Julien R. Fielding - Freelance Writer

Little House in the Prairie Style

Julien R. Fielding

During Frank Lloyd Wright’s prodigious career, spanning more than seven decades, the architect designed 1,141 structures, of which 532 were completed (including New York’s Guggenheim Museum). "He is America’s most famous architect," said Anthony Alofsin, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin and one of the leading authorities on Wright’s architecture. Wright’s renown, however, didn’t save him from the criticism and demands of a small-town Nebraska woman. Eliza Sutton of McCook, Neb., who commissioned Wright's work in 1905 after some of his designs were published in the Ladies Home Journal, had very specific notions of how her Wright-designed house should look … and how little it should cost her.

Transformation
Located in Red Willow County, McCook is in the southwestern section of Nebraska, approximately 14 miles north of the Kansas border. Because it is the midpoint between Omaha and Denver — it is 284 miles from the former and 254 miles from the latter — it was the ideal transportation hub. Not surprisingly by 1886 it had become a second-class city and had the largest railroad depot west of Red Cloud. In the early 1900s, approximately 2,500 people called it home.

While Wright designed public and civic structures he also frequently found work creating private residences, such as the Robie House, a three-story brick and stone house in Chicago.

According to an article published in 1965 in the Prairie School Review, Wright came to the attention of McCook through two plans he had published in the February and July 1901 issues of the Ladies Home Journal. These caught the attention of Rose Barnes of McCook, who then showed them to Mary S. Marlan, a local woman who in her youth had known the architect. At Marlan’s recommendation, Barnes placed an order with the architect. The plans arrived, but for one reason or another she never proceeded with the house.

Her close friend, Eliza Sutton, however, soon became interested and wrote to Wright’s studio, asking him to remodel her one-story house at 602 Main St. She sent him a sketch of a floor plan, detailing precisely what she wanted: "Now would like to have an upper floor added …want to raise house two feet on foundation … Want one bedroom below for an aged mother … The kitchen is larger than I care for and want butler’s pantry and modern conveniences, a bathroom upstairs or lavatory. Have one downstairs but don’t know if I want it there or not. Don’t want any more basement than necessary. Want a laundry and hot air furnace for heat. Wondered if it would do to take laundry and take kitchen for bedroom and change backstairs … Want to build as soon as spring opens up."

Sutton told Wright that she wanted to know the cheapest and best way to accomplish the redesign and that she didn’t want to spend more than $2,000. The Sutton home was about seven blocks north of the railroad and overlooked the town. Few other houses were nearby as the home was only a few blocks from prairie and grazing land. Harvey Sutton owned McCook’s only jewelry store and was the long-time director of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad Concert Band.

The first letter from Wright’s studio was dated Feb. 8, 1905. In it Walter B. Griffin, a member of the studio, acknowledged Mrs. Sutton’s requests then outlined the costs involved. When Wright finally submitted his initial plans to the Suttons, they rejected them as did they his second. In fact, Mrs. Sutton expressed her dissatisfaction in a letter, beginning with, "Am very unhappy to say the plan is not what I want at all. Have tried to make it plain as I know what my ideas are, but you do not seem to understand." She continued, saying that she didn’t want so many wings or windows — "they are very pretty but expensive and I cannot sacrifice the room I need for beauty" — and that the design didn’t have enough bedrooms or closets. After more correspondence and alterations, by December 1906 the house still hadn’t been built and the cost of the project had exceeded $5,000. Mrs. Sutton wrote to Wright, informing him that no payment would be made until she and her husband were satisfied: "Am figuring right along and doing all in my power to get started this spring as husband says we must have a house built by fall. Have fooled long enough. Have an unsightly hole at our front door and he is disgusted with it and I am discouraged."

About three months later, Wright responded: "Meanwhile, I will have to ask you to consider the architect a little as he certainly has taken pains enough to please his clients on this work and is clearly entitled to compensation for his services whether the building is built or not. He really needs the money badly at the present time and a check for $300, which should have been paid him long ago, should be paid without further delay."

Construction on the Sutton house finally was completed during the summer of 1908 at a cost of more than $10,000, a figure that apparently angered the Suttons. The fact that the project went over budget doesn’t surprise William Storrer, the author of The Frank Lloyd Wright Companion. "Wright never knew how to estimate costs or he underestimated them," he said. "He always was overspending."

Prairie Style
The McCook house was designed in the Prairie School of Architecture, a uniquely American style that evolved out of the teachings of architect Louis Sullivan and was popular from the 1890s to the 1920s. Wright’s Prairie Style combined an open plan with an emphasis on the horizontal plane. Other characteristics included asymmetrical façade elevations and broad, sheltering roofs. The Sutton house was executed at the high point of Wright’s First Golden Age, Alofsin said. "The Prairie Style idiom was executed efficiently by his office in Oak Park, Ill. The stucco house uses a ground plan that is in a cruciform shape. The interiors are very typical of Wright.

