Tag: Chicago Tribune

Taliesin August 1914 after first fire

Statements after the murders at Taliesin in 1914

Posted on | by admin
Reading Time: 6 minutes

August 15, this coming Thursday, marks 110 years since 7 people were inexplicably murdered at Frank Lloyd Wright’s home, Taliesin, by his servant, Julian Carlton.

I’ve written about it a couple of times1 and had not planned on writing anything today.

But I’ve gathered a lot of information over the years and,

in the spirit of “preservation by distribution“,

I decided to put up a post with the statements by the survivors, or related parties, that appeared in the newspapers.

I think this is kosher, since I’m publishing news that was written 110 years ago.

Just so you know, sometimes the stories spell Julian’s last name as “Carleton” and I decided to keep those misspellings without correcting them; writing “[sic]” after each misspelling gets distracting. Additionally, one story refers to Wright’s partner, Mamah Borthwick, as “Mrs. Borthwick”.

Herbert Fritz’s narrative of what happened

He was one of Wright’s draftsmen. He survived by jumping out of a window when he noticed the fire, but before Carlton could attack. As a result of his relative lack of injuries (he broke his arm), Fritz gave the most complete description of what happened.

This first appeared in the The Chicago Daily Tribune on August 16, 1914:

Story of Survivor.

“I was eating in the small dining room off the kitchen with the other men,” said Fritz. “The room, I should say, was about 12 x 12 feet in size. There were two doors, one leading to the kitchen and the other opening into the court. We had just been served by Carleton and he had left the room when we noticed something flowing under the screen door from the court. We thought it was nothing but soap suds spilled outside.

“The liquid ran under my chair and I noticed the odor of gasoline. Just as I was about to remark the fact a streak of flame shot under my chair, and it looked like the whole side of the room was on fire. All of us jumped up, and I first noticed that my clothing was on fire. The window was nearer to me than the other door and so I jumped through it, intending to run down the hill to the creek and roll in it.

“It may be that the other door was locked. I don’t know. I didn’t think to try it. My first thought was to save myself. The window was only about a half a foot from the floor and three feet wide and it was the quickest way out.

Arm Broken by Fall.

“I plunged through and landed on the rocks outside. My arm was broken by the fall and the flames had eaten through my clothing and were burning me. I rolled over and over down the hill toward the creek, but stopped about half way. The fire on my clothes was out by that time and I scrambled to my feet and was about

Cont’d, p. 6 column 1

to start back up the hill when I saw Carleton come running around the house with the hatchet in his hand and strike Brodelle, who had followed me through the window.

“Then I saw Carleton run back around the house, and I followed in time to see him striking at the others as they came through the door into the court. He evidently had expected us to come out that way first and was waiting there, but ran around to the side in which the window was located when he saw me and Brodelle jump out.

“I didn’t see which way Carlton went. My arm was paining me, and I was suffering terribly from the burns, and I supposed I must have lost consciousness for a few moments. I remember staggering around the corner of the house and seeing Carleton striking at the other men as they came through the door, and when I looked again the negro was gone.”

Statement by William Weston in The Detroit Tribune on August 16:

Weston was Wright’s carpenter. He followed Fritz and another victim, Emil Brodelle, out of the window. Carlton gave him a glancing blow, so he survived. However, Carlton did murder Weston’s 13-year-old son Ernest. Ernest and two others (David Lindblom and Thomas Brunker) were attacked exiting through the door on the opposite side of the room:

“As each one put his head out,” said Weston, “the negro struck, killing or stunning his victim. I was the last. The ax struck me in the neck and knocked me down and I guess he thought he had me, because he ran back to the window and I got up and ran. When I looked back, the negro had disappeared.[“]

Unfortunately, that’s it. Although he was probably not able to talk since his son died later on the 15th.

Gertrude Carlton quoted in the Escanaba Daily Press on August 18:

Authorities found Gertrude Carlton, Julian Carlton’s wife, innocent of any involvement in the crime. Two weeks later, she was allowed to leave. She took a train to Chicago and was never heard from again.

“I don’t know why Julian did it,” she said. “He must have been crazy. I think he was. He had just served dinner, and I saw him cleaning a white rug in a pan of gasoline out in the courtway. He had his pipe in his mouth, and I saw him light a match.

