August 25, 2026 • 44 mins
Frank Lloyd Wright is one of the world's most well-known, storied (ha) architects. Several of his works are official UNESCO World Heritage Sites, and he has undeniably influenced countless architects in the modern day. However, as Ben, Noel, and Max learn in the first part of this special two-part series, Frank's massive professional success came with a dark side: accusations of cult activity, scandalous affairs, and even mass murder.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
much for tuning in. Let's hear it from the band
The Myth Legend, our super producer, Max Guggenheim, williams.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Oh Man, I love I love the Goog. Dude, what
a cool building? Is that a Frank Lloyd Wright?
Speaker 1 (00:44):
It is? It is the Gougenheim Museum is one of
Frank's masterpieces that has been designated as a UNESCO World
Heritage Site. You're Noe Brown, I am Ben Bolan. Yeah,
and we are. We are diving into the story of
a guy named Frank Lloyd Wright. Even if you're not
(01:07):
an architecture buff or an architect yourself, guys, I would
say it's it's safe to assume most people have heard
this name.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Yeah, he's kind of you know, it's like if you
know two opera singers. You know, it's the same with
with with architects. There's maybe, like I am pay perhaps
Frank Lloyd Wright it's probably up there as well. But
back to the Goog. I just want to say really quickly,
I love how revered that site is and that it's
on the UNESCO World Heritage List, but it's also like
(01:38):
the weirdest of the mainstream museums in New York City. Like,
you can guarantee if you go in there, you're gonna
see some some real odd stuff bordering on pretentious but
oftentimes just straddling the line enough to be awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Yeah, pretentious and genius. There's a heck of a then
diagram there, and rank Lloyd Wright was definitely dancing in
the center of that map. Over a career spanning something
like seventy years, this guy literally designed some of the
most influential structures on the planet. And he made more
(02:14):
than a thousand different designs. And even though we're not architects,
that that sounds like a lot of buildings, right.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
I thought you were for a second, say, And he
made more than a thousand dollars he did make out
the course of his career. Yeah, inflation calculator anyone, No, No,
A thousand designs or were these all executed?
Speaker 1 (02:38):
That's a good question. We know that there was a
lot of stuff that would have been left on the
drawing board, and there were a lot of things that
maybe his disciples made under his influence. So the question becomes,
do we count those as part of his uvuh?
Speaker 2 (02:54):
But can we just also acknowledge that back to the
drawing board never really occurred to me to think of it.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
Literally.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
It's one of those things that just gets thrown around
so much, kind of an architecture expression.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
Oh yeah, yeah, I think you're right about that. Yeah,
and it still it just sounds better than back to
the drafting table, back to the future, right right. Look,
this guy, Frank a very controversial, divisive figure. He's inarguably
a genius, and don't worry, he would tell you that himself.
(03:24):
But one thing that we learned in the course of
researching this two part series is that there was a
heck of a dark side to his fame. He had
a life of personal scandal, professional controversy, and folks, even
a mass murder.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Ooh okay, all right. Oh and also a lot of
people might be on the side of history that casts
this fella as a bit of a cult leader.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, let's get into it. We're gonna
meet Frank. Folks. He is born in Richland Center, Wisconsin.
It's June eighth, eighteen sixty seven, and he's got a
really interesting background. His father is a musician and a
(04:15):
Christian preacher and travels a lot, and his mother, Anna
Lloyd Jones, is a teacher who's super into her Welsh heritage.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Yeah, and because of his father's career in the ministry,
the family traveled alongside him. Sounds like kind of tent
revival kind of stuff. We're talking the eighteen hundreds. I mean,
that seems like that's the kind of an itinerant preacher perhaps,
isn't that the word?
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Yeah? Definitely, definitely a nomadic lifestyle, right, because what we said.
Frank is born in eighteen sixty seven, and from there
to for the next several years, his family moves through
Rhode Island in Iowa, the Massachusetts and it's not until
eighteen seventy eight that they finally settled down permanently in Madison, Wisconsin.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
Madison, Wisconsin, I think that's kind of the ultimate metro
area of Wisconsin. And it ain't that metro. Madison's were
a University of Wisconsin is too, the college is college metro.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Yeah, I got a buddy moved up there recently.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
I guess I can't readily come up with another city
in Wisconsin off the top. Walking at Dome. Oh, Milwaukee's sorry,
thank you Milwaukee is definitely the most metro and uh
and is giving Wayne's World, Alice Cooper concert Vibes and
Richland Center, Wisconsin, of course, which we totally knew about
before researching this episode. No, no, no, no, not I
(05:40):
but I know you were being facetious. But you know,
as you can imagine, the life of a traveling preacher
was neither a particularly a money making good situation or
particularly glamorous.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
As a result, the Right family often lived lean. Things
did not get better when his parents the war. And
we have to remember, like you said, Noel, this is
still the eighteen hundred, So getting divorced in general is
pretty contentious, right, pretty controversial. They get divorced. It's eighteen
eighty five and Frank is eighteen years old. He has
(06:17):
a situation that a lot of people find themselves in
even today, where he has to do his best to
financially support his family. Right, So he takes a job
at the University of Wisconsin, which Max just mentioned, and
while he's there, he works for the dean of the
Department of Engineering. At the same time he's studying at
(06:39):
the university. But according to his later biographers, he was
one of those kids who always knew what he wanted
to do, Like he always wanted to be an architect.
Indeed he did, and what he wanted to be was
an architect. So in eighteen eighty seven, he pulled up
his proverbial tent stakes and headed out to Chicago, out east,
(07:03):
out midwest. I don't know what you'd call that, already
a well known spots, sort of a hot spot, a
bit of a mecca of the architectural scene. And while
he's there, he works for a couple of different firms.
Eventually he lands a job with an outfit called Adler
and Sullivan. This is a huge win for him. For
six years he is working directly under the legendary Louis
(07:27):
Sullivan himself. So it's kind of like it's kind of
like getting a job at Apple and working directly for
Steve Jobs or Steven Apple. Yeah right, Tim Apple. Sorry, Yeah,
he's also he's also he's still a young guy as
all this is happening. He is just twenty two years
(07:50):
old when he ties the knot, and this is eighteen
eighty nine. He marries someone named Catherine Lee Tobin, who
is conventionally known to her friends as Kitty, and so
you'll see her described as Kitty. Right, this is his
first wife, and he's right now, he's got a vast
(08:11):
horizon of possibility before him, and he says, you know, Kitty,
I love you. I love that we're getting married. I
can't wait for us to live together. But I also
love architecture. I want to build the house that we
live in. We just don't have. All we need is money.
We just need a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
And Ben, this is reminding me of I actually just
over the week and watched I can't remember the name
of the series or what platform it's on, so it's
not mega helpful. But this dude, who was clearly frank
Lloyd Wright inspired, this guy Robert O'shatz, designed himself this
incredible like upside down kind of funnel shaped like tree
(08:52):
home off the side of a cliff there in Oregon,
kind of more of a rural area, and it was
very frankly right inspired, and you know, really kind of
got me even before I knew we were doing this episode,
thinking about how interesting and specific the art of architecture
is and how it's like such a neat synthesis of
aesthetics and function.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
That's so cool. Yeah. One of my favorite quotations about
architecture is the following. I can't remember who said it,
but they essentially said architecture is frozen music. And that's
such a beautiful way to think of it, and I
think Frank would agree. He may have even been the
guy who made that quote. So apologies if you're listening
(09:35):
Frank somehow out there in the ether. We do have
good news for young Kitty and young Frank at this point,
because Frank's mentor, Louis Sullivan, is such a big deal
and so well healed. He goes to Frank and he says, hey, kid,
I'll help you out with a loan, and I'm happy
(09:56):
to give you the money pay me back when you can.
The only coveat here will be that you have to
agree to work under me directly for five years, which
is really cool because again, in our earlier comparison, that's
like going that's like working into Apple going to Steve
Jobs and saying, hey, will you help me? Will you
(10:18):
basically buy me a house? And then Steve goes, oh, yeah, sure, man,
you just have to work at this wonderful job for five.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
Years, right, And you know, we talked about this, I
think recently on stuff that it wants you to know
just about how you know, with the advent of automation
or the I guess further it exponential spread of automation
and AI, things like apprenticeship programs and sort of more
journeyman kind of craftsmen, things are not what they used
(10:46):
to be. This is exactly the example of this at
its best, right and at its highest level.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Yeah, yeah, this is a good one, right, and I
love that comparison. For a while, Kitty and Frank are
seeing their dreams come true, but they also soon find
themselves with a total of like six kids. They eventually
have six kids together. And so again, just like in
his childhood, Frank is facing serious financial concerns and this
(11:16):
drives him to moonlight. He starts accepting independent commissions to
design houses outside of his contract agreement with his mentor.
