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Parabiographies
Mrs. Amy Hamilton Hunter residence
Purcell and Elmslie
Flossmoor, Illinois 1916
Parabiographies entry, Volume for 1916
Text by William Gray Purcell
for 1916
Job Date (in Parabiography): August 5, 1916
AMY HAMILTON HUNTER DWELLING, Flossmoor, Illinois
This year of 1916 represented probably the full development of Purcell and Elmslie and what were to be among their most characteristic works. Early in this year were begun the designs of the Heitman Dwelling, the Logan-Branson bank, the Alexander General Offices in Philadelphia.
During the six years since George Elmslie had closed his twenty-two years associateship [sic] with Louis Sullivan he had become a re-integrated personality who was both a principal contributor to and a beneficiary of the going group of workers in the building art which finally became to be known as "Purcell and Elmslie." In this working team which benefited but the enthusiastic support of a large number of able experts working in many fields there were none who did not realize their debt to Louis Sullivan. They were also made constantly aware of what Frank Lloyd Wright was doing in the new architecture. The variety and charm of the work coming from his hand was evident on all sides at that time.
And, too, the work of the new masters in Europe and the dozen or so free minds in American architecture were of course known and their published work generally evaluated.
By 1916 the character of Purcell and Elmslie buildings had been established and in both visual designs and the total answers to necessity our organization did not need references, conscious or subconscious, to Sullivan, Wright or any other personality in order to accomplish the formulation of its ideas in building.
We were our own men.
We found our intellectual tools and equipment for producing any building within the complex of circumstances as it pressed in upon the point in time and space where the project was taking form.
Persons viewing Purcell and Elmslie as just another partnership in architecture with the usual office personnel will completely mistake the character of our practice and the significance of whatever the our contribution may prove to have been. For we were - everyone of us, in the office and out of it - makers of buildings and equipment. The usual architectural office instruments-of-service, graphic and legal, were necessarily looked upon as only ancillary to our purpose.
The production of drawings in behalf of the client, for the purpose of communicating the project to the builder, and accomplishing a legal contract, together with the resulting union between the finished building and its functioning in the business or home life of the owner, represented for us the progress of an unfolding process which developed in its own perfect rhythm and which served no fixed convention, professional or technological. It was a demonstration of democracy in the fullest sense - The Great Life in action, operation Freedom.
This was our dedication and all who worked with us felt this sense of equality. There were no importance differentials of class or station, no priorities of talent. The good idea - the resolution of a tough problem could come from anyone in the office or on the job, and usually did without controversy. One who hit the right answer, no matter whom, had the good word from all and everyone was happy about it. Such an approach automatically expanded our team to everyone who had anything whatever to do with the project. We all continually developed our contacts with the shovel men, bench craftsman, trowelers, carriers, plumbers, painters, weavers, wood carvers, glass makers, modelers, bankers, realtors in such a way as to make them feel that their experience and their wise know-how was going to make the building the best. Without Necessity, and the old barn-raising spirit of the pioneers, we knew a building would have no life. One could not invent a building; one could only grow it.
A writer on an architectural project who spent a half day with Mr. Jager and Mr. Strauel at our "Cave" on the Minnehaha Creek in 1955, years after the active business had been closed down, said "I now feel like a member of the team."
We never hesitated to acknowledge changing conditions on the job or even the preferences of the workmen. Thus everybody had the idea, those who directed and those who received the directions, to adjust specifications according to the reality of producing the buildings rather than an ironclad carrying out of the specifications contract terms. Of course here changes could not be made unless it was plain on all hands that these changes were an improvement rather than a substitution of inferior materials or insincere workmanship.
A good man does better when working in the way he thinks the job should be done. In 1905 on University of California constructions I learned from an excavating, who was indeed a tough character, something about his shovel men and what he had learned to his profit about how to move dirt by hand from one place to another place - and what men would and would not do. I have discussed this at some length in my opening piece on "Building Superintendence" of the series in NORTHWEST ARCHITECT (1940-1954), entitled "What is a Mistake", Volume V, #1, September-October, 1940.
I believe that this democratic and truly modest mental deportment toward all workers represents the source of whatever vitality our work came to have.
NOTES:
Flossmoor is a suburb of Chicago twenty-five miles south of the loop.
Buildings referred to in text:
Louis E. Heitman Dwelling, Helena Montana, Job #312, May 8, 1916.
Logan-Branson Bank, Mitchell, South Dakota, Job # 308, April 16, 1916.
Alexander General Offices, 414 North Third Street, Philadelphia, Job #311, May 17, 1916.
"Sullivan and Berlage," illustrated article in PROGRESSIVE ARCHITECTURE, November 1956, p. 138, by Leonard Eaton, Asst. Professor of Architecture, School of Architecture and Design, University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.
By the same author and in type at this writing (October 1st, 1957) a review of three Purcell and Elmslie houses - Bradley Bungalow (#2) at Wood Hole, Massachusetts; Bradley dwelling (#3), Madison, Wisconsin; architect's own dwelling, 2328 Lake Place, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Job #197, April 13, 1913; due for publication December 1957 or January of 1958.
Collection: William Gray Purcell Papers, Northwest Architectural Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries [AR:B4d1.10]
research courtesy mark hammons