Music Room as well. The openings on each side of the facade and the roof has lost some of its Tafts also commissioned drawings from the firm for a two- pitch. It has pushed out two low wings on the front line. ... Then the story "gallery" to be built onto the north bedroom wing whole has risen from the ground somewhat, disclosing windows. in 1917. Although the plans for the project survive in the The cellar has become a basement. The approach has widened the museum archives, they were not realized. force of the door porch, which is led up to by nine stone steps. Two No particular attempt was made to treat the wooden columns close together on each at the corners support the house as a historic artifact during the time the Tafts occupied pediment which crowns the portico. ...29 it. They lived in it comfortably, in the style of the day, as Greve was very conscious of the history and contemporary photographs illustrate and historians of the evolution of architectural styles, but he oversimplified the time have noted. The museum archives contain a whole process that actually takes place over time. His view was sequence of photographs of the interior including a post- excessively linear and progressive, and he assumed, as most card labeled: "The Taft Residence, 4th and Pike Streets, later writers did, that the overall form of the house had been Cincinnati" made for the "Ohio Valley Industrial Exposi- determined all at once, though he was aware—and even tion, Cincinnati, Aug. 29 to September 24, 1910." It not critical—of some "alterations:" only documents the appearance of the house, but suggests The door where the character of a house is so strongly told, has that it was invested with special significance at the time. suffered a base "alteration" and no longer holds the half-wheel

A.O. Elzner, Sketch of Sinton Residence, c. 1880, Cincinnati, Ohio. Note the introduction of the bay window on the north elevation and the Victorian entrance. Queen City Heritage

ence, 4U1 am: l'ike Sts., Cincinnati. OHIO •

30 transoms that once must have been the ornament of the house. The poetically old-fashioned house is wooden, the boards laid on His judgments were consistent with those of flat... the front door opens to a comfortable hall carpeted deep the architects forth e restoration, but he did not explain how red.— The woodwork furnishings of the library are wonderful he arrived at his conclusions. He mentioned the house's black Flemish oak carvings. Opposite the front door and opening "good proportion," noted that it was made of "wood put on into a transverse hall is the ballroom, a huge, airy old room with six smooth and painted white," and said that "the position and great windows giving on a porch which overlooks a back garden. ... 31 dignity are its best features." The house neither in its architecture, furnishings, A few years later, another local historian, the nor decoration makes any pretence to any particular style, nor is Reverend Charles Frederick Goss, discussed the house more there any trace of that wretched thing so incompatible with the sense passionately, personally, and romantically, but with a similar of home, the trail of the collector. Yet the architecture is predomi- regard for its history and for history in general: nantly colonial and there is a notable and noted collection of Down in the choicest part of town in a spot where the bugle notespictures numbering some seventy-five canvases hanging properly from Ft. Washington would have sounded... stands a house which here and there upon the walls in all the rooms. ... as a home always vitally touching the most pregnant historic There is a sense of great wealth spent lavishly but interest of the city, connects the past with the present. Over threequietly for comfort and beauty. There is perfect harmony. A nd there quarters of a century—well-nigh a century old, this house is perhapsis in it that best quality of all in human life or art, suggestion. One the most individual, the most symbolic, of the deepest interest and thinks not only of all the lovely and rare things that stand before significance of any in Cincinnati. ... one's eyes now, pictures and frail vases which will so far outlast the There is a broad and cheerful garden in front. ...A living eyes beholding them, but the quiet beautiful old home calls to low stone wall with high old-fashioned iron fence. ... Here even mind vanished days when former owners lived there,...33 before the portal of the place the word "old-fashioned" pleasantly Similar thinking must have influenced the intrudes. ... There are three sets of great stone gate-posts and youTafts' decision to convert their house and collection to a enter the middle one, turning the silver knob of its lock, and walk upmuseum. One of the reasons that the house "called to mind the stone flagging to the stone steps of the portico with its sets ofvanished days" was that its site remained bucolic long after 32 pillars on either side. the entire rest of the downtown basin was intensely developed, However, when Goss described the way the as illustrated by a large drawing, a Panorama of Cincinnati Tafts lived in the house, he praised them for not being by J.L. Trout from 1901, in the collection of The Cincinnati inhibited by its architecture: Historical Society. In the panorama, prepared when the

