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Chronology
Anthony Alofsin
Description: Wright and New York: The Making of America’s Architect
Wright and New York: The Making of America’s Architect
Chronology
Author
Anthony Alofsin
PublisherYale University Press
Copyright© 2019 by Anthony Alofsin
Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-32254
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Chronology
1867
July 8: (Richland Center, WI) Frank Lincoln Wright born; later changes middle name to Lloyd, connecting him to his maternal Lloyd-Jones lineage.
1909
September 22: (Chicago) Wright departs for New York City, his first documented visit to Gotham. Wright and Mamah Borthwick Cheney meet at the Plaza Hotel in time for the Hudson-Fulton Celebration.
October 5: (New York) Wright and Mamah leave New York to sail to Europe to prepare Wright’s Wasmuth publications.
1910
October 6: (New York) Wright returns from Europe, stays in New York for two days, and then returns to Oak Park, Illinois.
November 15: (New York) Wright arrives to oversee project for Universal Portland Cement Company exhibition. He visits his sisters, cousin, and Tiffany’s.
December 14–20: (New York) Wright’s pavilion for the Universal Portland Cement Company on view at the First Annual New York Cement Show, Madison Square Garden.
1911
January 16: (New York) Wright sails for Liverpool on RMS Lusitania en route to second stay in Europe.
March 30: (New York) Wright returns to United States, begins discussion in Spring Green to buy land for Taliesin.
Summer: (Spring Green, WI) Construction begins on Wright’s home and studio, Taliesin, located near Spring Green.
October 16: (Taliesin) Wright informed of possible commission for Imperial Hotel, Tokyo.
1913
January 11: (San Francisco) Wright and Mamah Borthwick sail to Japan to pursue commission for Imperial Hotel. Wright has no contract; project delayed by death of Meiji emperor.
Late May: (Taliesin) Wright and Mamah return from Japan; commission in limbo.
1914
August 15: (Taliesin) Tragedy with death of Mamah, her children, and others.
December 12: (Chicago) Miriam Noel contacts Wright. They begin an affair immediately.
1916
December 28: (Vancouver) With contract settled, Wright and Miriam sail to Japan for work on Imperial Hotel, their first of five trips.
1919
October: (New York) During a four-month return from Japan, Wright visits the city to sell Japanese woodblock prints.
1921
Early July: (New York) Wright spends two weeks in the city, again to sell Japanese woodblock prints. Returns to Los Angeles for final inspection of Aline Barnsdall’s project on Olive Hill.
July 30: (San Francisco) Wright and Miriam sail back to Japan, stopping in Honolulu.
1922
April 24: (New York) The Reverend William Norman Guthrie asks Bishop William T. Manning for permission to change the order of church service. Outraged, Manning prohibits any teacher or representative of a non-Christian religion to speak or take part in any service at St. Mark’s.
August 20: (Taliesin) Wright and Miriam return from Japan, via Seattle; final trip for both.
October 5: (Taliesin) Wright broaches idea with son Lloyd of working together on West Coast; Wright has no work.
October 27: (New York) Wright is en route to the city to see Bosch Reitz at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Wright intends further sales of Japanese prints to pay expenses at Taliesin. Bosch Reitz informs Wright that prints Wright had sold were retouched.
November 13: Wright finally obtains divorce from wife Catherine.
1923
February: (West Hollywood) Wright living and working in rented house at 1284 Harper Avenue in Sherman; staff consists of himself, his son Lloyd Wright, Kameki Tsuchira, and Rudolf M. Schindler.
February 9: (Oconomowoc, WI) Wright’s mother, Anna Lloyd-Wright, dies.
March—July: (West Hollywood) Various projects, mostly speculative: Doheny Ranch project; Commercial Building; Lake Tahoe summer colony.
September 1: (Tokyo) Imperial Hotel opens coincident with Great Kantō earthquake.
September: (Los Angeles) Wright moves office to 1600 Edgemont Street (Residence B, at Barnsdall’s Olive Hill complex).
October: (Taliesin) Wright returns to reopen a studio and claims he will soon have other studios in Chicago, Hollywood, and Tokyo.