And if we want to contextualize that in the modern day,
Nolan Max, I think we've all done a little bit
of like call it consulting or maybe writing or editing
(11:39):
or making music or producing for shows that friends do.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Right, Like, we've all done that and I also think
I'm certain in fact, that all three of us worked
on a mentorship program we had here at iHeart, you know,
for up and coming podcasters, helping folks on the development
side and you know, production side with Max and all
of that kind of stuff. And it's really nice. It's
a nice thing to be able to do, and it's
easy to take for granted, like just through experience alone,
(12:06):
how much shareable wisdom one can kind of amass, you know,
And you don't really notice sometimes until you're talking to
someone who hasn't been in it like you have, and
then you realize, wait a minute, I gotta know a
thing or two about this architecture game. And of course
you know the architecture of podcasting.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Yeah, I like that. That's so accurate. And folks, we
are the opposite of arrogant people. So the way I
always like to put it in those situations is not
in such a new medium, nobody is really the We
don't have a Frank Lloyd rite of podcasting yet, but
(12:44):
we have guys like us who have had the opportunity
to make most of the imaginable mistakes. So we like
to help people avoid, you know, like learn from our mistakes,
we like to help you avoid them. And also I
want to give on that point, I want to give
Max a special shout out here. Max, your work with
Next Up has just been phenomenal.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
So think that was the name of the program. Yeah,
Max did way more of these than we did, but
I know Ben and I did a few, and it's
super fun and super rewarding and a great thing to
be able to do. And Frank was benefiting from this obviously,
this mentor saw in him not only promise but potentially
(13:26):
like maybe not a cash cow, but he I think
he did see ways that he could benefit from this relationship,
knowing that Frank was a wonder kin I guess as
they called him.
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Oh yeah, yeah, that's the perfect phrase for it. Unfortunately,
this situation, this padawan situation, didn't end well because yeah,
Frank likely saw these this moonlighting, these extra contracts as
just a little bit more cheddar from a side hustle.
What's wrong with that? Well, Louis Sullivan found out and
(13:59):
he was livid, like he was pissed, and he was I'm.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Saying right, he was trying to lock that down. You know,
He's like, you are my guy, you know, Yeah, so
he was really happy.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Was not happy. He felt this was a breach not
just of their contract, but of their actual friendship. We
still don't know whether Frank resigned or whether he was fired,
but this disagreement, this perceived betrayal, caused a beef that
would last almost twenty years.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
Man, he gotta squash the beef, guys, not worth it,
not worth it. Luckily, Frank saw an opportunity in all
of this nastiness. In eighteen ninety three, he what do
they call it, Ben, hung up his own shingle. Yeah, yeah, yes,
opened his own office and started designing homes that he
felt had a connection to the regional sort of spirit
(14:52):
of the American prairie. So he was already from the
start really thinking not form over function, but like he
was a very form formal guy, you know, he was
trying to like connect structures with the spirit of the
place in which they were, you know, located.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
That's a great way to say it. Yeah, it's very
much a matter of esthetic and philosophy more so than
like it's it's asking the question not just how does
a person exist in this building, but how does this
building exist on the land?
Speaker 2 (15:26):
You know, And this is no ding to more you know,
straightforward types of builders or contractors or whatever. But that's
not quite You have to have an architect in the
situation is to like, you know, have the plans approved
for code and all of that. But I think when
we think architect now, in our mind's eye, we picture
something a little more flashy and you know, personal, like
(15:47):
the work of Frankloyd.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Right, absolutely, yeah, man, like the I love that point
because one of my neighbors is a is an architect,
and his specialization is entirely windows. Like he lives, breathes,
and eats and sleeps windows, and I love talking to
the guy. I think we all see a little bit
(16:11):
of magic, a little bit of wizardry in the craft
of architecture in that discipline, and a lot of that perception, honestly,
in the modern day comes from people like Frank Lloyd. Right,
He's not just building buildings, He's making statements about the
world around us. Okay, maybe we're being too nice to
the guy. You'll see why. I'm walking that back his
(16:35):
new office, like you're saying, his new office, once it opens,
it starts getting commissions. He's beaten the streets, you know,
he's shaking the hands, kissing the babies, networking. This leads
to a deal to design a house for a guy
named W. H. Winslow. And as we've mentioned previously, we
do have a bit of a stereotype often, folks. When Noel,
(16:58):
Max and I here an historical name with two initials
and then a surname, we assume the guy's rich.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Great, Okay, Yeah, it's got a bit of a hoy
toity quality to it.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Yes, And this, luckily for Frank, this new house design,
his very first job at the at the new office,
is a hit. It makes serious waves, and it grabs
the eye of another guy, another architect named Daniel Burnham.
This is like another Steve Jobs. He is the He
(17:34):
is acknowledged at the time as the most influential architect
in all of.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Chicago, which is architect city for Franks and purposes. Right,
so this is the guy for a moner of comparison
that you draw Ben as a hip hop head, it's
like making your first hip hop album and all of
a sudden, Doctor dre and Eminem you know, do a
conference call at.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
You right right, that'd be intimidating. Also, yeah, we don't
not everybody loves drade Em and m but you know,
picture whomever you're thinking about in that meal you yeah, uh, okay.
So what we're saying is Burnham feels he is discovered,
like you said, no avunder Kidd, once in a generation talent.
And this guy Burnham pitches a deal to Frank and
(18:18):
it's another crazy cool idea from a mentor. He says, Look, man,
I will subsidize your life for years. I will be
your patron so long as you agree to go study
in Europe and then come back with that knowledge and
become the principal designer in my firm.
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Okay, so not it's got a different flavor than his
previous opportunity where this guy still wants to lock him down,
but boy is he sweetening the deal. And I think
maybe now Frank has learned his lesson and knows that, Okay,
maybe if I go through with this, I can get
this crazy level of education and then all so be
working for the best firm. It's going to allow me
(19:02):
to do exactly what I want to do and I'm
not going to have to seek these side jobs and
maybe you know, hurt my new besties feelings.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Yeah, that would be a reasonable assumption. And I think
that's safe to say. That's what you and I and
probably Max would do. It's such a great offer. I'll
pay for everything. Oh you go on vacation to Europe.
I'll pay for that too, and then come be my
best boy, my right hand man. Get this though, folks,
Frank says, nah.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
What Yeah, he doesn't do it, Okay, So he knows
what he's worth. He knows at this point. Maybe the
lesson he actually learned from his previous mentorship was more like,
I don't need anybody, man, I.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Got maybe yeah, and maybe you know, not to read
the tea leaves of personality too much here. But maybe
he was responding with that in that way because training
in Europe would mean he's studying established architecture ah and
not doing his own thing.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
Yes, exactly. He was already thinking several steps ahead to
his own unique school of architecture of something that is
entirely American that is now known as you can imagine
with what we described earlier as the Prairie school, which
is so funny, Ben, because when I think of the Prairie,
I think of like little house on you know, like
(20:31):
very non ostentatious kind of stuff. And I guess that
is what makes his work interesting, because it is somehow
simultaneously grand and austere at the same time. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
And you can read some great in depth descriptions of
the Prairie School, and I think there's room for grand
and austere here because they have this. They eventually cultivate
this radical approach for making modern homes with mass produced
materials and equipment, and they have a lot of open
(21:06):
spaces like the Dixie Chicks. You know the prayer, understand
the reference, but I believe you the song wide Open
Spaces by the Time is a song.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
I'm not familiar with the work of the Chicks.
Speaker 1 (21:17):
It's the only one I know. Oh that's right, they're
just the Chicks. Now we're getting old, bro. But yes,
this guy is turning down the status quo in the
coxotic pursuit of a new way of building. And by
nineteen hundred his bet on himself pays off. The style
is established, it's immensely popular. Frank is only thirty three
(21:41):
years old at this time. He is the main character
of this new architectural revolution.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Yeah, I mean he had the chops man in the
space of just ten years from nineteen hundred and nineteen ten,
he built around fifty of these prairie style homes. He
also became a lecturer. Dajure in his particular field, did
a little bit of a tinorant, traveling himself a lot
like his father, only he was definitely getting paid, no
question about it. His work was featured in exhibitions. His
(22:14):
firm tackled more than just standalone houses, as you can imagine.