Postcard of The Taft Residence, but suggests that it was in- 4th and Pike Streets, Cincinnati, vested with special significance for the "Ohio Valley Industrial at the time. Exposition, Cincinnati, August 29-September 24, 1910." This postcard not only documents the appearance of the house, Spring 1988 The Baum-Taft House 41 downtown area was being transformed from a compact had done so. ... The Baum house exemplifies this preference. It has mixed-use nineteenth century city with houses, markets, the air... of a country seat, rather than of a town house, recalling churches, factories, offices, and business houses intermingled the "seats" of the Virginia and magnates of its period with one another into a purely commercial center with tall in its lateral extension and in its vertical restriction, as well as office buildings and stores, the Baum-Taft house and its in the amplitude of its grounds. ... The reduction of the portico to immediate neighbors occupy a verdant oasis. Two years later, a porch shows a willingness to sacrifice to practicality, of which the the houses on either side were demolished and factories results are architecturally rather unfortunate. A tetrastyle "order" were built next door. But the interest in history was moti- seems to be indicated, or if not that, a distyle of much less attenu- vated by more than nostalgia. The writers of the time were ated columns, even with pedestals, if necessary to bring them into trying to demonstrate the value of previous cultural achieve- classical proportions. On the other hand, the sacrifice of classicality ments. One of the ways they did so (perhaps not completely to practicality in the attic of the central block, apparently required intentionally) was by producing pedigrees for works of art for servants' quarters or other subordinate uses and lighted from its and architecture. own "ox-eyes," ignoring the requirement of some dividing member In 1908 Montgomery Schuyler, the most in- between it and its substructure, is architecturally effective, waiving fluential architecture critic of the day and one of the first convention and precedent, which Latrobe always took a pleasure in to appreciate American architecture, wrote in the Archi- waiving, provided there was anything to be gained by a waiver. tectural Record: The central block is signalized, the "composition" is attained. It ... there is at least one piece of evidence that in the is only a pity that the porch should be so excrescential.34 Cincinnati of 1827 there was a refinement incompatible with Schuyler was not the first to attribute the the notion that the "Domestic Manners" which the English critic house to Latrobe. As early as 1887, an anonymous editor [Mrs. Trollope] depicted were all-pervading... the house which labeled a picture of it in the Inland Architect and News Record: Martin Baum built in Cincinnati in 1817, and for which he "Old colonial residence, Cincinnati, O.; Benjamin Henry was well inspired to choose for his architect Benjamin H. Latrobe, Latrobe, architect."35 But because of his reputation, Schuyler's then fulfilling the last year of his service as architect of the Capitol opinions were echoed by a host of other writers. The Baum- at Washington. It is quite unmistakenly Latrobe}s, to those who Taft house was attributed to Latrobe in Thieme-Becker's art know the work that he was doing in and elsewhere in historical dictionary and by the art historian Fiske Kimball; those years, and who remember his insistence, in design as well asand even though Kimball worded his attribution carefully in words, upon "simplicity" as the first of architectural qualities. and refuted it later, it lived on in the literature. In 1919 ... It was this preference that induced him to revert from the Renais-Kimball wrote: sance to the models of classical Athenian antiquity as soon as he... there are in Ohio, in Michigan, and elsewhere beyond the was able to do so, and long before any other American architect Alleghenies, many most interesting houses in which the traditions of the Colonial style and of the classical revival were continued down to the Civil War. Notable among these is the old Martin Baum house in Cincinnati, now lovingly preserved, in spite of the

: * \ i encroachments of industry, as the residence of Mr. Charles P. Taft. ... The house itself with its smooth wall surfaces, its slender, dignified columns, its delicate cornices and window caps, has suffered but little in its century of existence. The original doorway, % to be sure, was replaced by one of Victorian pattern, and the lamps 7) with their heavy pedestals mere additions of the period. ... Always admired, the house attracted the attention of the late Montgomery Schuyler, a leader in the study of A merican architecture, who ascribed the authorship of its design to Benjamin Latrobe... the most highly trained and gifted architect of his day in America. The attribution is indeed a tempting one, especially as

- Latrobe was in Pittsburgh from 1811 to 1 814, and is reported by his son to have furnished designs for several houses along the Ohio. Although no preserved examples of domestic buildings surely designed