            “The next thing I knew the kitchen was in flames, and I saw Julian running toward the barn with a hatchet in his hand. I ran downstairs to the cellar and climbed from a window.”

The woman was arrested while walking on the road to town. She said her husband had been moody and “acting queer” of late.

            “I woke up several times at night and found him sitting up,” she declared. “I would ask him what was the matter and he would say that workmen around the place were trying to ‘do’ him. That was why he made me tell Mrs. Borthwick we would leave Saturday because it was lonely for me in the country.”

Wright was in Chicago,

finishing up his Midway Gardens commission when he found out about the fire. Here’s the Chicago Tribune again on Aug. 16:

Tells of Crime.

Mr. Wright was notified of the tragedy at his office in the Orchestra building by long distance telephone.

Mr. Wright almost collapsed when the news first reached him. He got the tragic long distance telephone message while at Midway Gardens, the new south side amusement park, which he designed.

“This is Frank Roth at Madison,” came a voice over the wire. “Be prepared for a shock. Your wife—that is, Mrs. Cheney—the two children, and one of your draftsmen have been killed by Carleton.

“Carleton set fire to the bungalow and got away. He must have gone crazy. A posse is chasing him. You’d better get to Spring Green right away.”

Roth, from whom the message came, is a friend of the architect.

Subsequently Wright received a telegram from Spring Lake signed with the initials of Mrs. Cheney—of Mamah Borthwick, or as she now calls herself

“Come as fast as possible; serious trouble,” was her message.

“Frank Roth” is an unknown person and no one has found the telegram. “Spring Lake” is wrong. It should be Spring Green.

Here’s the Chicago Tribune on Wright’s statements before he came back to Wisconsin on the train with his son, John:

Unable to Talk Coherently.

The architect was so distraught he could not tell a coherent story to the detectives.

“The Carletons, Julian and his wife, were the best servants I have ever seen,” he said. “The wife cooked and Julian was a general handyman. They were Cuban negroes, and Julian especially seemed to have an intelligence above the average and a good education for one of his class.

“They had not been engaged permanently and were to have quit our employ today. Julian was to have started for Chicago on the 7:45 train this morning. The train would have reached the city shortly after 1 o’clock, and he was to have visited my office to get his wages.

“Three days ago, when I last saw him, he seemed perfectly normal. He must have lost his mind—and yet I cannot believe that the news is true. The fact that the telegram was signed M.B.B. was received after the alleged murders buoys my hopes.”

Paul Hendrickson did some good work to show that Julian Carlton was not from Cuba or Barbados, which was repeated in other newspaper stories at that time. In his book, Plagued by Fire, Hendrickson makes the case that Carlton was from Alabama.

First published August 13, 2024.
A.S. Rockwell took the photograph at the top of this post on the day of, or the day after, the fire. The photograph in on Wikimedia Commons and is in the public domain. See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Taliesin_After_Fire.jpg for information about the origin of the photograph.

Note:

1. if only to tell you that Carlton didn’t serve his victims soup!

Exterior photograph of Taliesin in snow. Published December 1911. Property: the Chicago Tribune.

Another Change at Taliesin

Posted on | by admin
Reading Time: 6 minutes

This part of Taliesin in the photo above is the part that faces the Wisconsin River. A photographer for The Chicago Tribune took this on Christmas day, 1911.

The other night I was thinking about changes at Taliesin and remembered something I haven’t written about: the expansion of Taliesin’s “Front Office”. That is, in the room next to Taliesin’s Drafting Studio, Wright moved the wall to the north.

The First Time

this part of the building appeared in photographs was the photo at the top of this post. The photographer took it on Christmas day 1911, the day Wright gave a press conference that informed the world that Mamah Borthwick and he were living together at Taliesin.

I mentioned the press conference here, here, and here.

Drawing Time!

I’ve added some for you, so you know what part of the building you’re seeing in the old photo. The first drawing, #1104.013, is a nice rendition of Taliesin 1911-14. It’s in the book, In the Nature of Materials: The Buildings of Frank Lloyd Wright, 1887-1941, by Henry-Russell Hitchcock:

Taliesin Floor plan. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), #1104.013.

