2019 Summer Lecture Series: Great Family Estates | 2019 PSNC Research Fellows’ Lectures
2019 Summer Lecture Series: Great Family Estates
The Pamela and David B. Ford Lecture
The White House: “Something of splendor... for the credit of the nation”
William Allman, Curator Emeritus, The White House
Tuesday, July 9, Rosecliff
6:00 PM Lecture, 7:00 PM Reception
$10 Members / $15 General Public, Advance registration required
Since its opening in 1800 as the largest house in the United States, the White House has attracted the interest of the public. Most of the Presidents and First Ladies of the 19th century tried to keep the décor of the White House up-to-date, as far as appropriated funding would permit. A look at the changing interiors of the White House through the 1902 Theodore Roosevelt Renovation provides interesting comparisons between the nation’s official residence and the “Gilded Age” homes that would rival it in scale and surpass it in opulence.
William Allman served in the Office of the Curator of the White House for 41 years, the last 15 years as the Curator until his retirement in June 2017. The White House, while serving as home and office, also operates as an ever-evolving historic site with an important museum collection of the fine and decorative arts. Mr. Allman, a native and resident of Bethesda, received his B.A. in history from the University of Maryland in 1974 and an M.A. in American studies with museum concentration from The George Washington University in 1982. He is the author of the 2016 edition of Official White House China From the 18th to the 21st Centuries, published by the White House Historical Association.
or call 401-847-1000 ext. 178
Fallingwater: The Story of an American Icon
Lynda S. Waggoner, Director Emerita, Fallingwater
Tuesday, July 23, Rosecliff
6:00 PM Lecture, 7:00 PM Reception
$10 Members / $15 General Public, Advance registration required
Fallingwater is a beloved icon of the Modernist style and movement. Its story is one of drama and perseverance that resulted in the resuscitation of architect Frank Lloyd Wright’s waning career, and propelled the client, Edgar J. Kaufmann, to become one the greatest patrons of architecture in the modern era. But, like any story, the saga of Fallingwater is not without its twists and turns. Lynda Waggoner, Director Emerita of Fallingwater, will discuss the building of the house that stretched capabilities of architecture and design, the personalities involved, the challenges of preserving it, and its significance to 20th-century design.
Lynda S. Waggoner served as Vice President of Western Pennsylvania Conservancy and Director of Fallingwater from 1996 until her retirement in 2018, at which time she was named Fallingwater’s first Director Emerita. She has been affiliated with this Frank Lloyd Wright masterwork since her high school days, and is now widely regarded as one of the nation’s foremost authorities on Fallingwater.
Ms. Waggoner studied architecture at the University of Kentucky and art history at the University of Pittsburgh, where she graduated Summa Cum Laude and with Departmental Honors earning dual degrees in art history and anthropology. She serves on the board of directors at both Touchstone Center for Crafts and the Iconic Houses Network, based in Amsterdam, Netherlands, and Ms. Waggoner is a founding board member and past president of the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy of Chicago, Illinois.
She is also the author of two books, Fallingwater: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Romance with Nature, published by Universe (1996), and the award-winning, Fallingwater, published by Rizzoli (2011). She has published numerous articles on architecture, nonprofit organization management, and tourism both in the United States and abroad. Ms. Waggoner lectures widely, including presentations at the White House, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, National Building Museum, Washington, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, The John Adams Institute, Amsterdam, and the Cologne Museum of Art. Most recently she served as the primary author of the United States serial nomination of eight Frank Lloyd Wright properties to the UNESCO World Heritage list, which is currently under review.
or call 401-847-1000 ext. 178
The John G. Winslow Lecture
Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney’s Old Westbury Studio: A Tour
John LeBoutillier, Journalist and Former U.S. Congressman
Tuesday, August 6, Rosecliff
6:00 PM Lecture, 7:00 PM Reception
$10 Members / $15 General Public, Advance registration required
John LeBoutillier, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney’s great-grandson, will lead a discussion on the ultimate insider-tour of the iconoclast sculptor’s Old Westbury, Long Island studio, which today is his home. Mrs. Whitney was an accomplished professional sculptor of national stature and later went on to found the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. Her studio was designed by Delano & Aldrich in 1913, and is located on the grounds of the Whitney family estate.