E. Robinson and R.H. Pidgeon, Society. By comparing various Civil and Topographical Engi- fire insurance maps, we know neers Atlas of the City of that the bay windows on the Cincinnati, Ohio from Official north and south elevations Records and Actual Surveys, were in place by 1883-1884. 1883-1884, PI. 4, collection of The Cincinnati Historical 42 Queen City Heritage by him, which might serve as reliable terms of comparison, havetwo tasks which are somewhat incompatible, though no one been identified, there is a certain affinity in the window treatmentseems to have sensed so at the time. The architects were and other features of the Cincinnati house with details in some of Garber & Woodward of Cincinnati who had worked with Latrobe }s public buildings.36 Cass Gilbert of New York on the Union Central Building, This is a much more cautious and non- with John Russell Pope on the Cincinnati Gas & Electric committal attribution than Schuyler's, but it was repeated Company Building, and who had designed the Cincinnati carelessly even after Kimball changed his mind. As late as Club; the Dixie Terminal Building; and Withrow, Walnut 1970, in Early Homes of Ohio, I.T. Frary wrote: "Local tradi- Hills, and Western Hills high schools. Garber's son, Woodie, tion names as the architect James Hoban, who designed the a student at Cornell University at the time and later a White House at Washington, but... better grounds exist for prominent local modern architect, assisted on the project. attributing it to Benjamin Henry Latrobe."37 Kimball's even- He wrote a thorough paper on the effort which supplements tual reservations were not widely known, but even those Siple's brochure and derives from the same point of view who were aware of them did not always acknowledge them. which was very typical of the time. In a June 14, 1940, letter to Miss Margaret Kremers at the The Taft restoration began in 1929 at almost Taft Museum Kimball said: exactly the same moment as the restoration of Colonial You have tracked down one of my youthful hypotheses, one of the Williamsburg. Although until recently historians of archi- very few I ever advanced without a definite documentary basis. Itecture have tended to think of that time as the beginning of knew that Latrobe had been in Pittsburgh about 1813 -17... that the era of modern architecture, or at least as the heyday of he had designed Ashland for Henry Clay and a house in Newport, Art Deco, it was also a period of enthusiastic classical revival, Kentucky and this led me to venture the idea that the Martin as Garber & Woodward's buildings attest. Since American Baum (Taft) house might be by him. But when Walter Siple was architects of the 1920's and 1930's were trained in the restoring the Taft house, he wrote me, sending me what informa- tradition of the French Beaux Arts, they studied architectur- tion he had, and I answered him then that I had abandoned any al .history, but it was a very selective history, romantic in belief that Latrobe was concerned.38 character, and weak in its understanding of American work. However, in a brochure published by the Taft Yet architects were becoming interested in Americana. Museum soon after it opened, Siple (who was also director of Although Garber & Woodward's earlier commercial build- the Cincinnati Art Museum) said: "The name of Benjamin ings had been based on Italian Renaissance or Greco-Roman Henry Latrobe, designer of the White House porticos, has prototypes, Withrow High School drew its inspiration from been associated with the Taft residence by both Montgomery the Georgian Colonial, and Walnut Hills was a tribute to Schuyler and Fiske Kimball"39 and went on to quote the Jefferson, representing a free and eclectic cross between the earlier attribution. Of course, he may not have received University of Virginia and Monticello. Kimball's disclaimer when the brochure went to press, and Historians of the period were romantic, too. he did say that "it has not been possible to establish this At Williamsburg they painted a pretty picture of life in attribution."40 But then he reprinted a passage from the eighteenth century America with everything clean and spar- Journal of Latrobe, which supported it: kling, no animal smells or slaves' quarters; and all the build- While at Pittsburgh, he designed several private buildings that ings were restored—as well as they could be in 1929—to the were erected there or in the immediate vicinity. Also for other places.same moment in time. (They have subsequently been altered Among these last were the residences of Henry Clay at Lexington as new information was accumulated.) The 1988 view of a and Governor Taylor at Newport.41 living, changing, messy, confusing, overlapping history was Those houses were later destroyed by fire and simply not in vogue at the time. were not available for comparison, as Siple noted, but he did Attempts were made to be accurate but many not compare the Baum-Taft house with any of the docu- of the examination techniques available today were not mented existing Latrobe buildings that were available, such known. Siple explained: "In two rooms and the hall we as the Thomas Worthington house, "Adena," in nearby found traces of the original tinting of the walls—powder Chillicothe, Ohio. blue, lemon yellow, grey green. Here these colors have been Siple's brochure is most useful for its descrip- used," in other rooms, "colors popular in the 1820's—grey, tion of the methodology used during the restoration. The violet, and light blue."42 He noted: "With the exception of building was both "restored" and converted to a museum: the mantels and chair rails, all of the original woodwork has Spring 1988 The Baum-Taft House