"Wright was highly motivated to use the latest technology, such as reinforced concrete and the cantilever. And he used materials that would liberate the building from the humdrum. He always was very progressive," Alfonsin said.

In 1924, Mrs. Sutton discussed adding a library to the house but nothing was ever done. Then in 1932, a fire, which started in the basement, destroyed the original porch and severely damaged many of the original furnishings. Because no one could understand how the original cantilevered porch had been supported, plastered pillars were installed to hold it up. Steps were put onto the balcony and French doors became a main entryway. During World War II, the Suttons made the house into two apartments for Air Base personnel and added a downstairs bathroom. When the owners died in 1952, the house was sold to Dr. J. Harold Donaldson, a physician who altered it so it could be used as a clinic. He did this by dividing the interior space into 24 small rooms, adding an exterior diagnostic clinic and creating a lead-lined X-ray room. According to an article that appeared in the McCook Daily Gazette on Aug. 3, 1978, he also put concrete block around the house and added fences, fountains, a statue and lily ponds.

"Another room he used for minor surgery," said Mary Poore, the third to the last owner of the Sutton House. "Upstairs he had an eye chart at the end of the hall."

When he retired, Donaldson tried to sell the structure at auction, but it didn’t attract any buyers. When faced with the cost of taxes and upkeep he was forced to consider one of several options: move it out of town, to Omaha or Lincoln, where it would benefit from tourism; or tear it down and make it into modern apartments.

Poore was horrified to think that this could happen to a piece of McCook history, so in 1978 she procured it. "My grandparents who homesteaded sold butter to the Suttons," she said. "They were a higher class. I knew the son, Harold, since I was young. Velma [Kisevalter], his sister went through the house with us when we bought it." The same week the Poores signed the papers, the house was declared a National Historic Site. "We did try to make it into a residence again," she said. "We worked on it for one year before moving in. We had the plans and tried to do as much as we could. It was a matter of tearing down walls. But there were places where the doors were filled in and although originally there were oak floors, when [Donaldson] put in the walls he cut through them. We carpeted the floor and put Oriental rugs down. Our son went to technical school for construction so he did a lot of the work. We were frustrated because we didn’t have the funds. We wanted to put the original porch with the cantilever back in."

The Poores lived in the home for about 10 years, eventually selling it to John and Stacy Cannon. "I cried driving down the street," she said. "I knew selling the home was a mistake. It was wonderful to live in the house. It seemed cozy. It was a real comfortable house."

Original Splendor
Janet Korell had read about Wright and had been interested in the house for a long-time. So when she learned that the Cannons were moving, she and her husband Van went to look at it. They bought the house in 1992. "Our first project was to tear off the enclosed stairway," she said. Wanting to restore the house to its original splendor, the Korells, in 1999, turned to Wright architect John Thorpe about a complete restoration. "We went from old photos and built the cupboards back," she said. In 2001, they added onto the northwest part of the house, replaced the cantilevered porch and created a private outdoor area. Korell said that because the house was so different than any other structure in town, no one appreciated or understood it.

"Some of [Wright’s] most important works were torn down," she said. "So I felt it was important and worth [preserving it]. At some point the Historical Society seemed interested in it but it cost too much money to restore it. My husband’s and my goal was to protect it so it’s always here. It’s been a labor of love."

"It looks beautiful," Poore said. "The Korells have done wonders." Even though the house is a private residence and not open to the public — Korell gets about five calls in one day about it — she does let fifth graders at Central Elementary tour it in the spring, after they’ve completed a specially designed module on Wright and the Sutton house.

Even though Thomas A. Heinz AIA (an Evanston, Ill., architect who has written extensively on Wright’s works), Alofsin and Storrer agree the Sutton building is one of Wright’s great houses, few scholars include or discuss it. Storrer believes this is because of its location.

"Nothing is near it," he said. "You have to make a conscious decision to go there." It also doesn’t help that the house has undergone so many changes over the years. "It’s really unfortunate it’s been so altered," Heinz said. "[At one point] there was a fence around it so you couldn’t even see it."

"[Many scholars] will go to a place that hasn’t been altered and there are a lot in Oak Park," Alofsin said. "Also there’s a lack of familiarity [with the Sutton House]."

Interiors
Unlike many architects, Wright didn’t stop at designing the structure. He also designed the furniture, fabrics, art glass, lamps, dinnerware, silver, linens and graphic arts that would aesthetically enhance the interior.

"Both his furniture and graphic designs were integral to his principles in that everything was to relate to the whole," said Penny Fowler, author of Frank Lloyd Wright: The Seat of Genius, Chairs 1895-1955, in an e-mail interview. "The site-specific furniture designs were to create a unified whole with the building design. Wright said, ‘It is quite impossible to consider the building one thing and its furnishing another; its setting and environment still another.’ He also declared as early as 1894 that ‘the most truly satisfactory apartments are those in which most or all of the furniture is built in as a part of the original scheme considering the whole as an integral unit.’"

