HISTORIC PRESERVATION FOUNDATION OF THE FORTNIGHTLY ESTABLISHED IN 1998 November 2016 The LOWDOWN

McKim, Mead & White drawing from the collection of the History Museum ROSE BUCKINGHAM SELFRIDGE— LOVER OF CULTURE, MUSIC & ARCHITECTURE By Judith Scholl Lee

ose Buckingham Selfridge active in the family business, but Rose was a very successful property (Fortnightly 1904-1918) is one unfortunately died when Rose was owner and developer. In 1883 at age 23, Rof The Fortnightly’s more only four years old. She inherited a she (an unmarried woman!) purchased well-known members, thanks to the large amount of property and money land on Harper Avenue between 57th PBS Masterpiece Theater series from her family. and 59th Streets and hired architect Mr. Selfridge. Solon S. Beman to create Hyde Park’s In her teens, Rose traveled through first planned community—42 villas and Europe with her mother, studying artists’ cottages within a landscaped languages and music. She was said environment, which came to be known to be an extremely gifted harpist. In as the Rosalie Villas. Most of them are her 20s, her travels were exceptional! remarkably intact today. To Russia, Turkey, the Holy Land, Egypt, the Middle East, Greece, She married Harry Selfridge in 1890 Scandinavia, most of Europe and the when she was 30. They had three British Isles, always accompanied by daughters and two sons. One son died members of the family. Rose must as an infant. have been sensitive about her age, because she subtracted up to six years from her true birth date in some of her travel documents. Contemporaries said of her, “Rose Buckingham . . . was as lovely in mind as she was in body. I think, when Rose Buckingham Selfridge; she stood beside the Harp, which Photo Credit: glessnerhouseblogspot.com she played beautifully, she was an She was born Rosalie Amelia inspiration to those who saw her. Buckingham in Chicago on July 5, [She was] a great favorite in society 1860. Her grandfather had founded . . .” They said she was a great beauty, the firm that built the first grain “oriental in appearance, her coloring elevator in Chicago and handled all rich and dark,” and “of strong nature and gentle feelings, with a quick Harry Gordon Selfridge; the grain warehousing for the Photo Credit: glessnerhouseblogspot.com Central Railroad. Rose’s father was perception and intelligent sympathy.”

THE LATHROP HOUSE LOWDOWN 1 ROSE BUCKINGHAM SELFRIDGE (continued)

Born in 1858, Harry grew up in that her greenhouses were filled with in May 1918 word arrived that Rose Jackson, Michigan. His father over 2000 different varieties of orchid. Buckingham Selfridge had died. She abandoned the family after the Civil had suddenly contracted pneumonia War. His mother struggled financially, Harry left ’s in 1904, due to overwork and exposure working as a school teacher and and with business partners bought while caring for wounded soldiers. supplementing her income by painting the Chicago Her pallbearers were 8 American greeting cards. Harry and his mother Schlesinger & Meyer, including its doughboys and her bier was covered enjoyed each other’s company and landmark building designed by Louis with roses sent by the employees of lived together all their lives. Sullivan. Within a year, it was all sold the Selfridge store. to Carson Pirie Scott & Company Harry was an entrepreneurial go-getter for a great profit. Rose and Harry Always visionary, Rose and Harry from the age of 10. At 18 he moved lived fashionably on this immense had planned to build the largest castle to Chicago and worked 25 years at wealth. He retired, puttered around in the world at Hengistbury Head, a Marshall Field & Company where Harrose, bought a steam yacht, and mile-long stretch of beautiful Dorset he rose to become an executive. started playing golf. He became bored, cliffs. But with Rose’s death and the however, and on a trip to Wall Street Crash of 1929, no part Both Rose and Harry loved houses and hatched an idea for a new store. was ever realized. Harry ended up fine architecture. In 1898 they moved Selfridge & Company opened in 1909. living with his eldest daughter and to 1430 North Lake Shore Drive. They died almost destitute in 1941. also built one of the first estates on They rented Lansdowne House on Lake Geneva, an imposing Mock Tudor Berkeley Square in central London, Rose Selfridge would have mansion called Harrose. (Rosalie Bay a huge house with eleven servants. on the lake is named after her.) It had Previous tenants included three prime visited Lathrop House as a everything—300 feet of lake frontage, ministers and William Waldorf Astor, personal friend of the magnificent views, an English Great the richest man in America at the time. Hall, a ballroom and a stage. In the Lathrops rather than as a ceiling and walls, a Moorish design Rose did not enjoy life in London. member of The Fortnightly, emblematic of luck was worked out She missed her home and family and which did not purchase the with the letter “S.” It could be seen returned to Chicago to see her sister from any angle in the house. Anna three or four times a year. When House until four years after in Chicago she attended Fortnightly her death. I like to think that meetings, and was very much a part of the Society. (She had been a member of as a lover of fine architec- the board before moving to London.) ture, a real estate developer, During the First World War the retrofitter, and modernizer, rented in Rose would have approved Dorset as their country estate. Rose used her building knowledge to fit the of The Fortnightly’s 94-year castle with modern bathrooms, steam stewardship of the House and central heating, and a modern kitchen. HPFF’s dedication to its She served as a Red Cross ambulance preservation. Harrose Hall, Lake Geneva, c. 1900 driver and with her daughters worked for the Red Cross at a nearby Photo Credit: glessnerhouseblogspot.com (Editor’s Note: This article is based on the Christchurch Hospital. In 1917 she longer presentation made by Judith Lee at opened a convalescent hospital for Harrose was also noted for its large The Fortnightly’s Opening Social Luncheon the American Soldiers on the greenhouses and extensive gardens. on September 8, 2016. The wonderful grounds of Highcliffe. Rose was particularly fond of growing original can be found on the ‘blog’ in the orchids. In 1903 the The Fortnightly as a body felt that it members’ area of The Fortnightly’s website.) lauded her accomplishments, noting had suffered its own war casualty when