remained intact."43 He assumed that if it was there, it was casework in the Federal Style. In the 1980's it is standard original. Charles Brownell and Richard Cote, two of the practice to insert display cases which are obviously modern scholars who came to Cincinnati for a symposium in June so that no one is given the impression that they were part of 1987, found woodwork from four or five different periods the original building. The U.S. Department of Interior's and noticed inconsistencies in its use. They noticed peculiar Standards require rehabilitators to do so, even on commer- junctures between mouldings as well as other irregularities cial buildings, whenever historic preservation tax incentives proving that the house must have changed over time. But in are used. But in the early 1930's, it was thought more the early 1930's, the "authorities" assumed it was from one appropriate to make the cabinetry "fit in" in order to create or two building periods, and they took—or mistook—what- the illusion of an early nineteenth century house. ever they found for "original." The Baum-Taft house restoration was by no The restorers also felt free to add new ele- means an unsophisticated one for its time. The architects ments that resembled the "original" ones they found. They and administrators made a serious attempt to be accurate, removed the Victorian mantels because they did not see the and they published information about the effort, explaining Victorian era as part of the house's "history," and they put in what was new and what was old and why they had made the "new" ones salvaged or taken from other early nineteenth decisions they did. The brochure is especially valuable now century houses or designed to "match" existing trim. None since all of the paint samples and most of the other docu- of the mantels in the house today are original. Even more mentary materials were lost when a garage in which they shocking by modern standards, they added new museum were stored suffered a massive leak. The brochure explains:

Portico, the Baum-Taft House (TaftMuseum), c. 1900, collec- tion of The Cincinnati Historical Society. This elaborate Vic- torian entrance and the later light fixtures were removed in 1931 during the conversion of the house to a museum. 44 Queen City Heritage An effort was made to restore the interior as nearly as possible to its original condition. A careful inspection of the woodwork proved that the original color was a pure white. ...In addition to the colors discussed above, wall paper borders of the first quarter of the nineteenth century have been used in several rooms. The dressing of the windows was based on plates from Mcubles et Objets de Gout published from 1819 to 1820. The overdraperies are, with the exception of those in the offices, of materials dating from approxi- mately 1820. We know from advertisements in the early papers and directories that wealthy people of Cincinnati were buying many things manufactured in France and England, and they were in contact with such fashionable centers as and Alexandria. .. .44 Our idea with regard to the installation was to provide a dignified background for the Toft collections—this back- ground to reflect the feeling of a home of the first quarter of the nineteenth century. ... We were fortunate in obtaining several pieces of furniture from the workshop of Duncan Phyfe which were formerly in the Louis Guerineau Myers collection. These have been supplemented by old chairs which harmonize with the Duncan Phyfe style and provide visitors with seating accommodations which do not destroy the spirit of the rooms. ...45 Even though there was general agreement on this approach, there was one area where the architects and the director did not see eye-to-eye. That was on the preserva- tion of the Duncanson murals. Siple, being an art historian, decided to restore them. The architects who were primarily concerned with the restoration of the house wanted to have them removed and replaced with wall coverings typical of the 1820's. Siple's position was less consistent, but it was more in keeping with museum philosophy and later restora- tion policy. In the brochure Siple touches on some of the problems of converting the building to a museum but does not mention some of the ones that created the most dramatic changes, such as the new visitors' entry on the north elevation and the staircase to the second floor which radically alters the impression one would have received in the nineteenth century. Architects' drawings in the museum archives show that they labored over the design for the entrance, perhaps in an attempt to distinguish the new public entrance from the original private one facing Pike Street while preserving the illusion of an historic house. They produced three schemes before one was finally approved. Even so, the final scheme, like the new Pike Street entrance, which Garber & Woodward also designed, resembles stock neo-Federal details of the period. These insertions have none of the rough quirky charm of the original woodwork,

