Remembering Bryan Lathrop

This month marks the 100^th anniversary of the death of Bryan Lathrop.  Amassing a fortune in real estate and the insurance business, he became an extraordinary philanthropist in Chicago, supporting numerous organizations.  It was through his long-time service to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra that he and his wife Helen became close friends with the Glessners.

Bryan Lathrop was born in Alexandria, Virginia in 1844.  His family moved to Chicago at the outbreak of the Civil War, Chicago being the home of his uncle Thomas Barbour Bryan.  Lathrop was sent to Europe to study and did not return to Chicago until 1865.  It was during his years in Europe that he developed a deep appreciation for art, culture and landscape design, which would guide his future endeavors.  He later noted:

“In Europe (the intelligent traveler) sees almost everywhere evidences of a sense of beauty . . . In America, almost everywhere he is struck by the want of it. . . In this new country of ours the struggle for existence has been intense, and the practical side of life has been developed while the aesthetic side has lain dormant.”

Upon his return to Chicago, Lathrop joined his uncle’s real estate investment practice.  The two men shared a great deal in common, including their appreciation for landscape gardening.  As such, it is not surprising that Bryan involved his nephew in the development of Graceland Cemetery, with Lathrop joining the board of managers in 1867.  When his uncle moved to Washington in 1877, Lathrop became the president of the board, guiding the development of the cemetery until his death nearly forty years later.  

Almost immediately, Lathrop engaged the services of a civil engineer by the name of Ossian C. Simonds, who would go on to become one of Chicago’s most important landscape architects.  Together they shared an understanding and appreciation for naturalistic landscapes, and their work at Graceland had a profound effect on not only the cemetery, but the development of landscape architecture in the United States. 

Lathrop became an early advocate for the development of parks in Chicago, and as vice president of the Lincoln Park board, led an effort to extend that park along the shore of Lake Michigan supporting the concept of naturalism in its design. 

In 1891, Lathrop and his wife Helen Aldis, whom he had married in 1875, commissioned Charles Follen McKim, of the firm McKim, Mead and White, to design their home at 120 East Bellevue Place.  Completed in time for the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893, the house was described by architect Alfred Hoyt Granger as “the most perfect piece of Georgian architecture in Chicago.”  McKim came to Chicago in early 1891 regarding his design for the Agricultural Building at the Fair, and it was at that time that he and Lathrop were brought together.  One of the few buildings in Chicago designed by the firm, the design brought Georgian Revival to the Gold Coast, and in less than a decade, it was the predominant style.  (The house has been owned and occupied by The Fortnightly since 1922, and was designated a Chicago landmark in 1973).

Vauxhall Bridge, 1861; James Abbott McNeill Whistler
(Collection of the Art Institute of Chicago)

Lathrop was a sophisticated and well-respected art collector, and the home was filled with his treasures.  Of particular significance was his collection of the works of James Abbott McNeill Whistler, the largest in the country. 

Bryan Lathrop became a trustee of the Orchestral Association in 1894 and four years later was named vice president.  In 1903, he was elected president and served in that capacity until his death.  It was under his leadership that the orchestra moved into its new home, Orchestra Hall, and that the current name, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, was adopted in early 1913. 

First program using the Chicago Symphony Orchestra name, February 1913

Lathrop was a co-founder of the Chicago Real Estate Board, and developed an excellent reputation for handling large estates both in Chicago and in the East.  His other philanthropic activities included the Chicago Relief and Aid Society and the Newberry Library.

Lathrop died from heart disease at his Bellevue Place home in 1916.  As noted in Illinois, the Heart of the Nation by Edward Fitzsimmons Dunne:

“Bryan Lathrop, who died May 13, 1916, was a wealthy, generous, and public spirited citizen to whom the people of the city were indebted during his life time and since for his constructive work in behalf of several of Chicago’s cultural and philanthropic institutions.”

The funeral service was held in the chapel of Graceland Cemetery.  Frederick Stock, conductor of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, cancelled their concert in Buffalo, New York and returned to Chicago in time for the funeral.  Edgar Lee Masters wrote a commemorative poem about Lathrop specifically noting his support of music in Chicago, which was published in Poetry magazine.