November 19: (Taliesin) Wright and Miriam Noel marry.
1924
February 2: (Los Angeles) Wright’s assistant Rudolf Schindler informs Richard Neutra that Wright is in Los Angeles through the month.
April 14: (Chicago) Louis Sullivan dies; Wright attends the funeral two days later and meets Richard Neutra there.
May: (Taliesin) Miriam Noel leaves Wright.
September 2: (Chicago) Gordon Strong in touch with Wright about designing an “Automobile Objective” on Sugarloaf Mountain, near Washington, D.C.
October: (Taliesin) Richard Neutra arrives at Taliesin; will stay through early February 1925.
November 3–4: (Taliesin) German architect Erich Mendelsohn visits Wright.
November 30: (Chicago) Wright meets Olgivanna Hinzenberg.
December: (New York) Wright makes weeklong trip to city “for business.”
1925
January: (Taliesin) Olgivanna moves in and becomes pregnant.
February 17: (New York) Olgivanna introduces Wright to members of her Gurdjieffian circle.
April 12: (New York) Guthrie gives Easter sermon describing “a shrine of worship for all people,” the core idea for the Modern Cathedral Wright will design. Wright knows of the project and makes sketches, but the work is limited.
April 19: (Taliesin) Alexander Woollcott visits Wright.
April 20: (Taliesin) Wright’s home burns for second time.
July 10: Wright files for divorce from Miriam; protracted skirmishes begin between them.
October 14: (Chicago) Gordon Strong rejects Wright’s design for his “Automobile Objective.”
December 2: (Chicago) Olgivanna gives birth to Iovanna Lazovich Lloyd Wright and is harassed by Miriam in hospital.
Early December: (Hollis, NY) Wright and family take refuge with Olgivanna’s brother Vlado and his wife Sophie.
1926
January: (Puerto Rico) Wright takes Olgivanna to Puerto Rico so she can recover from postpartum depression.
March: (Taliesin) Wright returns from Puerto Rico with his family to his Wisconsin homestead.
June 3: (Taliesin) Miriam storms Taliesin but is blocked at the gate.
April 19–20: (Buffalo and Derby, NY) Wright visits Darwin and Isabelle Martin to see site for their cottage.
August 31: (Chicago/Taliesin) Miriam sues Olgivanna. Wright, Olgivanna, and her two daughters go into hiding in rented bungalow, near Wayzata, MN.
September 6: (Spring Green, WI) Bank of Wisconsin forecloses on Wright’s mortgage and takes possession of Taliesin.
October 20: (Lake Minnetonka, MN) Wright arrested and charged with violation of Mann Act.
October 22: (Minneapolis) Wright and Olgivanna released from jail.
November: (Minneapolis) Wright awaits clarification of legal issues.
December: (New York) Wright and his family take refuge with Maginel Wright Barney, the architect’s sister, at 41 West 12th Street in Greenwich Village.
1927
January–May: (New York) Wright and Olgivanna rent apartment on East Ninth Street, near the Lafayette Hotel. Guthrie and Wright begin discussing plans to build a tower for St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery.
January 6–7: (New York) Auction of Wright’s Japanese print collection.
January 16: (New York) Alexander Woollcott intercedes for Olgivanna with Colonel “Wild Bill” Donovan to resolve her immigration issues.
January: (New York) Wright and Guthrie resume contact.
February 8: (New York) Elizabeth Coonley Faulkner invites Wright and Olgivanna to dinner in Greenwich Village.
March 3: (New York) Wright, Olgivanna, and Alfred Orage meet to discuss Gurdjieff. The writers e. e. cummings and John Dos Passos join the meeting.
March 4: (Minneapolis) Wright’s charges of violating Mann Act dropped.
April: (Derby, NY) Wright visits Martins’ site on Lake Erie.
Early May: (New York) Wright departs the city after his longest stay to date; returns with Olgivanna to Taliesin.
May 5: (Taliesin) Wright provides Guthrie with initial description of the tower design for St. Mark’s.
August 6: (Madison, WI) Wright, Inc. registered in Wisconsin.
August 7: (Taliesin) Wright confirms interest in working with Leerdam Glasfabriek in Holland.