The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), #1104.013.1

And below is a closeup, with the Front Office near the middle of the drawing:

Taliesin Floor plan, The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), #1104.013

The drawing has the “TERRACE” under a roof, just like you see in the photo (the roof is noted by the arrow):

Exterior photograph of Taliesin in snow. Published December 1911. Property: the Chicago Tribune.

Here’s comparison:

This photograph I took below looks straight at the part of the building that had the “TERRACE” in the black and white photo:

Looking south at Taliesin from Office Terrace. Photograph by Keiran Murphy.

I took this photograph in 2004 while researching the Front and Rear Offices.2

The “TERRACE” was below the wall of rectangular windows behind the trunk of the White Pine tree.

btw: the pine trees (there were two) were removed in 2019. Don’t cry about it: one tree was dying (fixing Taliesin’s drainage took away a water supply); and each of the tree limbs weighed, like, 100s of pounds. Everyone in preservation at Taliesin felt nervous at every strong summer rainstorm.

Going inside

Wright never named the room, really. Moreover, Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation staff didn’t call it the “Front Office” when I started at Taliesin.

           At that time (1994), Foundation staff used it as their business office.

The Foundation used the space until 1998 when the Tea Circle Oak tree fell (I wrote about that in this post). Here’s a photo from there:

Taliesin's Front Office. Photograph by Stilhefler in 2018.

Today I’m going talking about the part of the room on the right.

I didn’t work on the restoration of the studio after the tree fall,

—Why? at that time I was just a tour guide—

so writing this post gives me a chance to educate myself.

More drawings—

Here’s one showing the other side of the room. It shows that part of Taliesin you see today in the Garden Court when you take a tour:

Taliesin elevation. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), #1403.020.

Details on the drawing indicate that Wright probably drew it by 1913.

The drawing’s ID, “1403.020”, implies that it’s a drawing from Taliesin II. It’s the “1403”: 1914-25. But that’s wrong because of details in the larger drawing. That drawing can be currently (and until August 2024) be seen online here.

The windows you see in 1403.020 were added in 1913-14. Wright was adding the windows (and making other changes) when the photo below was taken:

Wisconsin Historical Society, Lynn Anderson collection, c. 1901-c. 1987. ID #68047. Looking northeast from Taliesin tower with drafting studio and courtyard in view. Possibly late fall.

The Front Office is to the left of the large chimney for Taliesin’s Drafting Studio.

I’m always happy when I look at this photo because of all the changes you can see going on. While Wright was always doing that, they were rarely caught in photos. Among things happening, there are the windows near the ground and the clerestories in front of the chimney.

If you want to know what a clerestory is:

it so happens I wrote a post about what looks like one at Taliesin (BUT IT’S NOT).

Anyway, back to the Front Office:

in that drawing I added above with the red, you can see Wright labelled the room as “Library”.

And in 1911, when draftsman Taylor Woolley took the photo below, you can see bookcases against the wall on the left:

Taken by Taylor Woolley in Wright's Taliesin drafting studio, 1911. Looking west.

This photo’s also in my post, “Don’t Touch That Stone“.

But he changes his mind and puts in the windows. He designs furniture to be put elsewhere to at least (maybe?) put drawings. The collections coordinator for the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation noted there were several pieces of furniture, below:

Taliesin section drawing. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), 1104.011.

And

This drawing says “1104.011”, when it’s actually Taliesin II (“1104” means Taliesin I: 1911). 

Although, here former Archives Director Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer made the mistake.

There’s a photo looking at a drawer, or drawers. It’s been published a few times. I took a photo from the book, Frank Lloyd Wright, Selected Houses, v. 2: Taliesin, then put in an arrow pointing at the drawers:

Photograph taken in Taliesin drafting studio toward Studio alcove. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York).

 

It looks like Wright gobbled up a bit of the terrace by 1916, where he put that set of drawers. He added a flat roof because he enclosed the terrace when expanding the room:

Taliesin Roof plan. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), #1403.019.

The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives, drawing #1403.019.