Lathrop’s bequests were numerous including $700,000 to the Orchestra for the establishment of the Civic Music Student Orchestra, the predecessor of the current Civic Orchestra.  It was the largest gift ever made to the Orchestra up to that time.  (The orchestra also established the Bryan Lathrop Memorial Scholarship Fund in his memory, using a large gift from his sister Florence, the wife of Thomas Nelson Page, author and U.S. ambassador to Italy.)  His large collection of Whistler artworks was given to the Art Institute of Chicago and his library went to the Newberry.  Additional bequests were made to United Charities and Children’s Memorial Hospital.

Bryan Lathrop was buried in a large landscaped plot at Graceland Cemetery, with only a small unobtrusive headstone marking his grave.   Helen Lathrop died in 1935 at her summer home in Bar Harbor, Maine, and was interred beside her husband. 

A TRIBUTE TO FRANCES GLESSNER

In 1905, Bryan Lathrop was asked to submit a page to the calendar being prepared by the Monday Morning Reading Class as a surprise for Frances Glessner.  It was presented to her on her birthday, January 1, 1906.  For his page, Lathrop selected an excerpt from “Arcades,” a masque written by John Milton in 1634 to honor Alice Spencer, the Countess Dowager of Darby, on her 75^th birthday.  The selection of this excerpt says a great deal about Lathrop’s respect for Frances Glessner, as the piece extols the subject as being far superior to other noble women.  The excerpt reads:

“Such sweet compulsion doth in music lie,

To lull the daughters of Necessity,

And keep unsteady Nature to her law,

and the low world in measured motion draw

After the heavenly tune, which none can hear

Of human mold with gross unpurged ear.”

The Death of John Wellborn Root -- January 15, 1891

January 15, 2016 will mark the 125^th anniversary of the death of one of Chicago’s greatest architects – John Wellborn Root.  His unexpected passing sent shock waves through the city and the architectural community.  Not only had Root just turned 41 years old five days earlier, but he and partner Daniel H. Burnham were in the early stages of planning the World’s Columbian Exposition – by far the largest and most important project their firm had ever undertaken.

The tragic story of Root’s death has oft been retold.  As recounted in the death notice published in the Chicago Tribune on Friday January 16^th:

“Chicago will be shocked at the news of the untimely death of John W. Root, easily its most distinguished designing architect, if indeed he had his superior in the whole country.  In the prime of his life, his vigor, and his usefulness; in the midst of his invaluable services to the World’s Columbian Exposition, he seemed to be the man of all others who would be sure to continue for many a day one of its most esteemed and beloved citizens.  In the flower of his days pneumonia has suddenly ended his life, as it has during late years ended the lives of so many men young and strong like him.  Less than a week ago he was in the best of health.  Saturday he took a Turkish bath and later at his own house thoughtlessly stepped into the street to hand a friend to her carriage, becoming slightly chilled in so doing.  During Sunday he received at his hospitable home a visit from the Eastern architects visiting the scene of the World’s Fair, and that night he was seized with a severe chill, which proved the beginning of a fatal illness.  Even as late as noon of that day of his death he seemed in a fair way of recovery, but death came suddenly last evening.”

Daniel Burnham, an intimate friend and business partner of nearly 20 years, paced the floor of Root’s house, waiting for each update from the doctor.  When the end came, Burnham is supposed to have responded “Damn, damn, damn!”  considering not only life without his talented partner, but how he would proceed alone with the monumental task of planning and executing the World’s Fair.  Root had been appointed as the “consulting architect” for the Fair, which gave him supervision over all architectural related matters.  Lyman Gage, one of the directors of the Fair, noted that “In general it may be said that there is no man in any profession whose place cannot be filled.  But it really seems to me that John Root was an exception.”

The funeral took place on Sunday January 18^th from the family home at 56 Astor Street (now 1310 N. Astor Street.)  Root had designed the house in 1888, one of a series of four charming Queen Anne row houses for James L. Houghteling.  

Following the service, conducted by Bishop Cheney, the casket was sealed and the remains taken to Graceland Cemetery for internment.  Pall bearers included Burnham, Art Institute president Charles L. Hutchinson, and William Pretyman, a talented English designer and close friend of Root (who would later execute the hand-painted wallcovering in the Glessner parlor).