2 THE LATHROP HOUSE LOWDOWN WALK MATCH CONTINUES—LET’S RAISE THE ROOF! By Jean Perkins, HPFF President We are now in the third year of the What will HPFF do with these funds? from year to year. Rather, they spike Walk Family Foundation’s generous Every dollar you give this year will in some years and are de minimis in five-year matching grant. Your “raise the roof!” Every dollar the others. HPFF’s goal is to be able to generosity ensured that we were able to Walk Foundation gives in match will make grants as requested every year, meet their challenges for the last two be placed in reserves to await large, even for projects that may cost half a years. Let’s keep the momentum going! future requests from The Fortnightly. million dollars or more. What’s this year’s challenge? “Raising The 2014 Reserve Study, funded by the You will receive the annual appeal the Roof”—that is, covering HPFF’s Walk Family, and The Fortnightly’s own letter in a month or so. Thank you for grant to The Fortnightly to cover the planning and projections indicate that everything you have already done. We costs of installing the new ballroom HPFF needs to raise roughly $180,000 hope you’ll continue to give! A little, roof. The Walk Family Foundation each year to meet future needs. a lot—it doesn’t matter. will match one-for-one every dollar donated to HPFF up to $102,500. As all homeowners know, a house’s capital needs don’t occur smoothly

LATHROP HOUSE—A LIVING HOUSE MUSEUM? By Shelley Gorson, HPFF Treasurer & Former Chair of the Landmarks Illinois Board

recently attended a Landmarks Blenheim Palace and Monet’s Giverny Richard H. Driehaus Preservation Illinois Preservation Snapshot lecture come to mind. Awards in 2014 in recognition of about the uncertain future of House its more than 90 years of preserving I I would argue that our own Helen Museums. It made me think about our the House. own Helen and Bryan Lathrop House and Bryan Lathrop House is an equally because some of the same questions important House. The Lathrop House But we cannot rest on our laurels. A for its future apply. essentially IS a house museum, except 124-year old home is costly to keep up that it is not open to the public at to Landmark standards. Every year A House Museum is a private home large. It is, however, open to groups new maintenance and repair challenges currently used as a museum, with that have an interest in architecture await: a new ballroom roof was installed, historically important architecture and preservation; they can make and the front windows were completely or owners, and often both. The arrangements for special tours. The redone this last summer for which furnishings and artifacts are generally House continues as a living slice of HPFF making a grant to The Fortnightly. original or selected to reflect and history, enjoyed almost daily as home enhance the period of the house. to our Society as well as the Colonial How can you help? Let me count the The façade is usually quite imposing Dames and our hundreds of guests. ways! Start with a generous donation to and architecturally significant, and Even so, if The Fortnightly were not the Annual Appeal of the HPFF. Please memorable magic awaits inside. the fortunate owner, the House most act on the letter you will be receiving likely would have been torn down. The soon. Next, come—and bring friends—to Chicago abounds with well-known responsibility to maintain it looms large. the HPFF dinner on January 19, 2017 examples: Glessner House, Robie where the outstanding speaker and House, Hull House, So what is the obligation at hand? director of Glessner House, Bill Tyre, Henry B. Clarke House, Farnsworth will present. House and the Nickerson Mansion We have a unique and blessed (now known as the Richard H Driehaus association with a legendary building— We all need to do our part to maintain Museum). Many of you have traveled a City of Chicago Landmark since 1973. and preserve the Helen and Bryan the country to visit Mount Vernon, I believe we must take our stewardship Lathrop House. Its future is our future Monticello, The Mount, Winterthur, role seriously. Landmarks Illinois too—for ourselves, for Chicago, for and the Glass House. Internationally, awarded The Fortnightly its prestigious posterity. Thank you for sharing it. Stewardship Award at the