In his autobiography Wright also discussed designing clothing for his wife, Fowler said. "John Lloyd Wright mentioned that his father also designed some of Mrs. Coonley’s dresses to harmonize with the interiors. Others have said that he also designed dresses for Ms. Robie and Mrs. Dana. In a photograph of Mrs. Darwin Martin, the dress she is wearing is considered to have been designed by Wright. To the best of my knowledge, none of the dresses are known to exist."

For the Sutton house, Wright designed the furniture that was then built by the Karpen Furniture Company in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. As Poore remembers it, Mr. Sutton disliked the rigidity of the furniture. "[Wright’s] furniture was very uncomfortable," she said. "It looked great but it had very straight corners and a hard back. [Sutton] bought a club chair [to sit in] because he didn’t like the furniture Wright put in."

Currently, none of the furniture designed for the Sutton house exists on site. And even though there are more than 300 chair drawings in the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation archives, Fowler explained that "by his own admission, [Wright’s] furniture designs presented a challenge. He went so far as to say that his attitude toward designing a chair was ‘something between contempt and desperation.’ He was also very critical about his furniture, repeatedly complaining, ‘all my life my legs have been banged up somewhere by the chairs I have designed.’ One can certainly speculate that he compromised comfort for design in many instances. In a 1954 talk to apprentices, he said, ‘The chair business has always been a troublesome business.’"

Despite this fact, in 1955 Wright developed a commercial line of furniture that was produced by the Heritage-Henredon, of North Carolina, Fowler said.

"The rugs and accessories never went into mass production," she said. "It is extremely rare and collectible — a pull-up side/occasional table that sold for $75 now can be had for up to $400. The ensembles were designed in such a way that they would become the structural architectural elements with which to ‘build’ an organic space. They were meant to create a feeling of integration and harmony and could be grouped and regrouped to meet a variety of needs. Wright wanted to create innovative furniture that would encourage a new way of living." Of the three lines, the Four Square, which became the Taliesin Line, would be the only one to go into production, she said.

A Personal Practice
Although Donaldson had changed the McCook house considerably, Poore said the windows, done by Temple Art Glass Co., in Chicago, still were in tact when her family moved in.

"Most were original," she said. "Upstairs some had been replaced but they had been done in the same simple design. There were extras in the basement. We had to clean and re-grout them all."

Because they didn’t have any screens or storm shutters on them, the windows, during winter, allowed some snow in. "They were a little drafty but I would never complain," she said. "The fireplace was really efficient. It was right on the floor and we used it all the time. Mr. Sutton’s son lived only a couple of blocks from here and he made a fireplace in his house like the one in this house."

Julie Sloan, glass conservator and author of Light Screens: The Complete Leaded Glass Windows of Frank Lloyd Wright, said that the windows Wright designed during the Prairie-style period typically were composed of straight lines and clear glass. And although they often had decorative elements and color, primarily mossy greens and amber, their primary purposes were for looking out and to let light in.

"Wright used lead glass in every building he designed," she said. "It was a very important material to him. Few [designs] were repeated from one house to another. All were very specific."

"Wright always was looking for options; always trying new things," Heinz said. "When people wanted something he did it that way but tried to persuade them to do it his way. He was one heck of an engineer. He really understood design, engineering and structure. He knew how boards would go together. He was remarkable and yet he never published or talked about his ideas. Frank Lloyd Wright kept his practice under his hat; he kept it to himself. When clients would call he would say, ‘I’m the architect. Let them talk to me.’ His was a very personal practice."

The Wright Stuff
Born June 8, 1867, in Richland Center, Wis., Wright was encouraged by his mother early on to become an architect. At 12 years old, the youth settled in Madison, Wis., with his family. In 1885, he left high school to work for Allan Conover, the dean of the University of Wisconsin’s Engineering Dept., where for two years Wright studied civil engineering before moving to Chicago. There he worked for architect Joseph Lyman Stilsbee. The first building Wright designed was the Unity Chapel. He soon moved to Adler and Sullivan, where he worked directly with Sullivan. In 1893, Wright started his own firm in Chicago then five years later opened one in Oak Park.

According to Heinz, the architect’s career can be divided into three phases: the Prairie period that ended in 1909 when he went to Europe; the middle phase, 1909-30, sometimes called the "Lost Years"; and the "Second Golden Age," 1930-59. Wright died in 1959 at the age of 92.

The Guggenheim Museum, Fallingwater (the Kaufmann House), Taliesen, the Imperial Hotel, the Larkin Company Administration Building and the SC Johnson and Son Wax Company Administration Center building are just a few of his most recognized and revered projects. During his life, Wright authored 20 books and countless articles, lectured throughout the United States and in Europe, and developed a plan for decentralizing urban America.

"Wright was a complex and prodigious personality," Anthony Alofsin said. "He was driven and demanding as only the most gifted artists are. He will forever be an important figure in American culture."