I added the red outline to highlight the roof, terrace, and descending stairs. So, he pushed out part of the room (expanding it), then added the flat roof on top. There was a door under that roof, so you could walk out to the terrace, then down the stairs.

So he did name the space!

Or part of it. He thought this area was part of the studio, and this was the “studio alcove”. He apparently kept it this way into the 1920s, judging from a later drawing, #1403.023:

Taliesin Floor plan, The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), #1403.023

The drawing was originally published in Wendingen Magazine (in Holland) during issues it published on Wright in 1924 and 1925.

I’ve posted parts of this drawing before: here, here, and here (I like using it because that bastard didn’t create many drawings for all the changes he made).3

It occurred to me that, by 1924 he perhaps added two “studio alcoves” for the draftsmen that he wanted to live at Taliesin for extended periods of time.

After all,

by the summer of 1924, his personal life was looking up in (what he thought was) the end of his relationship with his second wife. Little did he know how things were going to change.

The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York). Wright standing at car outside of Taliesin. Mid-to-late 1920s.

This is a photo of Wright standing outside Taliesin apparently in the 1920s when he’s got kind of Knickerbocker-vibe.

actually, I just looked at the link I put up there: those don’t “have” a Knickerbocker look; those ARE Knickerbockers. I don’t know whether I’m proud or slightly disturbed that I instantly remembered that word. I can only imagine he was wearing those long black socks to keep the ticks at bay. 

He’s standing in the space that became Taliesin’s Lower Parking Court. The Front Office is out of the photograph, on the right. A recent photo of the area where he’s standing in the photo is here on Wikimedia Commons.

 

The photograph at the top of this post is printed it with a story “Flashback: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin was a refuge for illicit romance….” and was printed December 4, 2020.
Originally printed January 20, 2024.

Notes:

1. In the spirit of education, I’ve used those drawings from ARTSTOR a LOT on this site. Because I don’t want the fuzz (really, lawyers demanding money) coming after me. Hopefully I’ll figure this out because the site is supposed to be retired in August 2024. LATER: all former ARTSTOR images are now on JSTOR.

2. I have a feeling that some of you might be jealous and want to go onto that balcony. I’m no expert, but from a liability standpoint I can’t imagine anyone on a tour (or just visiting) being allowed up there. Because the edge of that balcony doesn’t even come up to my knees. If you fell off you’d either drop about 12 feet onto a concrete terrace; or 40-to-50 feet down the hill on the north side of the building.

3. While some of #1403.023 is incorrect, it’s not (as far as I know) in this area. You can always write me if you’re curious about what’s inaccurate.

Postcard of crowd at Taliesin. Caption on card: "WEST WING. WRIGHT'S BUNGALOW". Property: Patrick Mahoney

What is the oldest part of Taliesin? Part II

Posted on | by admin
Reading Time: 6 minutes

A postcard looking (plan) northeast at the western façade of Taliesin’s hayloft, summer (the hayloft is under the roof). Because the collection of people are unexpected at a farmhouse, Randolph C. Henning (who collected this postcard), thinks this was taken the day after Taliesin’s 1914 fire and murders.

I wrote The Oldest Thing at Taliesin (stuff that goes back to 1911-12), and was going to leave it at that. But before I posted, I realized there were too many things to point out. I needed to divide it into two posts. So, that was part I.

Here’s part II.

Like last time, I’m going back to stone because it’s the easiest material to trace at Taliesin. That’s because Taliesin’s shingles, wood, and plaster has to be replaced. And I’m not sure how much of the window glass at Taliesin goes back to 1911-12.1

Therefore, in 2010,

Taliesin Preservation‘s Executive Director taped a printout of the picture at the top of this post onto my computer monitor.

In 2005, she (Carol) also told me about “The Album” on auction at the online site, Ebay.

Architect and writer, Randolph C. Henning, had sent her the scan of the image. Although he knew what you see in this image (the courtyard on the other side of Taliesin’s Hayloft), he wrote asking for help on any research on the rest of the images in his upcoming book, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin: Illustrated by Vintage Postcards (this image is on p. 39).

I’d never seen anything like that image because

you can’t really see this view today.

Why?

Because that nutter changed his house all the time, of course.