THE LATHROP HOUSE LOWDOWN 3 SUMMER 2016 AT LATHROP HOUSE By Barbara Fitzpatrick, House Governors Chair he Fortnightly has just properties - somehow was installed important nonetheless, was restoration completed a very busy season of continuously UNDER all of the of the ballroom floor. Note its Tconstruction. I want to let you mechanical equipment already in beautiful finish! in on a secret by shining a spotlight on place. We are grateful to Knickerbocker three important preservation-related Roofing and Paving Co., Inc. for their We extend our thanks to all of you, projects that occurred this summer. expertise and patience in bringing this and to HPFF, for your support for challenging project to completion. preservation of this House. I’d like One of them will become quite apparent We look forward to many happy years to extend a particular thank you to this winter when the cold winds blow. enjoying what we do, in this room, Manager Allison Johnson for her careful With the help of expert window restorer under this new roof. We extend our oversight of all aspects of the summer’s Frank Rojas and his crew, the original appreciation and thanks to HPFF and construction, including her gracious its donors for funding this major communications with the contractors. project, as well.

House Governors, charged with both UPDATED DONOR short-term maintenance and long-range planning for the Lathrop House and RECOGNITION PANELS garden, arranged for an assessment of the state of the cornice this summer, Have you had a chance to look at the third important project. Allison the updated donor recognition Johnson has provided us with marvelous panels on the first floor landing? photos of a beautiful blue lift-boom, They now list the cumulative raising our intrepid architectural giving of each of the 670 donors consultant, Douglas Gilbert, to the Parlor Windows, Outside; who have written checks to HPFF roof cornice. (The cornice lies between Photo credit: Allison Johnson since it was established in 1998. the roof and the top of the decorative Every single one. Donors’ lifetime windows of the house have been limestone with wreaths.) Gilbert giving ranges from $10 restored. Look at them, particularly as performed an up-close, extensive to $100,000 and more. you approach the house from the street, assessment, and reported that “overall, and you will be delighted! Scraped, the entire cornice system is in very Every gift has been important. sanded, painted, and fitted with new good condition.” It was last assessed Look around to see what they weather-stripping, they will now keep (from the ground and the roof) in 2003. funded. One of the first projects out the drafts and mute the sounds Gratifying, indeed. was the highly visible restoration from the street while conserving the of the front terrace, done in 2004. warmth within each room. They are A summer maintenance project, not Less visible is the more recent architectural treasures. (President Mary funded with a grant from HPFF but replacement of electrical wiring and Beth Brown once characterized the distribution and all plumbing pipes. windows as the “soul of the house.”) The House Governors Committee and These panels are HPFF’s way of the Fortnightly Board are very grateful saying “thank you” to all who have to HPFF and its donors for funding this supported preservation project in the form of a grant to The of the Helen and Bryan Lathrop Fortnightly. House. We hope that you’ll take a moment to visit the panels Our second important project, begun and reflect on the members and and completed this summer, was friends, past and present, who the replacement of the roof over the have drawn together over the years ballroom. This new roof - lighter, Lathrop House Exterior Windows; to support this magnificent House. brighter, and with greater insulating Photo credit: Allison Johnson