a, b, and c. Garber & Woodward (visitor's) entrance before the Architects, Three Revised third (c) was finally accepted. Plans for North Entrance to Baum-Tafthouse (Taft Museum), 1931, Cincinnati, Ohio. The architects produced three schemes for the north Spring 1988 The Baum-Taft House 45 and most of the "matching" details no longer seem to the only man of this nature and capability at that time and who match. The baseboards in the President's Room have a was designing residences in this immediate area.47 streamlined Art Deco quality, and the cabinetry with its anachronistic movable modern shelving hovers awkwardly Although Garber placed greater weight on between reproduction and functionalism. A certain amount supposed similarities between Latrobe's work and the fabric of detailing is unavoidably dated, even today when we have a of the museum than other writers had, his attribution rests on much more complete understanding of historic American generalizations rather than observations based on compara- architecture. tive visual analysis. And he emphasized the fact that Latrobe The paper Woodie Garber prepared during was in Cincinnati around the time the house was built. the restoration is valuable for the insights it provides about If Garber, an architect, supported his case with architectural thinking on the subject at the time. Although biographical coincidence, it should not be surprising that young Garber drew heavily on Siple's brochure, repeating Carl Vitz, a librarian, made it the primary basis of his argu- verbatim many of its passages, he also surveyed and quoted ment. In a 19 5 4 Literary Club paper titled, "Benjamin Hen- heavily from the literature on the Baum-Taft house: Schuyler, ry Latrobe, Was He the Architect (?) of the Taft Museum," Kimball's initial positive attribution to Latrobe, Trollope, Vitz stressed the factors that could have led Baum to com- The Journal of Latrobe, the Lytle-Baum correspondence, Law- mission Latrobe: rence MendenhalPs Baum's Folly, Clara Longworth de Many reasons can begiven why Latrobe might have been sought out Chambrun's The Making of Nicholas Longworth, Cist's Cincin-by Baum. To him, a banker, Latrobe's first important commission, nati in 1 8 51, Martineau, Goss, Great Georgian Houses ofthe Bank of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, would have been America, Meubles et Objets de Gout, Liberty Hall, the Dailyknown. ... The residence of Worthington and Clay and of General Gazette, the Cincinnati Directory of 1 8 3 6-18 3 7, papers in Taylorthe just across the river, could not have been unknown to him. Taft Museum library, and the United States Department of Similarity of interests could have brought them together. Baum was Interior's Historic American Buildings Survey. His paper waGermans born, and Latrobe's mother was German and he had amply illustrated, containing even a rare print found on spent his years of youth and early manhood in German schools and book ends owned by the Comtesse de Chambrun, which he continental travel. Both men were interested in Ohio and Missis- said was "the earliest known drawing of the Taft Museum" sippi River navigation. ... Because ofBaum's interest in trade with though it showed double hung windows instead of ones with , he would have known that Latrobe had been engaged small panes and the present curving front steps. He spoke to build its light house and waterworks. Both were interested in with confidence and clearly believed that "the house as it gardens. Baum's enterprises had to do with machinery and we stands today, with the exception of the wing addition and find Latrobe often occupied with mechanical engineering few slight changes, is as near as it has been possible to restore, problems. ... He was well off financially. Baum would want the the same as originally constructed."46 Yet, it is obvious that best and Latrobe was tops and available. This would all seem very his knowledge of American architectural history was, by obvious, could we only find one clear documentary reference, or 1980's standards, sketchy. Like most writers of the time almost equally so, if Latrobe had left few or no records.48 and earlier, he attributed the house to Latrobe: In fact he left voluminous records, and there is no mention of the Baum house in them. There are letters In researching and exploring the Taft Museum for restoration, myfrom Latrobe's wife and daughter which substantiate the father, Frederick W. Garber, Architect, and I, separately then fact that the family had a ten-day unplanned stop in Cincin- jointly, concluded that, though no documentation has yet substan- nati in March 1820, but they make no mention of a commis- tiated it, the Architect was certainly Benjamin Henry Latrobe. It sion. Still, Vitz pointed out a number of ways Latrobe might cannot be justly ascribed to Hoban as it contradicts his recordedhave made contact with Baum at the time. He pinned his work in its more English tradition and formality. Latrobe, whose hopes on circumstantial evidence, and hopes they were. He imagination roved more freely yet as surely in his own creativity,very obviously wanted to be able to prove that Latrobe was expresses a more French flair in his personal departures from rigidthe architect of the Taft Museum. When he found positive tradition. This is indeed a residence in the grand manner, but it is attributions, like Schuyler's and Kimball's, he used them to not wood posing as stone, but wood expressed in its classic self withsupport his argument. But when he wrote to Talbot Hamlin, inventive freedom. The sophistication of proportion, the devices sothe leading Latrobe scholar of the time, and was discour- surely and uniquely applied here are indeed a signature of Latrobe,aged, he decided to "cease theorizing about architectural 40 Queen City Heritage styles and think of it only in terms of the conditions and journal or in Mrs. Latrobe's letter, both published in the Wilson situations at the time and of the two men who either were orbook, if such an important job from his designs had been under were not associated in the building." (italics his)49 In this wayconstruction at the time.50 his paper is typical of the commentaries on the Baum-Taft Hamlin's comments, of course, were cursory, and they were house—and probably of human nature as well. It shows that not published, so it is not surprising that the earlier attribu- the writer heard what he wanted to hear and that he trusted tions survived. It is largely because misinformation contin- what he heard (or read) more than what he saw. ued to be repeated that Ruth K. Meyer, director of the Taft Talbot Hamlin's response to his letter con- Museum, and its staff decided to invite specialists in the tains the first serious attempt to consider the authorship of field to convene for a symposium, comment on the attri- the house on visual evidence. In it Hamlin said: butions, and study the Baum-Taft house at first hand. This brings us to the Sinton-Taft house. There is not a mention or William Seale, the foremost authority on James trace of Martin Baum or of any Cincinnati work in the existing Hoban and author of The President's House: A History51, Latrobe papers. Furthermore, stylistically the house seems to me tobegan his presentation by remarking: "I had hoped that by have nothing whatsoever to do with the kind of architecture Latrobetonight I could tell you with absolute certainty that James stood for. If one compares it, for instance, with the Van Ness house,Hoban designed and built the Taft Museum 160 or more the plans and elevations of which are in Fiske KimbalPs Domestic years ago. Alas, I can't."52 He explained that there was little Architecture of the American Colonies and the Early Repub- documentary evidence to connect Hoban with any building lic, the difference in basic ideals becomes obvious. The interior trimbesides the White House and described what was known is quite different from anything I could attribute to Latrobe, and about his life and work. He ended: "There is really not much the whole design and its detail seem to me a harmonious expressionto go on. I think the most concrete thing that can be said, of the kind of "Late Colonial" or Federal work, against which in conclusion, is that the elusive architect of the Baum-Taft Latrobe was always protesting. Moreover, the dates are against anyhouse had much in common with James Hoban, if only in possibility of his connection with it, for he was much too busy in his remarkable ability to evade history."53 Baltimore and too much worried about the completion of the New Charles Brownell, the leading Benjamin Orleans waterworks to make it probable that he was doing this Latrobe scholar, announced more confidently: "The ascrip- house at the same time. Surely there would have been some mentiontion does not have a leg to stand on, either in the form of of it in the account ofLatrobe}s visit to Cincinnati given in his written sources, primary and secondary, or in the form of Spring 1988 The Baum-Taft House 47