Of course, that's where his legacy is headache. They built
everything from apartment buildings to group dwellings to rec centers,
businesses and churches.
Speaker 1 (22:29):
We should also mention what we're talking about, traveling widely.
He is a globe trotter. In nineteen five he went
to Japan, and honestly he became kind of a wiya boo.
Check out that term if you don't know what it means, folks.
But he had always cited Japanese wood block prints as
(22:51):
one of his big aesthetic influences, and when he traveled
to Japan for the first few times he called it
he was not at all hesitant with his praise. He really,
what do we call it today? He glazed Japan. He
said this is the most romantic, artistic, nature inspired country
on earth. It was hugely important to go, so he
(23:14):
went there again in nineteen thirteen. He spent almost three
years there from nineteen seventeen to nineteen twenty two, building
something called the New Imperial Hotel in Tokyo. And the
whole time, every time he traveled to Japan, even when
he was back in the States, he was always aggressively
collecting screens and textiles and pottery and sculptures from Japan,
(23:38):
and then he would later incorporate these as kind of
easter eggs in his architectural spaces because the Japanese style
of architecture, I think really spoke to his own values
and perspective.
Speaker 2 (23:52):
Well, it makes perfect sense. I mean, this is a
culture steeped in esthetics mixed with function, you know, and
remains so to this day. I mean, they've got they've
certainly got a lot on us here in the States
in terms of just their city planning, incorporating all of
these gorgeous temples into city scapes and you know, more
(24:15):
urban environments, not to mention just the practical nature of
their rails, their their travel, and the way it's all
kind of perfectly integrated into the big picture of what
it's like to live in a city, of course, which
I think is what he's talking about and probably most admiring.
But of course in the villages as well, you have
(24:36):
more carkening back to those kind of early days of
Japanese you know, homes and structures like the sliding doors
and the kind of matted floors and things like that,
all very much designed it to be efficient, energy efficient,
all of that stuff they had it on lock.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
Oh. Yeah, and this all sounds great, right.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Folks can also point out to Ben it would have
taken him almost a month to get from the East
coast of the United States to Japan. In those days,
he would have had to take a train from Chicago
all the way to San Francisco. So now we're talking
even longer of a time, probably than a month, and
then take a steamer from the coast to Japan. So yeah,
we're talking about a month's time one way.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Which is crazy because now you can do it in
a day, depending on where you live in the States.
So it is it is great, These are grand adventures,
but folks, we have to remember, despite acknowledging the man's genius,
we also mentioned controversy, and as so often happens with
larger than life figures, his meteor like rise in his
(25:41):
professional career occurs in step with sharp and horrible declines
in his personal life. Like we said, he married young
who is only twenty two. Fast forward to nineteen oh three,
He's designing a house for a married guy named Edwin Cheney,
who is a neighbor of his in the in the
(26:02):
Oak Park area of Chicago, and he meets Edwin's wife,
a lady named Martha Borthwick Cheney or Mama with an
H at the end to her.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Friends, Mama, Mama Cheney, Martha Borthwick Cheney, or Mama to
her friends. As he said, Ben was a kind of
an early feminist and right viewed her in a very
progressive way of of looking at women at the time,
as his intellectual equal. Their relationship became the talk of
(26:34):
the town. They could often be seen taking rides together
and writes automobile through Oak.
Speaker 1 (26:41):
Park without their respective spouses, without a chaperone, without a
without I don't know why I'm talking, like they were
in Kentucky or something like that. I Yeah, Frank's marriage
has been drifting for a while he is estranged from
his wife Kitty, and in nineteen oh nine or by
(27:02):
nineteen oh nine, his budding dalliance with Mama Cheney was
increasingly difficult to ignore. These two folks actually ditched their
spouses and their children and high tailed it off to Europe.
This is a crazy scandal, and they both ask their
spouses for a divorce. Mama's husband, Edwin, grants her a
(27:26):
divorce and, actually, speaking of strange for the time, he
gets custody of the children. But Frank's wife, Catherine Kiddie
Right refuses. She says, I'm not going to agree to
a divorce. You're crazy. We have six kids. What are
you doing in Europe? They knew that while they were
(27:46):
in Europe they had another series of adventures that may
be a different episode, but they knew the entire time
that this was a temporary escape for them. If they
returned back to Chicago, they would not be able to
weather the serious scandal that would ensue. Their affair was
(28:08):
already generating a lot of ill will in high society,
and it's the stuff that could negatively impact Frank's career,
so to put it simply, and a little undiplomatically. Nobody
wanted to work with a guy they thought was a scumbag.
Nobody wanted to a lithario right with someone they found
(28:31):
morally objectionable. And we also have to remember that when
we're talking about his clients, we are talking about well
to do people. It's there's a certain financial threshold required
to say, build for me a building.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
Well not to mention that these circles of the super
wealthy in a place like Chicago are pretty tight, and
people talk crap and you can very quickly be ostracized
and cast out of these social circles. Rich people be caddy.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
Yes, And we also have to remember that whenever some
even before the Internet, folks, whenever somebody gets very famous
or very prominent very quickly, there's always a contingent of
the public that wants to tear them.
Speaker 2 (29:18):
Down, cut them down to size, take them down a
few pegs, get them off there high. It would be
an architectural version of a horse podium column. Yeah, there
you got, And that's just what happened, more or less.
But you know again, Lloyd at this point was kind
of doing the more basic version of what ultimately became
(29:42):
his kind of like you know, I'm the one who
who decides what I build, and I'm gonna build things
for the sake of like leaving a lasting impression, like
the Pyramids of Old, you know that kind of stuff.
Not so much I'm gonna build a house on contract,
Like what am I gonna build that's gonna be one
of the great wonders of the world or as we
(30:02):
mentioned earlier on in ESCO World Heritage site.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
Yeah. Absolutely, So they try to address this scandal, and
they go into kind of a pr move and a
bit of a conspiracy. So Frank returns to the United
States in October of nineteen ten, and he's ostensibly traveling alone.
He comes back by himself, and he temporarily reconciles with
(30:28):
his estranged wife Kitty. This is probably at least in
part to improve his public image, as he said, in
that tightly knit high society. But the entire time he
has a secret plan. He goes to his mom and says, Mama,
not my mistress but my actual mother. Wi Ye, mother,
(30:48):
will you will you put your name on some land
on a deed for me in spring Green, Wisconsin And
this is near where his family has lived.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
Bro is this like a Disney kind of like Florida
Project situation where he's trying to, you know, get people
off his trail, where he's trying to do something in
secret by putting his mom's name on it so that
he's not tied to I'm sorry, i don't know this
part of the story, so I'm on the edge of
my seat.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
Yeah, it's exactly. It's eerily similar to that. You nailed it.
He's trying to get people off his trail because putting
the property in his mother's name helps him avoid too
much public attention. Right, He'll still have a Chicago office,
but he'll spend more time away and at this at
the very same time that he is reconciling with his wife, Kittie, Right,
(31:40):
he's also working to get funding for a house who
wants to build on this land at Spring Green, and
he's building it to be a studio, right, a meditative concentration,
concentration spot for him. But it's also a place he
can still live with his mistress, Mama Cheney, without reporters.
Speaker 2 (32:01):
Finding out he's being a le Yeah, he's making some
money moves. That's just sick. Yeah, gosh, he has a
bit of a Rascal.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Yeah, and he This land purchase goes through on April tenth,
nineteen eleven, and it's right next to land that his
mom's family, the Lloyd Jones, is already owned. Right, starts
building himself this new home and he calls it talison
t A l I E s I n taliesan.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
Uh. This cult has giving talisman. You know, it's giving
mystical wizardry. I don't know why.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Yeah, it's a It's that's perfect. It is a mystical
wizard like name. It means shining brow in Welsh. Remember
his mom's family is Welsh, and the name refers to
an old school Welsh bard, poet, magician and priest.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
What a magician and those things seem diametrically opposed.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Can you be a magician priest?
Speaker 2 (33:13):
I guess it depends on what your priesting? You know? Yeah,
this is why I get.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I guess it depends on what game you're playing. But
you can multi class.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
That's eric. I love where this story is going. Then
this is a lot of this is very new to me.
So I'm guessing we're inching towards the aforementioned promise of
cult activity.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Oh yeah, that's We're going to get there, Volts, even
if it takes us the rest.