August 26: Wright and Miriam divorce.
Fall: (Taliesin) Wright working alone with no draftsmen at Taliesin. Maintains contact with friends and colleagues in New York, including Guthrie, Frankl, and Woollcott.
September 13: (Taliesin) Wright provides Darwin Martin with encouraging account of Taliesin life.
October 19: (New York) Guthrie continues positioning Wright to get a formal appointment for the St. Mark’s tower commission.
October 26: (New York and Taliesin) Wright and Guthrie discuss further the Modern Cathedral project. Wright’s first sketch for it is dated February 1926.
November 12: (Milwaukee) Milwaukee Journal publishes exposé of Wright’s scandals.
November 25: (Taliesin) Wright worries the St. Mark’s tower project is doomed.
1928
January 2: (Phoenix) Albert Chase McArthur hires Wright to consult on textile-block construction for Arizona Biltmore Hotel. Discussion of St. Mark’s tower on hold.
January 13: (Spring Green, WI) Bank of Wisconsin orders Wright to leave Taliesin and insists he pay all debts or they will sell.
January–May: (Phoenix, AZ) In first visit, Wright consults on design of the Arizona Biltmore Hotel.
April 5: (Phoenix) Wright receives contract to design San Marcos in the Desert resort for Alexander Chandler.
May: (Phoenix) Wright departs, having defined concept for San Marcos resort.
May: (Spring Green, WI) Bank of Wisconsin announces plans to sell Taliesin at auction. Wright heads to La Jolla, California, for the summer.
July 30: (Spring Green, WI) Bank of Wisconsin buys Taliesin at auction for $25,000 with intention of selling it to a group of Wright’s friends.
August 25: (Rancho Santa Fe, CA) Wright and Olgivanna marry and return to Arizona.
September 27: (Phoenix) Wright departs for Wisconsin.
Early October: (Taliesin) Wright regains access to home, studio, and farm. The stability allows him to relaunch an architectural office.
November 8: (New York and Taliesin) Guthrie and Wright resume discussion of their two projects: the Modern Cathedral project for which Wright begins to produce fantastical drawings based on Guthrie’s suggestions, and the tower project for St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery. The former recedes in importance, while the latter becomes a joint obsession.
December 19: (Taliesin) Wright writes son Lloyd to encourage him and tells of progress in work and life.
December 26: (Taliesin) Wright discovers 1,500 copies of his Sonderheft and 100 sets of Wasmuth folios in his basement. He hopes to sell them for a quick profit.
December 31: (New York) Guthrie rhapsodizes on the Modern Cathedral. Wright defines his vision in drawings, three of which are extant.
1929
January 8: (New York) Guthrie informs Wright of positive movement for his commission for the St. Mark’s tower; the vestry board wants to see him in person prior to awarding the commission officially.
January 15: (Taliesin) Wright with family and crew leave for Arizona.
End of January: (Chandler, AZ) In his second extended visit to Arizona, Wright and staff begin construction of Ocatillo and work on San Marcos resort.
February 23: (Phoenix) Arizona Biltmore opens; Wright attends event.
March 3: (New York) Contempora Inc. invites Wright to speak at exhibition of work of Erich Mendelsohn.
March 4: (Phoenix) Wright resumes work on St. Mark’s tower.
Late March: (Ocatillo) Work complete on the desert camp.
May 24: (Ocatillo) Wright and family leave Arizona by car.
June 18: (New York) Wright arrives in the city to attend Contempora’s Exhibition of Art and Industry honoring his friend Erich Mendelsohn.
[c. June 20]: (New York) Wright presents Horace Holley his designs to date for the St. Mark’s tower; Guthrie is absent, on vacation.
June 22: (New York) Wright appears with architect and delineator Hugh Ferriss on WOR radio.
June 26: (Taliesin) Wright returns home after extended cross-country trip by car.
July: (Taliesin) Wright continues work on sketches for St. Mark’s tower.
September 6: (Taliesin) Wright informs Horace Holley that the St. Mark’s design is fully developed. The architect begins recording his impressions of the desert.
September 27: (New York) A. Lawrence Kocher proposes Wright exhibit his work at the Architectural League of New York.