architectural evidence."54 He pointed out that, quite unlike a considerable knowledge of the carpenter-builder tradition, Hoban, there is a wealth of material on Latrobe: "13 vol- concurred with Seale and Brownell. He suggested: "The Taft umes of Latrobe journals, 14 sketchbooks by Latrobe, and, Museum may NOT, in fact, have been designed by an archi- most important, 19 volumes of Latrobe's copies of outgoing tect. Rather... (it was) constructed under the direction of a letters" as well as "roughly 45 o architectural and engineering carpenter-builder who, more than likely, migrated to Cin- drawings... and records written not by Latrobe, such as cinnati during the early 19th century and practiced his institutional minutes and newspaper articles."55 He noted profession in the city at the time that the Taft Museum was 58 that "in the thousands of pages assembled at the Latrobe built." He pointed out that in 1819 Cincinnati had a papers, as well as all of the evidence carefully compiled by populaton of just over 10,000, and that the City Directory Heather Hallenberg from Cincinnati sources, there does listed "between 80 and 100 principal house carpenters and not exist so much as one recognizable phrase written by joiners employing about 400 journey men and apprentices, Latrobe or a contemporary of his to link him to Martin 2 5 brick yards employing, during the season of making Baum's villa in any way, however tangential."56 Brownell brick, about 200 workmen, 100 bricklayers, 30 plasterers, explained that the Baum-Taft house typifies a Renaissance- and 15 stonemasons. In a city of over 10,000 citizens, there inspired Adamesque style against which Latrobe's austere were 800 individuals engaged in the building trade. More- early Greek Revival work was very consciously reacting. over, the 1819 directory did NOT list one architect in a city After conducting a complete and precise visual analysis of that by March 1819 had 1,890 buildings, of which 1,003 59 the Adamesque manner, the Baum-Taft house, and build- were dwelling houses." He explained how carpenter-builders ings certainly attributed to Latrobe, he concluded: worked and showed, convincingly, how the Baum-Taft house The architectural evidence offers no support for any hypothesis thatcould have belonged to their tradition. the building incorporates ideas from a Latrobe design that the The symposium organized to find out "Who builders adapted into something of their own. This circumstance, was the architect of the Taft Museum?" concluded with the though, should not make anyone grieve. The Baum-Taft house can impression that the answer was "no one." The research showed stand on its own architectural merits.57 that the question was infinitely more complicated than any- Richard Cote, an architectural historian with one had assumed, and the event produced a fuller history, as well as a richer historiography, of the Baum-Taft house.