Speaker 2 (33:38):
Of the week for a second episode. Even yeah, that's
what you're in bying the rest of the week. I
got you, I got you.
Speaker 1 (33:45):
So this home eventually it's going to become a commune.
Uh Now it's officially known as the Talison Fellowship, Talisan
North or Talisan Spring Green. It's a beautiful how studio
custom built on and what ultimately becomes more than five
hundred acres, And it's really clever because the main compound
(34:09):
is itself a testament to the Prairie School. It's an
advertisement for Frank's design philosophies. So he abandons his wife
again and the six kids again. He shacks up with
his mistress. She is now going by Mama Borthwick post divorce.
Right she gets there that summer, she tries to throw
(34:29):
the heat off too by letting it be unofficially known
quote unquote that she's living with Wright's sister, with Frank
Wright's sister. But Frank is, for better or worse, pretty
much a celebrity. People want to know what he's doing.
TMZ is not in play yet, but people still have
that instinct. So word gets around, Yeah, gets around. He's
(34:52):
still with his mistress.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
Well he's also yeah, yes, that's right. And Ben, would
you say this is he's building a bit of a
cult of personality at the very least by this point
he's making a splash, both with his work and his
idiosyncratic behavior.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Absolutely, yes, very much. So we're laying the bones for
that conversation about about cultiness and tragedy. We know that
one reporter from the Chicago Examiner figured out that Frank
and Mama were living together again over there in Wisconsin,
and literally on Christmas Eve of that same year, the
(35:33):
Chicago Tribune revealed the truth about Talison to the world,
and they didn't care about this fancy, you know, somewhat
high fluting Welsh name and heritage and all that. Instead
they called this Frank's love cottage. It's Castle of Love.
So he's forty seven, and again he is in hot water,
but he and Mama feel like they're past the point
(35:54):
of return. You know, they're already living there.
Speaker 2 (35:57):
So if they were going to have to live a
life of social exile, they were able to kind of
have it on their terms. You know. Talisan was definitely
not the worst place for them to do that. They
had everything they need. Talisan is primarily referred to in
three big Stages of construction because over the course of
rights occupancy, two major fires led to the need for
(36:21):
significant restorations and which also probably led to some alterations
of the previous designs. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:28):
Yeah, and even Frank didn't get everything right every time.
There were some things he designed that were beautiful that
that just didn't work. They weren't super practical even if
they were beautiful. But think of it like Talson. One
has best thought of as three big sections. There's a
long section to the east that's the residential wing where
(36:49):
Frank and Mama lived. There's a big section on the
west that's the agricultural wing. And then there's an office
wing connecting the other sections, or I should say, like
the business wing and then the office wing or the
studio wing and the office wing. There's a courtyard to
the southwest. There's stables, there's a garage, there's servants quarters,
maintenance facilities, and as soon as they move in, Frank says,
(37:14):
all right, I'm getting back in the swing of things
with this architecture stuff. I'm still really about that. But
due to this negative publicity from the affair. There are
still people like you would call them draftsmen who come
to study under him, but high society still doesn't really
want to work with this guy.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
Would he have been independently wealthy at this point too,
And I mean it seems like he wasn't needing cash money,
you know, to take these gigs, like he was sort
of focusing on building this compound for himself. So he
had to have had some independence at this point.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah, he was making he was making a living, right,
but he was not I don't believe at this point
was he was at the juncture where he could just retire.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
He still had but he had some flexibility because he
certainly didn't seem like he was not able to pursue
this project because it didn't have enough cash coming in.
But he also wasn't doing tons of these more traditional
gigs because of the fact that he had kind of
been shunned.
Speaker 1 (38:16):
Yeah, and his stature in the architectural community is indeed
a currency all its own. So there were still at
this point. Even then, even early on, there were people
who said, yeah, I know about this scandal, but being
associated with this man's legendary work is more than worth
(38:36):
the social backlash to me. So he had a lot
of disciples showing up, a lot of employees. Local residents
did not agree. This was the big scandal of the
small town. They didn't Soup's dupes appreciate their new neighbors.
We have a statement from the superintendent of Iowa County Schools,
who I guess was a moral authority of the time. Yeah,
(39:00):
and so okay, this is like where's joh rule? But
the superintendent of the schools.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
We must know where he falls on this issue.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
Yes, right said. The scandal is bound to out a
demoralizing effect on the school children of the community. It
is an outrage to allow young men and women, and
boys and girls to grow up in the belief that
a man and a woman can go disregard the marriage bonds.
Living in sin. They didn't say living in sin. We
said that last part.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
We did. Yes, we did, indeed living in sin at
the Love Shack, Baby, Love Shack.
Speaker 1 (39:34):
Yeah. And this did not This did not get to
Frank and Mama. At least they did not leave town.
They stood up against the social opprobrium, and when they
refused to leave, some of the more moralistic locals even
went to the town sheriff and said, you've got to
(39:54):
arrest this Frank guy. And the sheriff said, for what
they were like, he's a jerk. Uh. It didn't work, spoiler,
and Frank wasn't cowed. In fact, he doubled out. I
think I would find this pretty interesting.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
Phenomenal dude. This quote is so indicative of where he
was at in terms of his opinion about himself.
Speaker 1 (40:15):
He had some hard, hot and I will say condescending takes.
Can you give it to us? Oh?
Speaker 2 (40:20):
I would love to. He said two women were necessary
for a man of artistic mind, one to be the
mother of his children and the other to be his
mental companion, his inspiration and soulmate. Well, you see, the
world might could be the same person. It's possible. I
(40:42):
don't now. Look, I'm no traditionalist by any shirts of
the imagination, and you know, love is love, but it's
an odd way of putting it, especially with the one
needing to be the mother of his child, the implication
being that that person couldn't possibly have the qualities of
the other. He is inherently like misogynists, Yes, very much so.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
And also the condescension of a man of artistic mind, right, Like,
it's okay for the dumbs and the pores to do
whatever they want, but I'm above it. He also he
had all these problematic quotes. He told another reporter. Laws
and rules are made for the average. The ordinary man
(41:26):
cannot live without rules to guide his conduct. It is
infinitely more difficult to live without rules. But that is
what the really honest, sincere thinking man is compelled to do.
Wank wank, wank. What a dick?
Speaker 2 (41:43):
Yeah, he's a dick, but he was also genius. And yeah,
there's a Venn diagram of dicks and geniuses. When you can,
you can quote me on them. So not only was
he not apologetic or contrite in the slightest, he seemed
pretty sure that he was in a rarefied air, floating
above whatever traditional society expected of him or considered moral,
(42:09):
and didn't have a problem coming off as you know,
heavy handed, high minded, condescending in his quotes.
Speaker 1 (42:18):
Yeah, yeah, it's definitely got some holier than now vibes.
And the thing is, though, even though even though it
was difficult for him to get commissions, and even though
he was maybe not working as much as he wanted to,
what he did create during this period made the history books,
(42:39):
things like the Midway Gardens in Chicago and the Avery
Coonley Playhouse in Riverside, Illinois. Oh and also at the
same time, he keeps on collecting this Japanese art so
much so that he becomes separate from architecture. He becomes
kind of famous as an authority on Japanese art.
Speaker 2 (42:59):
Makes sense. There's been a lot written about this period
of you know Right's life and this first version of Tolisin,
and it's definitely worth checking out onto itself. For a
time though, it seemed that Frank and Mama we're going
to be able to live out their lives in relative,
(43:20):
if isolated peace. That is, until the fire.
Speaker 1 (43:28):
That's our cliffhanger. Folks are so proud of ourselves for
doing a two Parker on purpose. This is part one
of Frank Lloyd Wright Wright's dark Side from colts to
mass murders. Please check out our second episode coming out
later this week. That this is the one where we
(43:49):
have the big plot twist in the turn. But honestly, no,
we couldn't think of a better cliffhanger.
Speaker 2 (43:54):
The fire.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
Big thanks to our super producer Max Blaze, and Saddles. Williams.
Fire just was on my mind with that one.
Speaker 2 (44:03):
Max blazed in the days, Williams, Here we go big
thanks to aj Bahamas, Jacob's big big thanks for rude
Dudes of ridiculous crime.
Speaker 1 (44:13):
Who else, who else?
Speaker 2 (44:14):
Chris hasiotas the names, Jeff Coats here in spirits wherever
they may roam, Rachel Bigxminish Lance, the Doctor of Underwater Explosions, Yes.
Speaker 1 (44:24):
Ed of course, A tepid how do you do to
Jonathan Strickland aka the Quister?