A similar angle of view is in the photo below:

Exterior photograph looking at the roofs Taliesin. Photograph taken in 2005 by Keiran Murphy.

I took this photograph from the roof of Taliesin’s former icehouse. The photograph is looking northeast according to Taliesin’s plan direction. Taliesin’s “Work Court” is one floor below.
I was up on this part of the roof with a member of the Preservation Crew. He was showing me details on the re-roofing. And, NO, you cannot stand on this roof while you’re on a tour.2

Almost nothing in this photograph matches what you see in the c. 1914 postcard at the top of this post.

But,

even though everything’s different here’s what got my attention: the stone pier under the hayloft.

THAT is still there! Here’s a comparison of the 1914 photo and the photo from 2004:

Looking (plan) southeast in Taliesin's "Work Court". In view: stone, roofing, plaster and windows in the courtyard.

In the Work Court, looking southeast according to Taliesin’s plan direction. This photograph has the stone pier that I saw in the 1914 postcard. The image below has both the old and new photos, with the stones in the pier compared.

Photographic comparison between 1914 Taliesin photograph, and digital photograph from 2004.

Here’s the stone pier in a close-up of the two photographs:

 

Close-up of stones in 1914 photograph and photograph from 2004.

TA-DA!

More Taliesin 1911-12:

The next photo appeared in 1911. I first saw it two years ago when the Chicago Tribune treated us all to was in a published article:

Looking east at Taliesin's agricultural wing.
In view behind trees: hayloft of Taliesin. Car [?] garage on the right. First published 12/29/11. Unknown photographer. (Chicago Tribune historical photo)

This photograph was taken December 25, 1911. The photographer was looking east/southeast (according to Taliesin’s plan direction) at Taliesin’s agricultural wing in 1911. The photo was taken on that day when Wright gave the disastrous press conference at Taliesin.

This, and the article that included it,

made me so happy that I wrote a post about it: “This is FUN for me…“.

Props go to Stan Ecklund on Facebook who, in 2020, first alerted me (and other Frankophiles) to this article. Stan created and curates two Wright-based groups on Facebook, The Wright Attitude, and Wright Nation. The “WA” is a private group, but Wright Nation on Facebook is public, here. If you are in the WA group, Stan posted the link to the article in the Tribune on Dec. 4, 2020.

Again, you can’t see the same view today because of Wright’s changes at Taliesin.

But I found a photo on Wikimedia Commons that’s shot from a similar angle. That’s below:

Photograph of Taliesin roofs taken on July 4, 2018.
By Stilfehler. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International License.

Looking (plan) southeast to the chimney that’s in the photograph from 1911 in the Tribune.
Taken by Stilhefler while on a tour. Click the photo to see it on-line.

I am not publishing the second photo from the Chicago Tribune. Most of what you see in the second photo cannot be seen on a tour and if you read “This is FUN for me…”, I explain it some more.

Then there’s the Hill Crown:

And its retaining wall:

Looking (plan) south at the stone retaining wall at Taliesin's Hill Crown. Photo by Keiran Murphy.

I took this photograph in April, 2005.

Most likely, there are other parts of the retaining wall that go back to 1911. However, I do not think you’ll be able to look at those places for any length while on a tour at Taliesin.

Lastly, I’ll show something else you can see on tours:

Wisconsin Historical Society, Fuermann Collection, ID# 83113

This was also published in Architectural Record magazine in 1913. Here’s where I wrote about it.

Look at the pier on the right, with the pool. The open windows on the right are at the kitchen (today it’s called the Little Kitchen). Every tour you take at Taliesin walks near that pool.

I put a present-day photo of it, below. The person who took this photo in 2018 also took the one above.

Photograph of pool next to the "Little Kitchen" at Taliesin. Taken on July 4, 2018.
By Stilfehler. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International License.

Taken in the Breezeway at Taliesin. Looking (plan) southeast at the stone veneer on the west wall of the Little Kitchen.
Photo from July 4, 1918, by Stilhelfer. Click the photo above to see it on-line. You’ll see that this photo has been cropped.

I love this area.

Wright changed things so much at Taliesin that I’m intrigued when he didn’t.