October 11: (New York) Wright speaks at AUDAC lunch.
October 13: (New York) Wright gives Guthrie and members of the St. Mark’s vestry board a preview of the tower drawings.
October 16: (Chicago) Wright leaks word of the tower project to newspapers before it is approved, embarrassing Guthrie and Holley. News media spread the story widely. Wright returns to Taliesin for final preparation of Tower drawings.
October 19: (New York) New York Times reports on “Odd-Type Buildings” at St. Mark’s.
October 29: (New York) “Black Tuesday” as stock market crashes.
November 4: (New York) Wright gives final presentation of tower project for St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery. Timing and lack of money will doom the venture.
November 6: (Taliesin) Wright returns home and awaits word from St. Mark’s vestry board.
December: (New York) Though the plans for the St. Mark’s tower are unapproved, the architectural press begins publishing them.
December 26: (New York) Regardless of the flux on the Tower project, Horace Holley is delighted with the layouts for typography that Wright had sent for the inside pages of his magazine, World Unity.
1930
January 3: (Minneapolis, MN) Miriam Noel dies.
February 3: (Princeton, NJ) Wright receives invitation for Kahn Lectures at Princeton University; he proposes his forthcoming New York exhibition to accompany the lectures, his first traveling show.
March 21: (New York) Wright attends unspecified meetings.
April 1: (Taliesin) Wright finishes drafts of his Princeton lectures. The architect and staff work on preparing photographs and models, organizing the material for travel.
May 5: (New York) Wright stops in the city en route to Princeton.
May 6–14: (Princeton, NJ) Wright gives his Princeton lectures, published the following year as Modern Architecture: Being the Kahn Lectures.
May 12–22: (Princeton, NJ): Wright’s exhibition The Work of Frank Lloyd Wright, 1893–1930 on view at Princeton.
May 15: (New York) Wright debates Ralph Walker, who’d just returned from Germany, on modern architecture at the Architectural League of New York.
May 16: (New York) Wright has lunch with Lewis Mumford, Douglas Haskell, and Joseph Urban.
May 22: (Princeton, NJ) Wright’s exhibition closes at the university and is sent to the Architectural League of New York, arriving by May 26.
May 26: (New York) Wright plans to return before his testimonial.
May 28: (New York) The Architectural League of New York sponsors testimonial for Wright. The Work of Frank Lloyd Wright, 1893–1930 is on view.
May 29–June 12: (New York) Wright’s exhibition at Architectural League of New York is open to the public.
June 29: (New York) New York Times publishes extensive feature on Wright.
July 1: (Berlin) Heinrich de Fries publishes “Neue Pläne von Frank Lloyd Wright” [New Plans by Frank Lloyd Wright] in Die Form, the first appearance of several of Wright’s projects; American architectural editors take note.
July 19: (New York) Alexander Woollcott publishes Wright’s profile, “The Prodigal Father,” in the New Yorker. The piece provides a canonical definition of the architect.
October 1–2: (Chicago) Wright gives two public lectures at the Art Institute of Chicago; these will be published July 1931.
1931
February 23: (New York) Launching a series of lectures, Wright speaks at the Twentieth Century Club in Brooklyn, followed by speaking at the Women’s University Club in Manhattan; AUDAC, and the School of Social Research.
February 26: (New York) AUDAC organizes a meeting to protest Wright’s exclusion from the “Century of Progress”; rancor was the only result.
February 27: (New York) Guthrie declares the tower project could never be built on the St. Mark’s site; Wright persists in arguing with him.
March 7: (Eugene, OR) Wright lectures at University of Oregon in conjunction with his traveling exhibition The Work of Frank Lloyd Wright, 1893–1930.
March 12: (Seattle, WA) Wright lectures at the University of Washington with his traveling exhibition in place.
May 9–31: (Amsterdam) The Work of Frank Lloyd Wright, 1893–1930 seen at the Stedelijk Museum.
June 17–July 12: (Berlin) The Work of Frank Lloyd Wright, 1893–1930 seen at the Prussian Academy of Fine Arts.
July 13: (Grand Rapids, MI) Wright lectures at international conference on interior decoration.