Speaker 2 (44:30):
A passive aggressive doffing of the cap. Hey, we'll see
you next time, folks for Part two. For more podcasts
from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to your favorite shows,
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
much for tuning in. Let's hear it from the band
The Myth Legend, our super producer, Max Guggenheim, williams.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Oh Man, I love I love the Goog. Dude, what
a cool building? Is that a Frank Lloyd Wright?
Speaker 1 (00:44):
It is? It is the Gougenheim Museum is one of
Frank's masterpieces that has been designated as a UNESCO World
Heritage Site. You're Noe Brown, I am Ben Bolan. Yeah,
and we are. We are diving into the story of
a guy named Frank Lloyd Wright. Even if you're not
(01:07):
an architecture buff or an architect yourself, guys, I would
say it's it's safe to assume most people have heard
this name.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Yeah, he's kind of you know, it's like if you
know two opera singers. You know, it's the same with
with with architects. There's maybe, like I am pay perhaps
Frank Lloyd Wright it's probably up there as well. But
back to the Goog. I just want to say really quickly,
I love how revered that site is and that it's
on the UNESCO World Heritage List, but it's also like
(01:38):
the weirdest of the mainstream museums in New York City. Like,
you can guarantee if you go in there, you're gonna
see some some real odd stuff bordering on pretentious but
oftentimes just straddling the line enough to be awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Yeah, pretentious and genius. There's a heck of a then
diagram there, and rank Lloyd Wright was definitely dancing in
the center of that map. Over a career spanning something
like seventy years, this guy literally designed some of the
most influential structures on the planet. And he made more
(02:14):
than a thousand different designs. And even though we're not architects,
that that sounds like a lot of buildings, right.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
I thought you were for a second, say, And he
made more than a thousand dollars he did make out
the course of his career. Yeah, inflation calculator anyone, No, No,
A thousand designs or were these all executed?
Speaker 1 (02:38):
That's a good question. We know that there was a
lot of stuff that would have been left on the
drawing board, and there were a lot of things that
maybe his disciples made under his influence. So the question becomes,
do we count those as part of his uvuh?
Speaker 2 (02:54):
But can we just also acknowledge that back to the
drawing board never really occurred to me to think of it.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
Literally.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
It's one of those things that just gets thrown around
so much, kind of an architecture expression.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
Oh yeah, yeah, I think you're right about that. Yeah,
and it still it just sounds better than back to
the drafting table, back to the future, right right. Look,
this guy, Frank a very controversial, divisive figure. He's inarguably
a genius, and don't worry, he would tell you that himself.
(03:24):
But one thing that we learned in the course of
researching this two part series is that there was a
heck of a dark side to his fame. He had
a life of personal scandal, professional controversy, and folks, even
a mass murder.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Ooh okay, all right. Oh and also a lot of
people might be on the side of history that casts
this fella as a bit of a cult leader.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, let's get into it. We're gonna
meet Frank. Folks. He is born in Richland Center, Wisconsin.
It's June eighth, eighteen sixty seven, and he's got a
really interesting background. His father is a musician and a
(04:15):
Christian preacher and travels a lot, and his mother, Anna
Lloyd Jones, is a teacher who's super into her Welsh heritage.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Yeah, and because of his father's career in the ministry,
the family traveled alongside him. Sounds like kind of tent
revival kind of stuff. We're talking the eighteen hundreds. I mean,
that seems like that's the kind of an itinerant preacher perhaps,
isn't that the word?
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Yeah? Definitely, definitely a nomadic lifestyle, right, because what we said.
Frank is born in eighteen sixty seven, and from there
to for the next several years, his family moves through
Rhode Island in Iowa, the Massachusetts and it's not until
eighteen seventy eight that they finally settled down permanently in Madison, Wisconsin.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
Madison, Wisconsin, I think that's kind of the ultimate metro
area of Wisconsin. And it ain't that metro. Madison's were
a University of Wisconsin is too, the college is college metro.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Yeah, I got a buddy moved up there recently.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
I guess I can't readily come up with another city
in Wisconsin off the top. Walking at Dome. Oh, Milwaukee's sorry,
thank you Milwaukee is definitely the most metro and uh
and is giving Wayne's World, Alice Cooper concert Vibes and
Richland Center, Wisconsin, of course, which we totally knew about
before researching this episode. No, no, no, no, not I
(05:40):
but I know you were being facetious. But you know,
as you can imagine, the life of a traveling preacher
was neither a particularly a money making good situation or
particularly glamorous.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
As a result, the Right family often lived lean. Things
did not get better when his parents the war. And
we have to remember, like you said, Noel, this is
still the eighteen hundred, So getting divorced in general is
pretty contentious, right, pretty controversial. They get divorced. It's eighteen
eighty five and Frank is eighteen years old. He has
(06:17):
a situation that a lot of people find themselves in
even today, where he has to do his best to
financially support his family. Right, So he takes a job
at the University of Wisconsin, which Max just mentioned, and
while he's there, he works for the dean of the
Department of Engineering. At the same time he's studying at
(06:39):
the university. But according to his later biographers, he was
one of those kids who always knew what he wanted
to do, Like he always wanted to be an architect.
Indeed he did, and what he wanted to be was
an architect. So in eighteen eighty seven, he pulled up
his proverbial tent stakes and headed out to Chicago, out east,
(07:03):
out midwest. I don't know what you'd call that, already
a well known spots, sort of a hot spot, a
bit of a mecca of the architectural scene. And while
he's there, he works for a couple of different firms.
Eventually he lands a job with an outfit called Adler
and Sullivan. This is a huge win for him. For
six years he is working directly under the legendary Louis
(07:27):
Sullivan himself. So it's kind of like it's kind of
like getting a job at Apple and working directly for
Steve Jobs or Steven Apple. Yeah right, Tim Apple. Sorry, Yeah,
he's also he's also he's still a young guy as
all this is happening. He is just twenty two years
(07:50):
old when he ties the knot, and this is eighteen
eighty nine. He marries someone named Catherine Lee Tobin, who
is conventionally known to her friends as Kitty, and so
you'll see her described as Kitty. Right, this is his
first wife, and he's right now, he's got a vast
(08:11):
horizon of possibility before him, and he says, you know, Kitty,
I love you. I love that we're getting married. I
can't wait for us to live together. But I also
love architecture. I want to build the house that we
live in. We just don't have. All we need is money.
We just need a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
And Ben, this is reminding me of I actually just
over the week and watched I can't remember the name
of the series or what platform it's on, so it's
not mega helpful. But this dude, who was clearly frank
Lloyd Wright inspired, this guy Robert O'shatz, designed himself this
incredible like upside down kind of funnel shaped like tree
(08:52):
home off the side of a cliff there in Oregon,
kind of more of a rural area, and it was
very frankly right inspired, and you know, really kind of
got me even before I knew we were doing this episode,
thinking about how interesting and specific the art of architecture
is and how it's like such a neat synthesis of
aesthetics and function.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
That's so cool. Yeah. One of my favorite quotations about
architecture is the following. I can't remember who said it,
but they essentially said architecture is frozen music. And that's
such a beautiful way to think of it, and I
think Frank would agree. He may have even been the
guy who made that quote. So apologies if you're listening
(09:35):
Frank somehow out there in the ether. We do have
good news for young Kitty and young Frank at this point,
because Frank's mentor, Louis Sullivan, is such a big deal
and so well healed. He goes to Frank and he says, hey, kid,
I'll help you out with a loan, and I'm happy
(09:56):
to give you the money pay me back when you can.
The only coveat here will be that you have to
agree to work under me directly for five years, which
is really cool because again, in our earlier comparison, that's
like going that's like working into Apple going to Steve
Jobs and saying, hey, will you help me? Will you
(10:18):
basically buy me a house? And then Steve goes, oh, yeah, sure, man,
you just have to work at this wonderful job for five.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
Years, right, And you know, we talked about this, I
think recently on stuff that it wants you to know
just about how you know, with the advent of automation
or the I guess further it exponential spread of automation
and AI, things like apprenticeship programs and sort of more
journeyman kind of craftsmen, things are not what they used
(10:46):
to be. This is exactly the example of this at
its best, right and at its highest level.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Yeah, yeah, this is a good one, right, and I
love that comparison. For a while, Kitty and Frank are
seeing their dreams come true, but they also soon find
themselves with a total of like six kids. They eventually
have six kids together. And so again, just like in
his childhood, Frank is facing serious financial concerns and this
(11:16):
drives him to moonlight. He starts accepting independent commissions to
design houses outside of his contract agreement with his mentor.