That’s all I’ve got the time to show you right now. Oh, and last thing: remember that these parts of the building I talked about were just what you can see.

So, thanks again for coming along!

 

Published November 26, 2022
Randolph C. Henning acquired this and sent this to the Executive Director of Taliesin Preservation while he was working on Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin: Illustrated By Vintage Postcards. You can see the photo on page 39. Henning sold his collection to Patrick Mahoney, AIA.

Here’s “What is the oldest part of Taliesin? Part I“

Notes

1 I could go and point out windows that seem like they were at Taliesin in 1911-12, but I dunno.

2 “WHAT – do you think we’d just walk onto the roof?”
No, I do not think you would.
However: one time a person arrived at the Frank Lloyd Wright Visitor Center in January or February and wanted to know if they could go into the buildings on the Taliesin estate. I asked, “Did you see the notice on our website that there are no tours at Taliesin until May 1?” The person replied nicely that, “Yes, we saw that. But you didn’t say the estate was closed.” So I’m double checking.

Drawing from The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), #1104.003.

Did Taliesin have outhouses?

Posted on | by admin
Reading Time: 4 minutes

A 1911 Taliesin floor plan showing Wright’s living room, kitchen, and his bedroom. The kitchen has a sink and his bedroom had a bathroom with a toilet, sink, and bathtub. This Taliesin I floor plan, 1104.003, is at the Avery Library in New York City and can be seen online at ARTSTOR.

People want to know: over 110 years ago when Frank Lloyd Wright was building his home out in the country (and public utilities were so not a thing), did Taliesin have an outhouse at any time? Even early on?

I was asked this question many times while giving tours, and asked again last week while giving a presentation, so that’s why I decided to address it.

Taliesin probably didn’t have an outhouse

The floor plan you see above (and shown, completely, online here) shows a large section of Wright’s living quarters as he was designing it in 1911. I showed it because you see that he planned for a home that had a sink in its kitchen, as well as running water in the bathrooms.1

although he didn’t design faucets or hardware for his home

Wright’s approach to getting water to Taliesin was quite ingenious. You see, Taliesin stands about 3 miles (just under 5 kilometers) from the village of Spring Green in Southwestern Wisconsin. So there was no help there even if Spring Green had had a water tower. In 1911, then, if he wanted running water he had to do some tricks.

His aunts’ school (the Hillside Home School, less than a mile away) got its water by using watermills (including Wright’s Romeo and Juliet windmill). Wright did not do that at Taliesin. There was, however, a creek in the valley in which Taliesin sits. He used a hydraulic ram to pump water from the creek up to a reservoir on the hill behind it. The hydraulic ram worked when a drop in the water happened, which took place via a waterfall. He created a waterfall by damming up the creek running through the valley. He completed damming up the creek in early 1912.

The press hearing about Taliesin’s dam

We know his timetable for getting the water going because on December 26, 1911, Wright told visiting reporters about the dam. That’s when they bombarded came to Taliesin upon finding out he was living there with Mamah Borthwick. This is written at the end of that Chicago Tribune story:

Then Mr. Wright called to a worker to bring the visitor’s horses. As he stood waiting in the courtyard he talked a little of his bungalow. . . .

There is to be a fountain in the courtyard, and flowers. To the south, on a sun bathed slope, there is to be a vineyard. At the foot of the steep slope in front there is a dam in process of construction that will back up several acres of water as a pond for wild fowl.

Note that the newspaper story says that the dam is “in process of construction”.

Taylor Woolley (draftsman for Wright in 1911-12) took a photograph around that time. It shows the state of the dam’s construction:

Taliesin photograph by Taylor Woolley.
© 2011 Utah State History. All Rights Reserved.

This is a cropped photograph by then-draftsman Taylor Woolley. The internet address of this at the Utah Historical Society is here. The photograph looks (true) southwest at the dam being constructed (at the bottom of the photo), with Taliesin seen against the hill above. This photograph is one of over 40 photographic negatives by Woolley that show Taliesin and the Taliesin grounds. Those negatives are available here.

Another photograph by Woolley shows the new waterfall:

Photograph by Taylor Woolley of dam and pond at Taliesin
© 2011 Utah State History. All Rights Reserved.

