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Abstract
In 1912, Walter Burley Griffin famously won the international design competition for Australia's national capital, later named Canberra. In 1914, Walter – along with his wife and professional partner Marion Mahony Griffin – moved from their native Chicago to Australia to orchestrate Canberra's realization. On a return visit to the USA in 1925, Walter was commissioned to lay out an extension to the Chicago suburb of Park Ridge. Until now, this project was only known from a singular, passing mention of it in a period newspaper article. This report reconstructs the writer's convoluted effort – spanning more than a decade – to confirm Walter Burley Griffin's authorship of this enigmatic project and to locate the plan itself. In parallel, it recovers, partly based upon evidence-derived suppositions, the circumstances surrounding what proved to be Griffin's final American commission.
Acknowledgements
Conducting research across hemispheres inevitably requires collegial assistance and collaboration. In the USA, the author is grateful to Barbara Bezat, David Jameson, Paul Kruty, Lesley Martin, Vincent Michael, John Notz and Tim Samuelson for their insights and assistance. And, ‘on the ground’ at Park Ridge, he thanks the late Anita Anderson, Randall Derifield, Josephine F. Moeller and, most recently, Craig Harris and Judy Barclay. In Australia, Simon Reeves generously shared his Henry Pynor expertise. This report also benefited greatly from the comments of three anonymous reviewers.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes on contributors
Christopher Vernon is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Visual Arts at the University of Western Australia. There, he teaches design and the history and theory of landscape architecture. Vernon is a leading authority on the lives and works of Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin, widely lecturing and publishing on the subject. More broadly, his research focusses upon architecture and landscape as collective expressions of identity, especially within the context of designed national capitals such as Canberra, New Delhi and Brasília.
Notes on contributors
Christopher Vernon is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Visual Arts at the University of Western Australia. There, he teaches design and the history and theory of landscape architecture. Vernon is a leading authority on the lives and works of Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin, widely lecturing and publishing on the subject. More broadly, his research focusses upon architecture and landscape as collective expressions of identity, especially within the context of designed national capitals such as Canberra, New Delhi and Brasília.
Notes
1. Beardsley, “A Monument to”. The article's appearance anticipated the Australian Parliament's Canberra opening that May. In 1987, the writer first encountered a cutting of Beardsley's article in Griffin's alumnae file at the University of Illinois. See University of Illinois Archives, RS 26/4/1, Walter Griffin Folder. The article likely remained obscure as the Chicago Daily News apparently has yet to be digitized and made available online.
2. Harrison, Walter Burley Griffin, 67. Pioneering Griffin scholar Peter Harrison, for instance, only noted – without reference – that Griffin's ‘last planning commission in the United States, for the suburb of Park Ridge near Chicago, was also completed about this time [1924]'. To the best of this author's knowledge, apart from himself, Harrison is the only Griffin scholar to mention the Park Ridge project in-print. Unsurprisingly, an actual cutting of Beardsley’s article (not a reproduction) is to be found in ‘Papers of Peter Harrison (1918–1990)’ (MS 8347), Series 6, box 12, folder 40, National Library of Australia, Canberra. Harrison possibly obtained it from Griffin’s former partner Eric Nicholls (i.e. the cutting was likely Griffin’s own).
3. The advertisement is reproduced in Barnes, Park Ridge, 23.
4. This writer initially undertook the study as he planned to at least mention Park Ridge in a chapter he was invited to contribute to a catalogue raisonné of the Griffins’ Australian and Indian works. See Vernon, “An ‘Accidental’ Australian.”
5. In 1910, Park Ridge's population was only around 2000 people. See http://www.parkridge.us/about/history.aspx (accessed July 22, 2013). Also see Park Ridge Community Church Circle, History of Park Ridge; and Barnes, Park Ridge.
6. Cushing Smith, “Greater Park Ridge.” Griffin's plan, Smith qualified, ‘applied only to the limited area then included within the city limits. It did not prove to be adequate to assist the Plan Commission and the officials of the city in controlling extensions to the streets outside of the city limits’. Consequently,
[l]ate in the year 1925 the City Plan Commission retained the writer [Griffin was then back in Australia] to revise the first [i.e. Griffin's] plan, keep its main features, make them where possible a part of the new plan, and extend the detailed planning to include the area of one and one-half miles outside the city limits.
7. Between 1920 and 1930, Park Ridge's population tripled, booming from 3383 to 10, 417. See http://www.parkridge.us/about/history.aspx (accessed July 22, 2013).
8. “Architectural records for landscapes by F. A. Cushing Smith & Associates” (1989.0813), Chicago History Museum, Chicago, Illinois (USA).