September 19: (New York) Wright and Olgivanna sail to Rio de Janeiro, spending three weeks there to judge competition entries for Christopher Columbus Lighthouse.
1932
February 10: (New York) Modern Architecture, the International Style exhibition, opens at Museum of Modern Art.
February 14: (Chicago) Wright lectures to overflowing crowd at Chicago City Club.
March 23: (New York) International Style show closes in New York and begins touring the United States.
March 30: (New York) Longmans Green publishes Wright’s Autobiography; it meets with immediate critical success.
October 20: (Spring Green, WI) Taliesin Fellowship officially opens with arrival of apprentices.
1934
December 18–19: (Pittsburgh/Bear Run, PA) Wright visits site at waterfall over which he will locate Falling-water; requests a survey of the area, securing commission for the famous house.
1935
January 10: (Taliesin) Wright and Edgar J. Kaufmann confer on the design of Fallingwater.
April 15–May 15: (New York) Broadacre City model exhibited, Industrial Arts Exhibition, Rockefeller Center.
December 17 (Buffalo, NY) Darwin Martin, Wright’s friend and patron, dies.
1936
July 23 (Racine) W. F. Johnson Jr. requests that Wright proceed with plans and sketches for a $200,000 office building for S. C. Johnson & Son, Inc., launching the design for the Johnson Wax Administration Building.
1937
(Scottsdale, AZ) Wright obtains land for construction of Taliesin West, winter home of Wright, his family, and the Taliesin Fellowship.
1938
January: (New York) Architectural Forum begins promoting Wright’s work.
January 17: (New York) Time magazine puts Wright on its cover, confirming the celebratory trajectory his career will take for the next two decades.
1939
(Maricopa Mesa, AZ) After site work, construction begins on buildings for Taliesin West.
1940
November 13: (New York) Frank Lloyd Wright: American Architect exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art; it runs through January 5, 1941.
November 29: (Taliesin) Wright’s assets reorganized into the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation.
1943
June 29: (Taliesin) Wright signs contract for Guggenheim Museum.
1945
September 20: (New York) Wright presents model of Guggenheim Museum at Plaza Hotel.
1952
June 10: (Taliesin) Harold Price Sr. and building committee visit Wright to commission office tower for H. C. Price Company, Bartlesville, OK. Wright will use his design for the tower for St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery with minor modifications to create Price Tower.
1953
November 10: (Bartlesville, OK) Construction of Price Tower begins.
October 22: (New York) Traveling exhibition Sixty Years of Living Architecture: The Work of Frank Lloyd Wright, 1071 Fifth Avenue (site of Guggenheim Museum), opens in New York after touring; it runs through December 13.
December 17: (New York) Wright accepts commission to design the Beth Sholom Synagogue, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania. He will transform his Modern Cathedral for Guthrie, with a reduced scale and modifications, for the new temple.
1954
June–December: (New York) Wright and Olgivanna renovate suite in Plaza Hotel to create Taliesin East.
1955
(New York) House Beautiful promotes licensee partnerships.
1956
August 16: (New York) Construction begins on Guggenheim Museum.
June 3: (New York) Wright appears on the NBC television quiz show What’s My Line?
February 10: (Bartlesville, OK) Price Tower dedicated.
1957
May 4–12: (New York) Showcase for Better Living, International Home Building Exposition, Fiberthin Air House.
September 1 and 28: (New York) Broadcasts of Mike Wallace interviewing Wright in two-part series.
1958
May 3: (New York) Plan for Greater Baghdad exhibited at Iraqi Consulate.
October 29: (New York) Wright’s work included in International Festival of Art November 23 exhibition at Seagram Building.
1959
January 27: (New York) Wright’s last visit to the Plaza Hotel, his final view of Gotham.
April 9: (Phoenix, AZ) Wright dies, two months short of his ninety-second birthday.
June 9: (New York) Traveling exhibition, Form Givers at Mid-Century, at Metropolitan Museum of Art, through September 6.
September 20: (Elkins Park, PA) Beth Sholom Synagogue dedicated.
October 21: (New York) Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum opens to the public.
Chronology
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