Looking (true) east over the Taliesin dam and waterfall. Photograph taken in early 1912 by then-draftsman, Taylor Woolley. This photograph is online here. All of these photographs can be seen in the book, Building Taliesin: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Home of Love and Loss, by Ron McCrea.

Looking at the weather, it looks like the photo was taken in later winter (maybe February?). The hydraulic ram (getting water to the house) was powered by the waterfall.

Wright, about the dam

Wright wrote about the dam, and getting water to Taliesin, in his autobiography (first published in 1932):

Each court had its fountain and the winding stream below had a great dam. A thick stone wall was thrown across it, to make a pond at the very foot of the hill, and raise the water in the Valley to within sight from Taliesin. The water below the falls thus made, was sent, by hydraulic ram, up to a big stone reservoir built into the higher hill, just behind and above the hilltop garden, to come down again into the fountains and go on down to the vegetable gardens on the slopes below the house.

Frank Lloyd Wright, An Autobiography, in Frank Lloyd Wright Collected Writings: 1930-32, volume 2. Edited by Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer, introduction by Kenneth Frampton (1992; Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., New York City, 1992), 226.

The Chicago Tribune (on December 26, 1911) tells us he was working on the dam. Woolley’s photograph show the waterfall, which means the hydraulic ram was working. So, it appears that Wright had running water at Taliesin by midwinter.

And, while it no longer works, Taliesin’s dam educated me about hydraulic rams.

Thus, the short answer to the question, “Did Taliesin have outhouses”? appears to be NO.

Plus, he (and then Mamah) were only living there for months before he got water running. Where the heck could they go to the bathroom? Well, his sister lived across the way in the house that he designed for her and her husband. In fact, the two homes: Taliesin and Tan-y-deri, are in view of each other (the word Tan-y-deri, like the word, Taliesin, is Welsh; see the Tan-y-deri link for the definition of the word).

Originally published August 5, 2021

1 There were two bathrooms on the main floor of Taliesin’s living quarters.

Looking east at Taliesin's agricultural wing.

“This stuff is FUN for me”: Taliesin photographs from Frank Lloyd Wright’s lifetime.

Posted on | by admin
Reading Time: 5 minutes

The photograph above was published in a “Flashback” article from December 4 by Ron Grossman at The Chicago Tribune: “Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin was a refuge for illicit romance. But tragedy tore apart the love he built”. It’s one of two photographs taken at Taliesin on December 25, 1911. That was published in my entry, “I looked at stone.”

That’s what I said to journalist Ron McCrea in 2010 after I’d spent my weekend looking at photos of Taliesin (he was writing about them, Wright, and Mamah Borthwick in his book, Building Taliesin, published in 2012). 

What prompted this statement here has to do with the photos on this link (archived from The Wayback Machine).

The photos didn’t just capture my attention. No: I yelled in a way that they show you in movies or cartoons. It’s yelling with lots of special characters: “Holy C*$#!”

What made me yell:

The article’s two photographs—exteriors of Taliesin I (Taliesin 1911-14)—I’d only seen as dark/dusty photos, or drawings made from them.

And it appears the photographer took these the on Christmas day, 1911. On that day, Wright (and his partner, Borthwick) gave an (unintentionally disastrous) press briefing at Taliesin. They did this because they hoped to stave off public damnation. Wright thought he could do that by addressing the press.

(or the “war correspondents” as he called them, in the Day Book newspaper, on Jan. 4).

The “newspaper men” put them back on the front pages because, while they’d left their families in Oak Park, Illinois in 1909, Wright returned alone in late 1910. Everyone reading the newspapers thought Wright and Borthwick had ended their relationship.

That was not true:

Wright was in the US, but acquired land in Wisconsin to build his home. Meanwhile, Cheney was in Europe. She had to wait until she could divorce her husband based on “abandonment”.

They divorced on August 5, 1911. Thereafter she petitioned a judge to allow her to reclaim her maiden name, Borthwick.1

The “war correspondents” found the two, realized that Wright had not reconciled with wife Catherine, and descended on Taliesin.