9. “Architectural records for buildings by Francis Barry Byrne” (1980.0081), Chicago History Museum, Chicago, Illinois (USA). Hereafter, Byrne Papers.
10. Byrne dated the typescript 27 March 1963. Byrne Papers, Series III, Box 2, personal correspondence. The original article is “Australia Honors U.S. Architect.” The writer thanks A. I. A. archivist Nancy Hadley for supplying him with a scan of the notice.
11. Iannelli's typescript is, however, unsigned. Most importantly, it comes not from Byrne's papers, but from two boxes of photocopies of documents formerly in Iannelli's possession. These copies were donated years after the Byrne material. Chicago History Museum, “Iannelli Reference Copies,” Box 2. In “Mr. Griffin's original plan”, Iannelli further elaborated,
the central part, including the Carpenter property was to be retained as a park for the center of our city. The program that is being developed by a group of citizens [who] desire to keep the Carpenter property as a civic improvement and the building to be used as an Art Center – a historical landmark.
12. On this writer's behalf, Randall Derifield and Judy Barclay scoured Park Ridge's municipal records for documentation of the Plan Commission's activities, unfortunately, without result. The Park Ridge Weekly and the Park Ridge Review began publication in 1925; however, the earliest available holdings do not begin until 1929.
13. Michael, Architecture of Barry Byrne; and Jameson, Alfonso Iannelli.
14. The Griffins sailed from Sydney to San Francisco on 4 December 1924, anticipating only a three-month absence (the voyage itself required approximately three weeks’ time in each direction). See “Personal”; and “Mrs. W. B. Griffin Farewelled.”
15. Both letters are to be found in the William Gray Purcell Papers (N3), Northwest Architectural Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries, Minneapolis, Minnesota (USA). The writer thanks Barbara Bezat for providing him with scans of the correspondence. When Griffin first wrote Purcell, he had already visited Los Angeles; by the time he wrote again, he had consulted with his clientele in southern Illinois and Monroe, Louisiana. See Kruty, Walter Burley Griffin, 5, 26. The fast pace of Griffin's domestic travels also indicates he envisaged only a brief American visit.
16. See: http://trove.nla.gov.au/.
17. “Federal Capital Designer.” The article does not mention Marion Griffin, raising the possibility that she may have returned to Australia in advance of Walter, perhaps to manage the Australian practice in his absence.
18. To date, Griffin's Presidential appointment is unknown from any other source.
19. “The Federal Capital.” On the Federal Capital Commission and the Federal Capital Advisory Committee, see Reid, Canberra; and Taylor, “The Federal Capital Commission.”
20. See Vernon, “An ‘Accidental’ Australian.”
21. On that date, Griffin ‘gave a very interesting talk on the architecture and construction practices of Melbourne and other Australian cities as well as the gardens, beaches, suburbs, railroads and labor situation’. ‘He also touched on the layout of Federal Capital City which he created’. “Minutes of Regular Meeting of the Chicago Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, held Tuesday evening, January 13, 1925, at 6:30 o'clock at The University Club.” American Institute of Architects Archives, Record Group 801, A. I. A. Office Files, Series 3.0, Chicago Chapter, Box 1, 1925.
22. Jameson, Alfonso Iannelli, 331.
23. Michael, Architecture of Barry Byrne, 16. The Griffins were in Europe to interview potential adjudicators for another international design competition, this one for Australia's Parliament House.
24. See entry no. 308 in Chicago Architectural Club, Book of the Twenty Seventh Annual Exhibition, n.p.
25. Ibid., 21–22. Iannelli first met Byrne in late 1912, when the two were living in Los Angeles. The pair soon became friends. Near the end of 1913, Byrne moved to Chicago to begin his partnership with Griffin. One imagines he mentioned the reason for his relocation to Iannelli.
26. “Papers of Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony collected by Eric Nicholls, 1900–1947” (MS 9957), National Library of Australia, Canberra. Eric Nicholls was the Griffins’ Australian partner. The papers include no material on Park Ridge. Under the auspices of an Australian Research Council grant, the writer catalogued the collection in 1998; the National Library acquired it in 2006. On the collection, see http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/3912897
27. Electronic communication, Benson Ford Research Center (Dearborn, Michigan, USA) to Christopher Vernon, 19 November 2014. The author thanks automobile specialist Lee Watson for his detailed analysis of Midway Gardens photographs http://nla.gov.au/nla.pic-vn3603884-s738; and http://nla.gov.au/nla.pic-vn3603884-s740: ‘1) Drum type headlights were typical of cars until 1926, after which headlights were conical style. (All headlights visible are Drum style); 2) Most manufacturers stopped using rubberized fabric for the sun visors by 1927 (This fabric is on all cars in the photo); 3) All cars in the photo have louvers typical of cars after 1921. Cars before this date had fewer and larger style of louvers; 4) There is one car with a slanted windshield and a small triangular window next to it. This type of windshield was used on some luxury cars from 1922 through 1928; 5) The car in the foreground has a very square roof on the rear which was discontinued on most cars by 1925’.