And if we want to contextualize that in the modern day,
Nolan Max, I think we've all done a little bit
of like call it consulting or maybe writing or editing
(11:39):
or making music or producing for shows that friends do.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Right, Like, we've all done that and I also think
I'm certain in fact, that all three of us worked
on a mentorship program we had here at iHeart, you know,
for up and coming podcasters, helping folks on the development
side and you know, production side with Max and all
of that kind of stuff. And it's really nice. It's
a nice thing to be able to do, and it's
easy to take for granted, like just through experience alone,
(12:06):
how much shareable wisdom one can kind of amass, you know,
And you don't really notice sometimes until you're talking to
someone who hasn't been in it like you have, and
then you realize, wait a minute, I gotta know a
thing or two about this architecture game. And of course
you know the architecture of podcasting.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Yeah, I like that. That's so accurate. And folks, we
are the opposite of arrogant people. So the way I
always like to put it in those situations is not
in such a new medium, nobody is really the We
don't have a Frank Lloyd rite of podcasting yet, but
(12:44):
we have guys like us who have had the opportunity
to make most of the imaginable mistakes. So we like
to help people avoid, you know, like learn from our mistakes,
we like to help you avoid them. And also I
want to give on that point, I want to give
Max a special shout out here. Max, your work with
Next Up has just been phenomenal.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
So think that was the name of the program. Yeah,
Max did way more of these than we did, but
I know Ben and I did a few, and it's
super fun and super rewarding and a great thing to
be able to do. And Frank was benefiting from this obviously,
this mentor saw in him not only promise but potentially
(13:26):
like maybe not a cash cow, but he I think
he did see ways that he could benefit from this relationship,
knowing that Frank was a wonder kin I guess as
they called him.
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Oh yeah, yeah, that's the perfect phrase for it. Unfortunately,
this situation, this padawan situation, didn't end well because yeah,
Frank likely saw these this moonlighting, these extra contracts as
just a little bit more cheddar from a side hustle.
What's wrong with that? Well, Louis Sullivan found out and
(13:59):
he was livid, like he was pissed, and he was I'm.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Saying right, he was trying to lock that down. You know,
He's like, you are my guy, you know, Yeah, so
he was really happy.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Was not happy. He felt this was a breach not
just of their contract, but of their actual friendship. We
still don't know whether Frank resigned or whether he was fired,
but this disagreement, this perceived betrayal, caused a beef that
would last almost twenty years.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
Man, he gotta squash the beef, guys, not worth it,
not worth it. Luckily, Frank saw an opportunity in all
of this nastiness. In eighteen ninety three, he what do
they call it, Ben, hung up his own shingle. Yeah, yeah, yes,
opened his own office and started designing homes that he
felt had a connection to the regional sort of spirit
(14:52):
of the American prairie. So he was already from the
start really thinking not form over function, but like he
was a very form formal guy, you know, he was
trying to like connect structures with the spirit of the
place in which they were, you know, located.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
That's a great way to say it. Yeah, it's very
much a matter of esthetic and philosophy more so than
like it's it's asking the question not just how does
a person exist in this building, but how does this
building exist on the land?
Speaker 2 (15:26):
You know, And this is no ding to more you know,
straightforward types of builders or contractors or whatever. But that's
not quite You have to have an architect in the
situation is to like, you know, have the plans approved
for code and all of that. But I think when
we think architect now, in our mind's eye, we picture
something a little more flashy and you know, personal, like
(15:47):
the work of Frankloyd.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Right, absolutely, yeah, man, like the I love that point
because one of my neighbors is a is an architect,
and his specialization is entirely windows. Like he lives, breathes,
and eats and sleeps windows, and I love talking to
the guy. I think we all see a little bit
(16:11):
of magic, a little bit of wizardry in the craft
of architecture in that discipline, and a lot of that perception, honestly,
in the modern day comes from people like Frank Lloyd. Right,
He's not just building buildings, He's making statements about the
world around us. Okay, maybe we're being too nice to
the guy. You'll see why. I'm walking that back his
(16:35):
new office, like you're saying, his new office, once it opens,
it starts getting commissions. He's beaten the streets, you know,
he's shaking the hands, kissing the babies, networking. This leads
to a deal to design a house for a guy
named W. H. Winslow. And as we've mentioned previously, we
do have a bit of a stereotype often, folks. When Noel,
(16:58):
Max and I here an historical name with two initials
and then a surname, we assume the guy's rich.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Great, Okay, Yeah, it's got a bit of a hoy
toity quality to it.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Yes, And this, luckily for Frank, this new house design,
his very first job at the at the new office,
is a hit. It makes serious waves, and it grabs
the eye of another guy, another architect named Daniel Burnham.
This is like another Steve Jobs. He is the He
(17:34):
is acknowledged at the time as the most influential architect
in all of.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Chicago, which is architect city for Franks and purposes. Right,
so this is the guy for a moner of comparison
that you draw Ben as a hip hop head, it's
like making your first hip hop album and all of
a sudden, Doctor dre and Eminem you know, do a
conference call at.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
You right right, that'd be intimidating. Also, yeah, we don't
not everybody loves drade Em and m but you know,
picture whomever you're thinking about in that meal you yeah, uh, okay.
So what we're saying is Burnham feels he is discovered,
like you said, no avunder Kidd, once in a generation talent.
And this guy Burnham pitches a deal to Frank and
(18:18):
it's another crazy cool idea from a mentor. He says, Look, man,
I will subsidize your life for years. I will be
your patron so long as you agree to go study
in Europe and then come back with that knowledge and
become the principal designer in my firm.
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Okay, so not it's got a different flavor than his
previous opportunity where this guy still wants to lock him down,
but boy is he sweetening the deal. And I think
maybe now Frank has learned his lesson and knows that, Okay,
maybe if I go through with this, I can get
this crazy level of education and then all so be
working for the best firm. It's going to allow me
(19:02):
to do exactly what I want to do and I'm
not going to have to seek these side jobs and
maybe you know, hurt my new besties feelings.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Yeah, that would be a reasonable assumption. And I think
that's safe to say. That's what you and I and
probably Max would do. It's such a great offer. I'll
pay for everything. Oh you go on vacation to Europe.
I'll pay for that too, and then come be my
best boy, my right hand man. Get this though, folks,
Frank says, nah.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
What Yeah, he doesn't do it, Okay, So he knows
what he's worth. He knows at this point. Maybe the
lesson he actually learned from his previous mentorship was more like,
I don't need anybody, man, I.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Got maybe yeah, and maybe you know, not to read
the tea leaves of personality too much here. But maybe
he was responding with that in that way because training
in Europe would mean he's studying established architecture ah and
not doing his own thing.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
Yes, exactly. He was already thinking several steps ahead to
his own unique school of architecture of something that is
entirely American that is now known as you can imagine
with what we described earlier as the Prairie school, which
is so funny, Ben, because when I think of the Prairie,
I think of like little house on you know, like
(20:31):
very non ostentatious kind of stuff. And I guess that
is what makes his work interesting, because it is somehow
simultaneously grand and austere at the same time. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
And you can read some great in depth descriptions of
the Prairie School, and I think there's room for grand
and austere here because they have this. They eventually cultivate
this radical approach for making modern homes with mass produced
materials and equipment, and they have a lot of open
(21:06):
spaces like the Dixie Chicks. You know the prayer, understand
the reference, but I believe you the song wide Open
Spaces by the Time is a song.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
I'm not familiar with the work of the Chicks.
Speaker 1 (21:17):
It's the only one I know. Oh that's right, they're
just the Chicks. Now we're getting old, bro. But yes,
this guy is turning down the status quo in the
coxotic pursuit of a new way of building. And by
nineteen hundred his bet on himself pays off. The style
is established, it's immensely popular. Frank is only thirty three
(21:41):
years old at this time. He is the main character
of this new architectural revolution.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Yeah, I mean he had the chops man in the
space of just ten years from nineteen hundred and nineteen ten,
he built around fifty of these prairie style homes. He
also became a lecturer. Dajure in his particular field, did
a little bit of a tinorant, traveling himself a lot
like his father, only he was definitely getting paid, no
question about it. His work was featured in exhibitions. His
(22:14):
firm tackled more than just standalone houses, as you can imagine.
Of course, that's where his legacy is headache. They built
everything from apartment buildings to group dwellings to rec centers,
businesses and churches.