The hope by Wright (and Borthwick) that a public statement would calm the press didn’t work out. Even though Wright said in Baraboo News (Baraboo, WI, January 4), “may not the matter be left in privacy to those whose concern it chiefly is?”, it was too late. That newspaper, on December 28, said that Taliesin was “known as Crazy House.”

I encourage you at this point, if you haven’t done so already, to click the link to Grossman’s story so you can look at the “Crazy House” photos.

A drawing in 1914 made from a 1911 photograph

Drawing showing Taliesin's north facade

If you read the article, the first photograph, underneath the article’s title, shows the building’s northern face, with a parapet ending in a stone pier to the immediate left. I had never seen the photo before. But someone took the photo and made it into a drawing. That appeared in the Des Moines Daily News (published August 18, 1914). I put that drawing above. I think I should be ok to publish it. Given its age, it’s now in the public domain.

I wanted to show how you’d see that same part of the building today, but I couldn’t. Almost nothing in the photograph from Taliesin I (or the drawing) is the same. That’s because Wright kept adding on and changing the building. However, I say that, “Taliesin keeps its history within its walls.” So I’ll show where that history marker is, but I’ll orient you first.

A view toward Taliesin’s entry steps

You walk up the steps at Taliesin to Wright’s studio at Taliesin (the north wall of the studio is to the right). The parapet from the Taliesin I photo ended at the stone that is to the left of the tree trunk (the tree trunk is to the left of the window that’s on the extreme right in the photograph) .

The next photo is the other side of that stone wall. That tree trunk I just mentioned is just to the right of the end of wall. 

That little black rectangle you see is where the cap on the parapet terminated into the stone.

The second image in the Grossman article, near the bottom, shows that same wing (the agricultural wing) from its broad western façade. That photograph is at the top of this entry, because it first appeared in print before 1924. The images, while not being unknown to me, are probably pretty rare for fans of Frank Lloyd Wright or even Taliesin. That’s how many changes Wright made to the structure over time.

This second image (showing Taliesin’s far western facade), shows the building’s hayloft ending on the right side with a garage that has the cantilevered roof. I don’t know if the garage ever held cars since there are no photographs of cars in there and no photographs with wheel tracks leading up to the garage either. There are no close up photos of it, but you see the garage across the hill in this photo at the Wisconsin Historical Society.

Another photograph used in a newspaper article

Grossman’s article used a second image taken in late December 1911, the day of Wright and Borthwick’s press conference.

I found this image because of a habit I had (and have). I search online for old Taliesin photographs. When I worked, I did this on my Friday afternoons after I had finished any other projects. I would type “Taliesin” and other qualifiers into a search bar to see what came up.

Note to the neophyte: make sure to narrow the search so that you aren’t seeing results regarding Taliesin West in Scottsdale, Arizona; things about the 1914 murders/fire at Taliesin; some movie out there about vampires with a character who is, I guess, named Taliesin*; and information on actor/voice actor, Taliesin Jaffe (I’m sorry Mr. Jaffe, but I’ve never seen anything you’ve been in).

One day that brought me to a newspaper article in the Chicago Evening American, published on December 29, 1911:

I don’t remember my first thought in seeing the agricultural wing photo, but I’m sure I was really excited. And, ultimately a little disappointed, because the photograph was muddy and a little dark and, well, just newspaper print. It’s very likely I looked at it, tried to get what information I could by scanning it, then expanded, lightened, and darkened, and gave up.

I thought that these photographs, if they existed, were in a drawer or a folder, stuck away or mislabeled. After all, I had no idea of the photo of Taliesin’s north facade existed at all out there. But, obviously, I was wrong and the original photos were NOT lost.

* Here’s part of the problem in not exploring what comes up in my website searches: “Taliesin Meets the Vampires” is not a movie. “Taliesin Meets the Vampires”—if I had taken a moment to click on the link—is a “Vampire blog” where you “will find views and reviews of vampire genre media, from literature, the web, TV and the movies.” Well, I’m glad I did that because I prefer looking at a page on a website to finding, then watching, a vampire movie.

First published, 12/11/2020.
The photograph at the heading for this post comes from the Chicago Tribune Historical Images.

1. That was reported in the Chicago Daily Tribune on December 24, 1911.