The Music Room, the Taft houses back to their original James Hoban, Design for the dispelled once and for all the Museum, Cincinnati, Ohio. The period. President's House, collection attribution that James Hoban Taft restoration began in 1929 of the Maryland Historical designed the Baum-Taft house. at almost exactly the same Society, Baltimore, Maryland. moment as the restoration of At the June 1987 symposium, Colonial Williamsburg. There "Who was the architect of the was a great fervor to take Taft Museum?" William Seale Dining Room, the Taft Museum, cases were designed by the Cincinnati, Ohio. Federal man- firm of Garber and Woodward tels salvaged from period in the Federal style. houses in the region replaced ones from the Victorian era during the restoration of the house in 1931. The display Spring 1988 The Baum-Taft House 49

1. This paper is an edited version of the introductory presentation at the reprinted from an article in The Bulletin of the Cincinnati Art Museum, symposium, "Who was the architect of the Taft Museum?" which took January 1933, pp. 6-7. place in Cincinnati, Ohio, on June 1 1 and 12, 1987, at the Taft Museum. 15. The transaction is recorded in Deed Book 24, p. 61 8 at the Hamilton The symposium was conceived by Dr. Ruth K. Meyer, Taft Museum County Courthouse. director. The preliminary research for this paper and the other lectures at 16. Charles Theodore Greve, Centennial History of Cincinnati, Vol. I (Chica- the symposium was carefully and lovingly prepared by Heather Hallenberg, go, 1904), P- 545- an art and architectural historian on the Taft Museum staff. 17. The transaction is recorded in Deed Book 34, p. 34, at the Hamilton 2. G.E. Kidder Smith, The Architecture of the United States, Vol. II, "The County Courthouse. South and Midwest, An Illustrated Guide to Notable Buildings, Open to 1 8. Martineau, p. 6. the Public" (New York, 1 98 1 with an introduction by Frederick D. Nichols 19. Richard Cote observed all of these inconsistencies during a careful tour and Frederick Koeper), p. 463. of the building when he was in Cincinnati for the symposium in June 1987. 3. Transfer of land from Daniel Symmes to Martin Baum, September 1, 20. W.H. Martin, Map of Cincinnati for Insurance Companies and Real Estate 1 812, Deed Book S., p. 284, on file at the Hamilton County Courthouse. Agents Containing Every Lot and House with Its Number Classified According to 4. Marilyn Ott, "Martin Baum," a paper prepared for the Taft Museum the Reference Below, Vol. II (Cincinnati, 1 8 5 5), p. 9. In-School Program, March 1975 with a bibliography from 1977, unpub- 21. A copy of this rare edition is in the archives of the Taft Museum. lished, p. 1. 22. Walter Siple, The Taft Museum, a brochure reprinted from an article in 5. H.A. Ratterman, DerDeutschePionier(Cincinnati, May 1 878),p. 42. The The Bulletin of the Cincinnati Art Museum, January 193 3, p. 14. Siple was information recorded here was derived from interviews with Baum's director of the Art Museum and of the Taft Museum during the restoration. descendants. 23. Woodward Garber, "The Taft Museum," an unpublished paper, Decem- 6. Carl Vitz, "Benjamin Latrobe, Was He the Architect (?) of The Taft ber 21, 1934, written by the son of the architect on the restoration of the Museum," a paper presented to the Cincinnati Literary Club on March 1 5, Taft Museum while he was a student in architecture at Cornell University 1954, unpublished. and working with his father on the remodeling, p. 16. 7. Ott, pp. 1-4. 24. Goss, p. 444; Greve, p. 572. 8. Ibid., p. 4. 2 5. Greve, Vol. II, p. 170. 9. Ibid. 26. Siple, p. 2. 10. Ibid., p. 5. 27. Insurance Maps of 1 891, Cincinnati, Ohio, Vol. I (Chicago, 1 891), pp. 11. Henry Howe, Historical Collections of Ohio, Vol. I, from a treatise of 1 8 8 8 1 1-12. published by the State of Ohio in 1904, p. 817. 28. E. Robinson and R.H. Pidgeon, Civil and Topographical Engineers, 1 2. Charles Frederick Goss, Cincinnati, the Queen City, 1 788-1912, Vol. I Atlas of the City of Cincinnati, Ohio from Official Records, Private Plans and (Chicago and Cincinnati, 191 2), p. 444. Actual Surveys (New York, 1883-18 84), pi. 4. 13. Ott, p. 5. 29. Greve, Vol. I, p. 5 79. 14. Harriet Martineau, "A Retrospective of Western Travel," 1838, pub- 30. Ibid. lished in abbreviated form in The Taft Museum, a brochure by Walter Siple 31. Ibid. THE MUSEUM NEWS PUBLISHED BY THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF MUSEUMS