John LeBoutillier is an author, pundit, political columnist, and former U.S. Congressman. A graduate of Harvard Business School, he is the author of Harvard Hates America (1978), and Vietnam Now: A Case for Normalizing Relations with Hanoi (1989). A seasoned journalist, Mr. LeBoutillier has interviewed Presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan as well as international political figures like Alexander Solzhinitsyn. He has written numerous articles that have appeared on The New York Times Op-Ed page, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times Magazine, and in major publications throughout the country. A born raconteur, Mr. LeBoutiller is a life-long resident of Westbury, Long Island.
or call 401-847-1000 ext. 178
The Crane Estate’s Downton by the Sea: Bringing Castle Hill Back to Life
Susan Hill Dolan, Curator, Ipswich Properties, The Trustees of Reservations
Thursday, August 22, Rosecliff
6:00 PM Lecture, 7:00 PM Reception
$10 Members / $15 General Public
Considered by some to be the nearest relative to an English country house on this side of the Atlantic Ocean, Castle Hill was the grand summer estate of plumbing magnate Richard T. Crane, Jr. , heir to Crane Co. of Chicago, and his family. The estate was built between 1910 and1928 in a unique seaside location in Ipswich, Massachusetts. With the help of some of America’s most renowned early twentieth-century architects, landscape architects, and artists, the Cranes transformed the property into one of America’s great Country Place Era estates, and now it is designated as a National Historic Landmark. After years of interior restoration, landscape restoration, object conservation, and a new approach to interpretation, The Trustees brought Castle Hill on the Crane Estate “back to life.” The estate’s centerpiece is the Great House, an English-inspired mansion designed by Chicago architect David Adler, which has been painstakingly restored to recapture much of its original design, including the addition of Crane-family furnishings recently returned by descendents.
Susan Hill Dolan has worked for The Trustees of Reservations since 1996, serving as Curator for the Ipswich properties. A graduate of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and Christie’s Fine & Decorative Arts program with the Royal Society of Art in London, Ms. Hill Dolan has more than twenty years curatorial and historic preservation experience, including positions at The Trustees, Historic New England, and Skinner Inc., among others. At Castle Hill, she was responsible for the interior restoration of the Great House, as originally designed for the Cranes by David Adler. She also oversees collections and acquisitions, historic preservation and object conservation projects, and temporary exhibitions. She has curated two exhibitions at Castle Hill in cooperation with major museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Addison Gallery of American Art, and collaborated with The Art Institute of Chicago for their 2002 exhibition on David Adler.
Ms. Hill Dolan has lectured and written essays on decorative arts, historic interiors and architecture for books and magazines including: David Adler, Architect: The Elements of Style; Ars Ceramica; Classic Chicago Magazine, and The New England Antiques Journal. She was recently featured in Architectural Digest’s AD PRO magazine, WGBH’s Open Studio, and will be featured in an upcoming documentary film about the architect David Adler, due out in 2020.
or call 401-847-1000 ext. 178
2019 PSNC Research Fellows’ Lectures
The Eaddo and Peter D. Kiernan Lectures
Tuesday, July 30, Rosecliff
4:00 PM Lecture, 5:00 PM Reception
$5 Members / $10 General Public, Advance registration required
“To Gratify the Eye with Color:” Newport’s Leaded Glass and the Aesthetic Movement
Lea Stephenson, The Preservation Society of Newport County Research Fellow
Newport’s nineteenth-century artistic interiors incorporated the brilliant effects of stained glass. Lea C. Stephenson will discuss leaded glass found in early McKim, Mead & White interiors from the Aesthetic Movement, including the Kingscote dining room and Isaac Bell House. She will explore the newly discovered glass designer D. Turno and how the firm created cosmopolitan designs to enhance McKim, Mead & White architectural spaces and early 1880s ambient spaces.
Lea Stephenson received her MA in Art History from the Williams College Graduate Program with a concentration on late nineteenth-century American and British art. She has held positions at the Dallas Museum of Art, Clark Art Institute, and Philadelphia Museum of Art. Her research interests include depictions of interiors, American portraiture, and the role of ghosts and spiritualism in art. This fall, Ms. Stephenson will be entering the University of Delaware’s Art History PhD program to continue her exploration of Gilded Age art and collections.