Speaker 1 (22:29):
We should also mention what we're talking about, traveling widely.
He is a globe trotter. In nineteen five he went
to Japan, and honestly he became kind of a wiya boo.
Check out that term if you don't know what it means, folks.
But he had always cited Japanese wood block prints as
(22:51):
one of his big aesthetic influences, and when he traveled
to Japan for the first few times he called it
he was not at all hesitant with his praise. He really,
what do we call it today? He glazed Japan. He
said this is the most romantic, artistic, nature inspired country
on earth. It was hugely important to go, so he
(23:14):
went there again in nineteen thirteen. He spent almost three
years there from nineteen seventeen to nineteen twenty two, building
something called the New Imperial Hotel in Tokyo. And the
whole time, every time he traveled to Japan, even when
he was back in the States, he was always aggressively
collecting screens and textiles and pottery and sculptures from Japan,
(23:38):
and then he would later incorporate these as kind of
easter eggs in his architectural spaces because the Japanese style
of architecture, I think really spoke to his own values
and perspective.
Speaker 2 (23:52):
Well, it makes perfect sense. I mean, this is a
culture steeped in esthetics mixed with function, you know, and
remains so to this day. I mean, they've got they've
certainly got a lot on us here in the States
in terms of just their city planning, incorporating all of
these gorgeous temples into city scapes and you know, more
(24:15):
urban environments, not to mention just the practical nature of
their rails, their their travel, and the way it's all
kind of perfectly integrated into the big picture of what
it's like to live in a city, of course, which
I think is what he's talking about and probably most admiring.
But of course in the villages as well, you have
(24:36):
more carkening back to those kind of early days of
Japanese you know, homes and structures like the sliding doors
and the kind of matted floors and things like that,
all very much designed it to be efficient, energy efficient,
all of that stuff they had it on lock.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
Oh. Yeah, and this all sounds great, right.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Folks can also point out to Ben it would have
taken him almost a month to get from the East
coast of the United States to Japan. In those days,
he would have had to take a train from Chicago
all the way to San Francisco. So now we're talking
even longer of a time, probably than a month, and
then take a steamer from the coast to Japan. So yeah,
we're talking about a month's time one way.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Which is crazy because now you can do it in
a day, depending on where you live in the States.
So it is it is great, These are grand adventures,
but folks, we have to remember, despite acknowledging the man's genius,
we also mentioned controversy, and as so often happens with
larger than life figures, his meteor like rise in his
(25:41):
professional career occurs in step with sharp and horrible declines
in his personal life. Like we said, he married young
who is only twenty two. Fast forward to nineteen oh three,
He's designing a house for a married guy named Edwin Cheney,
who is a neighbor of his in the in the
(26:02):
Oak Park area of Chicago, and he meets Edwin's wife,
a lady named Martha Borthwick Cheney or Mama with an
H at the end to her.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Friends, Mama, Mama Cheney, Martha Borthwick Cheney, or Mama to
her friends. As he said, Ben was a kind of
an early feminist and right viewed her in a very
progressive way of of looking at women at the time,
as his intellectual equal. Their relationship became the talk of
(26:34):
the town. They could often be seen taking rides together
and writes automobile through Oak.
Speaker 1 (26:41):
Park without their respective spouses, without a chaperone, without a
without I don't know why I'm talking, like they were
in Kentucky or something like that. I Yeah, Frank's marriage
has been drifting for a while he is estranged from
his wife Kitty, and in nineteen oh nine or by
(27:02):
nineteen oh nine, his budding dalliance with Mama Cheney was
increasingly difficult to ignore. These two folks actually ditched their
spouses and their children and high tailed it off to Europe.
This is a crazy scandal, and they both ask their
spouses for a divorce. Mama's husband, Edwin, grants her a
(27:26):
divorce and, actually, speaking of strange for the time, he
gets custody of the children. But Frank's wife, Catherine Kiddie
Right refuses. She says, I'm not going to agree to
a divorce. You're crazy. We have six kids. What are
you doing in Europe? They knew that while they were
(27:46):
in Europe they had another series of adventures that may
be a different episode, but they knew the entire time
that this was a temporary escape for them. If they
returned back to Chicago, they would not be able to
weather the serious scandal that would ensue. Their affair was
(28:08):
already generating a lot of ill will in high society,
and it's the stuff that could negatively impact Frank's career,
so to put it simply, and a little undiplomatically. Nobody
wanted to work with a guy they thought was a scumbag.
Nobody wanted to a lithario right with someone they found
(28:31):
morally objectionable. And we also have to remember that when
we're talking about his clients, we are talking about well
to do people. It's there's a certain financial threshold required
to say, build for me a building.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
Well not to mention that these circles of the super
wealthy in a place like Chicago are pretty tight, and
people talk crap and you can very quickly be ostracized
and cast out of these social circles. Rich people be caddy.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
Yes, And we also have to remember that whenever some
even before the Internet, folks, whenever somebody gets very famous
or very prominent very quickly, there's always a contingent of
the public that wants to tear them.
Speaker 2 (29:18):
Down, cut them down to size, take them down a
few pegs, get them off there high. It would be
an architectural version of a horse podium column. Yeah, there
you got, And that's just what happened, more or less.
But you know again, Lloyd at this point was kind
of doing the more basic version of what ultimately became
(29:42):
his kind of like you know, I'm the one who
who decides what I build, and I'm gonna build things
for the sake of like leaving a lasting impression, like
the Pyramids of Old, you know that kind of stuff.
Not so much I'm gonna build a house on contract,
Like what am I gonna build that's gonna be one
of the great wonders of the world or as we
(30:02):
mentioned earlier on in ESCO World Heritage site.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
Yeah. Absolutely, So they try to address this scandal, and
they go into kind of a pr move and a
bit of a conspiracy. So Frank returns to the United
States in October of nineteen ten, and he's ostensibly traveling alone.
He comes back by himself, and he temporarily reconciles with
(30:28):
his estranged wife Kitty. This is probably at least in
part to improve his public image, as he said, in
that tightly knit high society. But the entire time he
has a secret plan. He goes to his mom and says, Mama,
not my mistress but my actual mother. Wi Ye, mother,
(30:48):
will you will you put your name on some land
on a deed for me in spring Green, Wisconsin And
this is near where his family has lived.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
Bro is this like a Disney kind of like Florida
Project situation where he's trying to, you know, get people
off his trail, where he's trying to do something in
secret by putting his mom's name on it so that
he's not tied to I'm sorry, i don't know this
part of the story, so I'm on the edge of
my seat.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
Yeah, it's exactly. It's eerily similar to that. You nailed it.
He's trying to get people off his trail because putting
the property in his mother's name helps him avoid too
much public attention. Right, He'll still have a Chicago office,
but he'll spend more time away and at this at
the very same time that he is reconciling with his wife, Kittie, Right,
(31:40):
he's also working to get funding for a house who
wants to build on this land at Spring Green, and
he's building it to be a studio, right, a meditative concentration,
concentration spot for him. But it's also a place he
can still live with his mistress, Mama Cheney, without reporters.
Speaker 2 (32:01):
Finding out he's being a le Yeah, he's making some
money moves. That's just sick. Yeah, gosh, he has a
bit of a Rascal.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Yeah, and he This land purchase goes through on April tenth,
nineteen eleven, and it's right next to land that his
mom's family, the Lloyd Jones, is already owned. Right, starts
building himself this new home and he calls it talison
t A l I E s I n taliesan.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
Uh. This cult has giving talisman. You know, it's giving
mystical wizardry. I don't know why.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Yeah, it's a It's that's perfect. It is a mystical
wizard like name. It means shining brow in Welsh. Remember
his mom's family is Welsh, and the name refers to
an old school Welsh bard, poet, magician and priest.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
What a magician and those things seem diametrically opposed.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Can you be a magician priest?
Speaker 2 (33:13):
I guess it depends on what your priesting? You know? Yeah,
this is why I get.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I guess it depends on what game you're playing. But
you can multi class.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
That's eric. I love where this story is going. Then
this is a lot of this is very new to me.
So I'm guessing we're inching towards the aforementioned promise of
cult activity.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Oh yeah, that's We're going to get there, Volts, even
if it takes us the rest.
Speaker 2 (33:38):
Of the week for a second episode. Even yeah, that's
what you're in bying the rest of the week. I
got you, I got you.
Speaker 1 (33:45):
So this home eventually it's going to become a commune.