VOL. VJ1I MARCH .15, 1931 No, 18

The Taft Residence in Cincin- windows were removed from nati, The Museum News, pub- the exterior. lished by the American Association of Museums, Vol. VIM, No. 18, March 15, 1931, the porte cochere (1910- 1911) and the bay dormer Queen City Heritage

32. Goss, p. 444. 47. Ibid., preface. 3 3. Ibid. 48. Carl Vitz, pp. 345-346. 34. Montgomery Schuy\cr, Architectural Record, Vol. 23, 1908,pp. 341-346. 49. Ibid., p. 345. 3 5. Inland Architect and News Record, photogravure ed., Vol. 1 o, November 50. Talbot Hamlin, response to a letter from Carl Vitz, director of the 1 887, 70 and p. 1. This reference was discovered by Thomas J. Holleman, a Cincinnati Public Library, from , New York City, student of Charles Brownell, in 1974 and brought to my attention during March 3, 1954, p. 2. The letter is now in the archives of the Taft Museum. Brownell's lecture. 51. William Seale, The President's House, A History, White House Historical 36. Fiske Kimball, "Masterpieces of Early American Art," Artand Archaeol- Association, Washington, D.C., 1986. ogy, September/October 1919, p. 297. 52. William Seale, "James Hoban—The Man and His Taste," Who was the 37. I.T. Frary, Early Homes of Ohio (New York, 1970, reprint of 1936 architect of the Taft Museum? Symposium, June 1 1 and 12, 1987 (Cincinnati, edition), p. 155. 1988), p. 1. 38. This letter is in the Taft Museum archives. 5 3. Ibid., p. 11. 39-Siple, p. 4. 54. Charles Brownell, "Neoclassicism, B.H. Latrobe's Domestic Architec- 40. Ibid. ture and the Baum-Taft House," Who was the architect of the Taft Museum? 41. Ibid. Symposium, p. 44. 42. Ibid., p. 5. 5 5. Ibid., p. 48. 43. Ibid., p. 7. 56. Ibid., pp. 48-49. 44. Ibid., p. 1 1. $7.Ibid.,p. 56. 45. Ibid., p. 14. 58. Richard Cote, "Building Practices in 19th Century America," Who was 46. Woodie Garber, "The Taft Museum," p. 5. It was recently discovered the architect of the Taft Museum ? Symposium, p. 62. that this drawing was first published in Harper's Weekly, July, 1858. 59. Ibid., p. 63.

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E.A. Lloyd, Sketch ofSinton the lunette and is flanked by Residence, 1890, Cincinnati, arched side lights. Ohio. The Victorian entryway, which was probably installed in the mid-nineteenth century, shows small panels of glass in