Secrest Meryle - Frank Lloyd Wright

ALSO BY MERYLE SECREST

Between Me and Life: A Biography of Romaine Brooks
Being Bernard Berenson
Kenneth Clark: A Biography
Salvador Dal

THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF, INC.

Copyright 1992 by Meryle Secrest Beveridge

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Distributed by Random House, Inc., New York.

Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to quote from the letters of Frank Lloyd Wright, the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation 1992, and courtesy of the Frank Lloyd Wright Archives; to Sophia Mumford for permission to quote from the letters of the late Lewis Mumford; to Robert, Oliver and Nicholas Gillham for permission to quote from The Valley of the God-Almighty Joneses by Maginel Wright Barney; to the Milwaukee Journal for permission to quote from The Romance of Miriam Wright; to Aimee Humphreys for permission to quote from an unpublished memoir by her mother, Babette Eddleston; to Alan Crawford, for permission to quote from his unpublished letter; to Mosette Broderick, executor of the estate, for permission to quote from an unpublished letter by Henry-Russell Hitchcock; to Felicity Ashbee, for permission to quote from the letters and journals of C. R. and Janet Ashbee; to Carter H. Manny, Jr., for permission to quote from his unpublished letter; to Eric Lloyd Wright, president of Unity Chapel, Inc., for permission to quote from Trilogy and Heritage and the unpublished letters of his father, Frank Lloyd Wright, Jr.; to Mrs. Howard J. Barnett for permission to quote from The Lloyd Letters and Memorial Book; and to the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation for permission to quote from Olgivanna Lloyd Wrights letter to Mrs. Andrew Porter.

ISBN 0-394-56436-7
eBook ISBN: 978-0-8041-5338-6
LC 92-53168

v3.1

In memory of my father,
ALBERT EDWARD DOMAN (19041983)
who wanted to be an architect

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

This books scope has been greatly enlarged by the new availability of the archive of photographs, drawings, letters, books and other materials assembled by Frank Lloyd Wright and inherited by members of his Memorial Foundation.

Until recently this largest single source of information about the architects life was, largely for practical reasons having to do with the size of the archive and the cost of maintaining a research facility, limited to specialists working in well-defined areas.

As the result of a grant from the Getty Foundation, the total archive of over one hundred thousand letters, documents and other materials has been placed on microfiche and completely indexed. It is now available for study at the Getty Center Archives for the History of Art and the Humanities in Santa Monica, California, which has a first-class research facility, as well as at the Frank Lloyd Wright Memorial Foundation in Scottsdale, Arizona. Even though three volumes of the architects letters are now in print, the size of the archive has meant that only highlights of the correspondence could be touched upon, leaving the vast majority unexplored until now.

The collection, believed to be the largest of its kind assembled by an architect in modern times, begins in 1886 with a handwritten letter by Wright, then an apprentice architect aged nineteen, to his uncle, Jenkin Lloyd Jones, and ends shortly before his death in 1959. The archive is more complete after 1925, when Wright began to keep carbons of all his letters, than it is before that date, when he often wrote letters in longhand and kept no copies or, at best, retained only a draft of a letter, much amended and incomplete. Correspondence concerning his early architectural practice has also been lost, perhaps as a result of the many fires at Taliesin over the decades. Similarly, there are no letters to or from Wrights father, William Carey Wright, or his side of the family. The archive does include a large group of letters from his mother and sisters, and letters from Lloyd Jones family members who played important roles in his life. There are several letters to him from his second wife, Miriam Noel Wright, but none by his first wife, Catherine, and only one or two by his third wife, Olgivanna.

Wright was not only a dedicated letter keeper but also a talented letter writer, with a lifelong preference for paper rather than a telephone as a satisfying outlet for self-expression. Consequently his dispatcheson occasion, brickbatspaint a broad and vivid portrait of his thoughts and feelings over the decades. They also reveal the way he set about realizing his goals, demonstrating enormous resourcefulness and considerable advance planning. The tone was so idiosyncratic and singular that, paradoxically, it became predictable. One of the bons mots ascribed to Wrights principal secretary, Eugene Masselink, was that he could write as good a Wright letter as Wright himself. Be that as it may, the existence of this lively, opinionated and self-revelatory archive is the kind of treasure a biographer rarely encounters, as good a substitute for having known someone personally as could be hoped for.

I am indebted to Dr. Nicholas Olsberg, then director of the Getty Center Archives for the History of Art, Gene Waddell, associate archivist, and their staff, for making my stay at Santa Monica and work in the archives so delightful and in offering me every kind of courtesy and help. I am equally grateful for the many courtesies extended me by Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer, archivist of the Frank Lloyd Wright Memorial Foundation in Scottsdale. I particularly want to express my appreciation and thanks for the many hours spent on my behalf by Richard Carney, chief executive officer and managing trustee, who not only gave me numerous interviews but made introductions, wrote letters, offered suggestions and more than once treated me to the famous Taliesin hospitality. I would like to express my great gratitude to the Foundation for its generosity in granting me copyright permissions and for refraining from asking any conditions in return for this remarkable privilege. I am enormously indebted to it. I want especially to record my debt to the late William Wesley Peters, chairman of the board of trustees and raconteur par excellence, for his inimitable descriptions of the Fellowships early days. I also wish to thank other members of the Taliesin Foundation who kindly allowed themselves to be interviewed: Cornelia Brierly, Tony Puttnam, Charles and Minerva Montooth, Joe Fabris, Dr. Joseph Rorke, Kenneth Burton Lockhart, Susan Jacobs Lockhart, Heloise Crista, Kay Rattenbury, E. Thomas Casey, Effi Bantzer Casey and the former development director, Elaine Freed.

Members of Frank Lloyd Wrights family have been just as generous with their time, granting interviews followed up by lengthy telephone discussions and letters, as well as giving me access to private family papers and photographs. I am most of all appreciative of the many kindnesses extended to me by Wrights son, David Samuel Wright, and his wife, Gladys, who is the family archivist and ultimate authority on these matters. They invited me to their home, showed me their archives and provided me with important materials. I am also indebted to Iovanna Lloyd Wright, who readily granted me interviews and spoke to me at length about her childhood and young womanhood. I wish to thank Mrs. Robert Llewellyn Wright, who also gave me interviews and went through her photographic and other files on my behalf with patience and good humor. I am especially grateful to Franklin Wright Porter and his charming wife, Mary, who were my hosts for a fascinating weekend spent in long conversations and a lengthy perusal of their own extensive files on his uncles life; to Elizabeth Wright Ingraham, who also entertained me regally and patiently answered my endless questions; to Mr. and Mrs. Eric Lloyd Wright, for their invaluable insights and for making available copies of Wrights letters to Frank Lloyd Wright, Jr.; to Rupert Pole, another grandson, for his generous help and many kindnesses; to Jenkin Lloyd Jones, son of Richard Lloyd Jones, who stepped in with vital help at a crucial moment; to his sister, Florence L. J. (Bisser) Barnett, who was equally indulgent about my demands upon her time and help; to her daughter, Heidi Kiser; and to Mrs. Stuart Natof, daughter of Frances Lloyd Wright Caro, who gave me important insights into her mothers life.