Uh Now it's officially known as the Talison Fellowship, Talisan
North or Talisan Spring Green. It's a beautiful how studio
custom built on and what ultimately becomes more than five
hundred acres, And it's really clever because the main compound
(34:09):
is itself a testament to the Prairie School. It's an
advertisement for Frank's design philosophies. So he abandons his wife
again and the six kids again. He shacks up with
his mistress. She is now going by Mama Borthwick post divorce.
Right she gets there that summer, she tries to throw
(34:29):
the heat off too by letting it be unofficially known
quote unquote that she's living with Wright's sister, with Frank
Wright's sister. But Frank is, for better or worse, pretty
much a celebrity. People want to know what he's doing.
TMZ is not in play yet, but people still have
that instinct. So word gets around, Yeah, gets around. He's
(34:52):
still with his mistress.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
Well he's also yeah, yes, that's right. And Ben, would
you say this is he's building a bit of a
cult of personality at the very least by this point
he's making a splash, both with his work and his
idiosyncratic behavior.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Absolutely, yes, very much. So we're laying the bones for
that conversation about about cultiness and tragedy. We know that
one reporter from the Chicago Examiner figured out that Frank
and Mama were living together again over there in Wisconsin,
and literally on Christmas Eve of that same year, the
(35:33):
Chicago Tribune revealed the truth about Talison to the world,
and they didn't care about this fancy, you know, somewhat
high fluting Welsh name and heritage and all that. Instead
they called this Frank's love cottage. It's Castle of Love.
So he's forty seven, and again he is in hot water,
but he and Mama feel like they're past the point
(35:54):
of return. You know, they're already living there.
Speaker 2 (35:57):
So if they were going to have to live a
life of social exile, they were able to kind of
have it on their terms. You know. Talisan was definitely
not the worst place for them to do that. They
had everything they need. Talisan is primarily referred to in
three big Stages of construction because over the course of
rights occupancy, two major fires led to the need for
(36:21):
significant restorations and which also probably led to some alterations
of the previous designs. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:28):
Yeah, and even Frank didn't get everything right every time.
There were some things he designed that were beautiful that
that just didn't work. They weren't super practical even if
they were beautiful. But think of it like Talson. One
has best thought of as three big sections. There's a
long section to the east that's the residential wing where
(36:49):
Frank and Mama lived. There's a big section on the
west that's the agricultural wing. And then there's an office
wing connecting the other sections, or I should say, like
the business wing and then the office wing or the
studio wing and the office wing. There's a courtyard to
the southwest. There's stables, there's a garage, there's servants quarters,
maintenance facilities, and as soon as they move in, Frank says,
(37:14):
all right, I'm getting back in the swing of things
with this architecture stuff. I'm still really about that. But
due to this negative publicity from the affair. There are
still people like you would call them draftsmen who come
to study under him, but high society still doesn't really
want to work with this guy.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
Would he have been independently wealthy at this point too,
And I mean it seems like he wasn't needing cash money,
you know, to take these gigs, like he was sort
of focusing on building this compound for himself. So he
had to have had some independence at this point.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah, he was making he was making a living, right,
but he was not I don't believe at this point
was he was at the juncture where he could just retire.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
He still had but he had some flexibility because he
certainly didn't seem like he was not able to pursue
this project because it didn't have enough cash coming in.
But he also wasn't doing tons of these more traditional
gigs because of the fact that he had kind of
been shunned.
Speaker 1 (38:16):
Yeah, and his stature in the architectural community is indeed
a currency all its own. So there were still at
this point. Even then, even early on, there were people
who said, yeah, I know about this scandal, but being
associated with this man's legendary work is more than worth
(38:36):
the social backlash to me. So he had a lot
of disciples showing up, a lot of employees. Local residents
did not agree. This was the big scandal of the
small town. They didn't Soup's dupes appreciate their new neighbors.
We have a statement from the superintendent of Iowa County Schools,
who I guess was a moral authority of the time. Yeah,
(39:00):
and so okay, this is like where's joh rule? But
the superintendent of the schools.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
We must know where he falls on this issue.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
Yes, right said. The scandal is bound to out a
demoralizing effect on the school children of the community. It
is an outrage to allow young men and women, and
boys and girls to grow up in the belief that
a man and a woman can go disregard the marriage bonds.
Living in sin. They didn't say living in sin. We
said that last part.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
We did. Yes, we did, indeed living in sin at
the Love Shack, Baby, Love Shack.
Speaker 1 (39:34):
Yeah. And this did not This did not get to
Frank and Mama. At least they did not leave town.
They stood up against the social opprobrium, and when they
refused to leave, some of the more moralistic locals even
went to the town sheriff and said, you've got to
(39:54):
arrest this Frank guy. And the sheriff said, for what
they were like, he's a jerk. Uh. It didn't work, spoiler,
and Frank wasn't cowed. In fact, he doubled out. I
think I would find this pretty interesting.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
Phenomenal dude. This quote is so indicative of where he
was at in terms of his opinion about himself.
Speaker 1 (40:15):
He had some hard, hot and I will say condescending takes.
Can you give it to us? Oh?
Speaker 2 (40:20):
I would love to. He said two women were necessary
for a man of artistic mind, one to be the
mother of his children and the other to be his
mental companion, his inspiration and soulmate. Well, you see, the
world might could be the same person. It's possible. I
(40:42):
don't now. Look, I'm no traditionalist by any shirts of
the imagination, and you know, love is love, but it's
an odd way of putting it, especially with the one
needing to be the mother of his child, the implication
being that that person couldn't possibly have the qualities of
the other. He is inherently like misogynists, Yes, very much so.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
And also the condescension of a man of artistic mind, right, Like,
it's okay for the dumbs and the pores to do
whatever they want, but I'm above it. He also he
had all these problematic quotes. He told another reporter. Laws
and rules are made for the average. The ordinary man
(41:26):
cannot live without rules to guide his conduct. It is
infinitely more difficult to live without rules. But that is
what the really honest, sincere thinking man is compelled to do.
Wank wank, wank. What a dick?
Speaker 2 (41:43):
Yeah, he's a dick, but he was also genius. And yeah,
there's a Venn diagram of dicks and geniuses. When you can,
you can quote me on them. So not only was
he not apologetic or contrite in the slightest, he seemed
pretty sure that he was in a rarefied air, floating
above whatever traditional society expected of him or considered moral,
(42:09):
and didn't have a problem coming off as you know,
heavy handed, high minded, condescending in his quotes.
Speaker 1 (42:18):
Yeah, yeah, it's definitely got some holier than now vibes.
And the thing is, though, even though even though it
was difficult for him to get commissions, and even though
he was maybe not working as much as he wanted to,
what he did create during this period made the history books,
(42:39):
things like the Midway Gardens in Chicago and the Avery
Coonley Playhouse in Riverside, Illinois. Oh and also at the
same time, he keeps on collecting this Japanese art so
much so that he becomes separate from architecture. He becomes
kind of famous as an authority on Japanese art.
Speaker 2 (42:59):
Makes sense. There's been a lot written about this period
of you know Right's life and this first version of Tolisin,
and it's definitely worth checking out onto itself. For a
time though, it seemed that Frank and Mama we're going
to be able to live out their lives in relative,
(43:20):
if isolated peace. That is, until the fire.
Speaker 1 (43:28):
That's our cliffhanger. Folks are so proud of ourselves for
doing a two Parker on purpose. This is part one
of Frank Lloyd Wright Wright's dark Side from colts to
mass murders. Please check out our second episode coming out
later this week. That this is the one where we
(43:49):
have the big plot twist in the turn. But honestly, no,
we couldn't think of a better cliffhanger.
Speaker 2 (43:54):
The fire.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
Big thanks to our super producer Max Blaze, and Saddles. Williams.
Fire just was on my mind with that one.
Speaker 2 (44:03):
Max blazed in the days, Williams, Here we go big
thanks to aj Bahamas, Jacob's big big thanks for rude
Dudes of ridiculous crime.
Speaker 1 (44:13):
Who else, who else?
Speaker 2 (44:14):
Chris hasiotas the names, Jeff Coats here in spirits wherever
they may roam, Rachel Bigxminish Lance, the Doctor of Underwater Explosions, Yes.
Speaker 1 (44:24):
Ed of course, A tepid how do you do to
Jonathan Strickland aka the Quister?
Speaker 2 (44:30):
A passive aggressive doffing of the cap. Hey, we'll see
you next time, folks for Part two. For more podcasts
from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to your favorite shows,
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