28. “Walt B. G.” to “Will Gray”, January 7, 1925. See note 15. On Pynor, see http://www.builtheritage.com.au/dua_pynor.html (accessed November 13, 2014).
29. See Smith (one of Pynor's traveling companions), “Across America by Car.”
30. Public Records Office of Victoria (PROV), VA 1422 (Architects’ Registration Board of Victoria), VPRS 8838/P1 (Individual Architects Registration Files), Unit 12 (File on Henry Pynor); Letter (handwritten), Henry Pynor to Registrar, 1 May [1924]. The author thanks Simon Reeves for supplying him with a scan of this letter.
31. The Griffins’ papers formerly included a booklet commemorating Midway Gardens’ June 1914 opening (this document is now in a private collection; the Chicago History Museum, however, holds another copy). As it was published after the couple's Chicago departure, one of their American friends or employees (for instance, Barry Byrne) likely posted the booklet to them. Disappointingly, it does not identify Iannelli as the building's sculptor. See Midway Gardens Co., Midway Gardens. The writer thanks Paul Kruty and Lesley Martin for consulting this rare text on his behalf.
32. On 14 February 1914, Chicago's Construction News broke the news, cited in Kruty, Frank Lloyd Wright, 62n44; Chicago Daily Tribune, “Midway Gardens Planned”; and Chicago Daily Tribune, “Proposed Midway Gardens.”
33. Taylor, “There!” Earlier Midway Gardens photographic sources were available to the Griffins. In December 1914, for instance, the Chicago Portland Cement Company published a promotional booklet featuring 16 illustrations of the newly completed building. Long an advocate of concrete construction, Griffin possibly secured this document (or received it) directly from the publisher. See Chicago Portland Cement Co., Beauty and Utility in Concrete. In February and May 1915, more photographs were published. See The Architect and Engineer of California, “The Aesthetic in Concrete”; and Sell, “Interpretation not Imitation.” All three sources acknowledged Iannelli's involvement. The Australian accessibility of these overseas documents, however, is uncertain.
34. Ibid., 99. The Griffins knew George Taylor and his architect wife Florence all too well. Initially, the Taylors were the Griffins’ staunchest allies in their politically embattled effort to realize Canberra. Around the time this article appeared, however quite mysteriously, the Australian couple reversed their position. On the relationship between the pairs, see Freestone and Hanna, Florence Taylor's Hats, 139–51; and Johnson, On Frank Lloyd Wright's, 53–98.
35. Ibid., 100.
36. Ibid.
37. Whenever Byrne was confronted with a planning project, he involved other professionals, such as city planner Frederick Thomas Bigger and civil engineer H. V. Stephenson. See Michael, Architecture of Barry Byrne, 32, 178.
38. For even-handed accounts of the Griffin–Byrne partnership and its eventual expiry, see Vernon, “An ‘Accidental’ Australian”, 3, 10, 11; and Michael, Architecture of Barry Byrne, 21–33, 189–190n113. Nothing in either man's demeanour suggests they harboured lingering animosity towards one another. In 1939 (two years after Walter's death), Byrne advocated, for instance, that the ‘return of Mrs. Walter Burley Griffin to Chicago suggests the interesting possibility of an exhibition of the architectural work of this talented couple’. ‘That a prophet should be without honor in his own land', he continued, ‘is a condition against which honest persons should oppose themselves’. See “The Chicago School of Architecture: Transcript of Papers Prepared by Robert C. Spencer, George G. Elmslie, [and] Barry Byrne: Delivered before the Illinois Society of Architects, Tuesday, November 28, 1939” [unpublished typescript] held at the Ricker Library of Architecture and Art, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (OCLC: 77624446): 3, 4.
39. On Elgh, see Vernon, “Out from the Shadows.”
40. There are actually three privately held Iannelli archives, unidentified here for privacy reasons.
41. The lettering is from Walter's, not Marion's hand, suggesting that she had already returned to Australia by then. See note 17.
42. The original plan drawing's whereabouts, however, remains a mystery. Griffin, moreover, would likely have prepared an accompanying report, now also lost.
43. Stern, Fishman, Tilove, Paradise Planned, 258.