Venture Cargo: Newport Furniture Exports to the West Indies in the 18th Century
Emilio Ruiz, The Preservation Society of Newport County Research Fellow
The care, design, and craftsmanship of Newport’s eighteenth-century cabinetmakers has become a symbol of Rhode Island’s material cultural heritage. The eighteenth century marked a golden era for furniture making in Newport until the occupation of the city by British troops in 1776. The city was a manufacturing center for numerous products and had one of the busiest harbors during the colonial era. Newport’s merchants were ambitious and skillful traders, many of whom were engaged in the triangle trade. The West Indies, or the Sugar Islands, were a destination for Newport furniture, sold primarily as small ventures within the British-controlled islands or smuggled into Spanish colonies. This lecture will take a closer look at the faces that embraced such enterprises, and the cabinetmakers, merchants, and the West Indies market for Newport furniture in the eighteen century.
Emilio Ruiz is a Cuban-born art historian, who earned his BA from the University of Havana in 2014. While still a student, Mr. Ruiz conducted research for the National Museum of Decorative Arts (NMDA) in Havana, Cuba, and eventually became Curator upon graduation. In 2016, he was awarded a fellowship at the Newark Museum to assist with research on silver. During the term of that fellowship he traveled to Newport to give a lecture about the NMDA at The Preservation Society of Newport County. Since then, Mr. Ruiz has permanently settled in the U.S. and interested himself in the cultural and social ties between the two countries. As part of his current position as a Research Fellow for the PSNC, he has undertaken a project examining Colonial American/British venture cargo with an emphasis on possible connections between Rhode Island and the island of Cuba.
or call 401-847-1000 ext. 178
The Jacalyn and William P. Egan Lectures
Tuesday, August 13, Rosecliff
4:00 PM Lecture, 5:00 PM Reception
$5 Members / $10 General Public, Advance registration required
A Picturesque Paradise: Kingscote and Early 19th-Century Landscape Design in Newport
Jenn Robinson, The Preservation Society of Newport County Research Fellow
During the mid-nineteenth century, landscape design began to emerge as a professional field in America, promoted by tastemakers such as Andrew Jackson Downing and influenced by European precedents of the previous century. These trends coincided with early estate development on Newport’s famed Bellevue Avenue and were particularly reflected in the landscape design of one of its first cottages, Kingscote (1839-1841). This lecture will trace the evolution of Kingscote’s landscape, as well as its changing context within the broader expansion of Bellevue Avenue. It will highlight nineteenth-century developments in horticulture and Picturesque landscape design, and illuminate the ways in which both professional and amateur landscape gardeners shaped Newport’s environment in this dynamic period.
Jennifer Robinson’s work includes an investigation of Kingscote’s landscape as well as assessments of several public landscapes in Providence in collaboration with the Providence Preservation Society. Ms. Robinson received a BS in Textiles, Fashion Merchandising, and Design from the University of Rhode Island in 2009 and an MSc in Architectural Conservation from the University of Edinburgh in 2017. She worked for several years in museum collections at the Newport Historical Society, and has been a member of the Architectural Heritage Society of Scotland's Forth and Borders Cases Panel, a volunteer planning review body, since 2016. Her interests include preservation policy and advocacy, planning, and historic site management – with a special affinity for historic textiles and mid-century architecture.
For Love of Home & Heritage: The Morris Women as Preservationists
Taylor Bye, The Preservation Society of Newport County Research Fellow
Alletta Nathalie Bailey Morris and her daughters Alletta Morris McBean and Elizabeth Morris Smith were passionate amateur architectural historians and historic preservationists. Taylor Bye will examine how these two generations of Morris women documented gothic revival houses, restored Newport’s colonial homes, and left The Preservation Society of Newport County one of its most unique properties. They epitomized the true meaning of amateur, French for “lover of,” and are examples of the vital role women have played in preserving America’s architectural heritage.
Taylor C. Bye holds a MA in Public History from the University of Missouri-Kansas City. In his career, he has won honors from the National Council on Public History and has been published in Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains.
or call 401-847-1000 ext. 178
Books
Books@Rosecliff:
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Dr. Renee Somers, Assistant Professor of English, Bridgewater State University, MA
Saturday, July 27, Rosecliff Terrace
Discussion 10:00-11:30 AM
$5 Members / $10 General Public, Advance registration required
First published in 1925, this quintessential novel of Jazz Age-excess still holds lessons for us today. The story shares the mysterious life of the wealthy Jay Gatsby and his love for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan and details lavish parties on Long Island when gin was the national drink and sex the national obsession. Arguably F. Scott Fitzgerald’s most well-known book, The Great Gatsby is an exquisitely crafted tale that explores the dark side of the “American Dream.” The book’s 1974 film version starring Mia Farrow and Robert Redwood was filmed at Rosecliff.