4 THE LATHROP HOUSE LOWDOWN THE ORIGINAL “BALLROOM ROOF” By Henrietta Paisley, Fortnightly Friend recently heard from eagle-eyed and the former billiard room. The “I congratulate you most Judith Reese that my name two windows flanking the hearth in I was misstated in the past two the Reception Hall were removed, and heartily—that you have secured newsletters. My surname is, of doors to the Assembly Hall added in this beautiful home. It was course, Paisley. You can remember it their place. as an intricate teardrop pattern that always a dream of mine that originated in Persia a millennia ago. For generations my family has told the Fortnightly should have a (I hope that helps the editor remember it!) the tale of a skylight in the roof over the Billiard Room. It’s in most of the real home and a fireside, but But enough about me . . . now to the drawings. I’m amazed that no humans we have been more or less topic of the day, the ballroom roof. ever mention it. Not everything that’s wanderers. Now you wise drawn gets built, of course. Still, it’s I heard boots clomping on the not impossible. McKim seemed to like ones have seen the vision and ballroom roof all summer and skylights; there’s one on the fourth I can imagine nothing more remembered overhearing that it floor here. I wanted to ask the guys was going to be replaced. What a on the roof if they saw any vestige of a beautiful than this.” commotion! skylight, but a lot has happened since (Words of Josephine Dexter at It reminded me of my family’s stories 1892—and they probably wouldn’t want The Fortnightly’s Golden Anniversary of how the house has changed over to talk to a mouse. party in 1923, where she was honored as the only surviving member of the the years. It was a perfect neo- Editor’s Note: New members may not have original group of twelve women who Georgian gem when it was built in met Henrietta Paisley, a friendly resident of founded The Fortnightly in 1873.) 1892. Because needs change, however, Lathrop House (our “House Mouse”!). Her the Lathrops themselves made some family has lived here for generations – changes 15 years later, including ever since the House was built in 1892. adding a sewing room on the third floor. But nothing like the big changes when The Fortnightly bought the House in 1922. At that time the biggest change was to Mr. Lathrop’s Billiard Room. The Billiard Room was much smaller than the current Ballroom—only about 19’ x 24.5’. You entered from the Drawing Room, which was the same width. There was a hearth in one corner and a revolving bookcase/pool cue rack in another. The room was obviously too small for The Fortnightly’s large meetings and was, therefore, enlarged to its current 36’ x 46’, or about 3.5 times larger, for what was then called the Assembly Hall. Nearly 20 feet were added to the length of the room and the width was nearly doubled by expanding westward McKim, Mead & White drawing from the HABS drawing, School of the Art Institute, c. 2002 into the garden space between the stair collection of the , c. 1891

THE LATHROP HOUSE LOWDOWN 5 A NEW BALLROOM ROOF SAVE THE DATE— By Allison Johnson, General Manager, The Fortnightly HPFF ANNUAL DINNER At Lathrop House this was not a good summer for people with acrophobia! JANUARY 19, 2017 The roofing crew spent the better part 5:30 P.M. COCKTAILS of the summer 25 feet above the street 6:30 P.M. PROGRAM replacing the old ballroom roof. FOLLOWED BY DINNER

After more than 22 years the roof William Tyre, Executive Director had reached the end of its useful life. and Curator of Glessner House Roofs typically last 25 years. The crew Museum, will talk about Glessner removed the old roof down to the Ballroom Roof Before House, which (like Lathrop House) wooden deck and replaced it with a is an architectural masterpiece of self-adhering membrane that protected the 19th century. Unlike Lathrop the surface while the new roof was House, Glessner House was installed and served as the base of the progressive in design and shunned new roof. by its Prairie Avenue neighbors. Then they attached a one-inch He will also explore how the insulation board to which they Glessners and other residents attached a half-inch coverboard. of “Millionaire’s Row” shaped These boards are made of tough, light the business and cultural life of high-tech materials. Once the covering Ballroom Roof During Chicago. John Glessner and Bryan was in place, they flashed all the walls. Lathrop (from the north side) Flashing involves inserting strips to worked closely together as two of direct water away from sensitive the major forces behind securing openings and connections so that the land and building Orchestra moisture doesn’t seep in and create Hall for the Chicago Symphony mold. It is especially important at the Orchestra. Frances Glessner, a windows of Mr. Lathrop’s Dressing long-time Fortnightly member, Room because the sills are almost flush was a fine silversmith and active with the roof. Finally, they installed cultural leader. urethane sealant. Ballroom Roof After; Because HPFF is dedicated to historic Photo credits: Allison Johnson Complicated as it was, the whole preservation in Chicago, we sponsor an process was so unexciting that I have the equipment and walkways. As annual dinner program about historic nothing juicy to report. The rain Barbara Fitzpatrick notes in her article, preservation and Chicago architecture held off, except for two days, until the they installed all these layers UNDER and history. The program provides job was done, for which we were all the equipment and walkways! The insight and information and is not grateful. It was a tough job made more Knickerbocker team did their usual intended to be a fundraiser. Come, difficult by the need to work around fine job AND came in under budget. and bring friends!

CONTACT US! We invite comments and questions from readers at [email protected]

Newsletter Editor: Jean Perkins | Graphic Designer: Megan Lane Reed | Newsletter Review: Kate Arias, Jill Isselhard | HPFF Board of Directors: Jean Perkins, President; Judy McCaskey, Vice President; Terri Hanson, Secretary; Shelley Gorson, Treasurer; Kate Arias; Barbara Fitzpatrick; Jennifer Goldman; Jill Isselhard; Ruth Ann Phillips

6 THE LATHROP HOUSE LOWDOWN