PRAIRIE AVENUE CONNECTIONS

Burnham and Root were responsible for the design and remodeling of more than a dozen residences on and around Prairie Avenue.   Their first commission on the street in 1873, the residence for John B. Sherman, president of the Chicago Union Stockyards, was the second commission ever received by the new firm.   (Burnham met and married Sherman’s daughter Margaret during construction and the couple moved into the house upon its completion).

In 1880, Root married Mary Louise Walker, a daughter of James M. Walker of 1720 S. Prairie Avenue.   The newly married couple took up residence with the Walkers, but Mary Root died a month later at the age of 21. 

GLESSNER CONNECTIONS

The Glessners were long-time friends of Daniel Burnham and would have known Root through that friendship.  Frances Glessner and Root’s wife were both members of The Fortnightly.  She sent flowers and a note of condolence to Root’s widow, which were acknowledged with the following note on March 18^th:

“Dear Mrs. Glessner

I thank you from my heart for the beautiful roses, and above all for the sweet sympathy which I know accompanied them.  I shall never forget that you thought of me when I most needed help.

Always faithfully yours,

Dora Louise Root”

John Root and John Glessner were also fellow members of the Chicago Literary Club.  At the time of Root’s death, the Club occupied rooms on the third floor of the Art Institute, a Burnham and Root designed building at the southwest corner of Michigan and Van Buren.  At the meeting of the Club on February 16, 1891, the following resolution was read, which sums up in a few words Root’s importance to the architectural community, as well as his value as a friend and Club member.

“In the death of JOHN WELLBORN ROOT the Literary Club has lost a valued member and Chicago has lost a gifted man.

“Everybody knew him as an architect and artist.  Our city is full of his work; his great buildings tower above our business streets, monuments of the strength and breadth of his genius; and quiet homes along our residence streets bear witness to his grace and refinement.  All of us and all of the members of his chosen profession knew his ability as a writer.  But the full scope and range of his versatile nature were less well known.  Only a few knew him as a musician, and yet he had rare musical gifts.  Many surpassed him in mere brilliance of execution, but he had few equals in interpreting the spirit of the great composers.  To hear him play from memory Mendelssohn’s “Songs Without Words” was a revelation.  It stirred the deepest emotions.

“He died at the age of 41, young even for his years, doing the best work of his life, and giving promise of still greater development; like all true artists, dissatisfied with what he had accomplished, and hoping yet to do something great.

“As our fellow member and our friend has gone from us, and we shall never see another design from his hand, it is a pleasure to remember that this home of our club is all his work, the building, which was perhaps his most artistic creation, and the decoration and arrangement of these rooms, to which he gave much loving thought and much of his precious time.

“We shall remember him not only as a great architect and a versatile genius; but as a modest gentleman, a delightful companion, and a faithful friend.

Bryan Lathrop,

William L. B. Jenney,

Irving K. Pond,

Committee”

NOTE:  Among those who gathered in Chicago in January 1891 for the planning of the World’s Columbian Exposition was landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, who planned and supervised the landscape design for the fairgrounds.  Frances Glessner noted in her journal on January 12^th, “At dinner time Mr. Olmsted came with his satchel to stay with us.”  He remained with the Glessners until January 18^th, leaving Chicago after Root’s funeral. 

A Glessner Homecoming

On Friday August 3, 2012, a very special event took place at Glessner House Museum.  More than two dozen people gathered for the first ever Glessner family reunion.  Included in the group were three great-grandchildren, seven great-great grandchildren, and seven great-great-great grandchildren, along with spouses and partners.  A special guest was Nigel Manley, director of The Rocks Estate, the Glessners’ former summer estate in the White Mountains of New Hampshire.  The age range of the guests was 5 to 85, with participants traveling from California, Connecticut, Maryland, Montana, New Hampshire, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, and Vermont. 

After the initial gathering, family members posed on the curved porch in the courtyard, recreating a classic shot of Mrs. Glessner’s Monday Morning Reading Class taken in 1902.  Dinner and a presentation on John Jacob Glessner followed, and the evening concluded with tours of the museum.

Saturday activities included the Chicago Architecture Foundation architecture river cruise, and tours of important Tiffany sites including the Chicago Cultural Center, Marshall Field, and Second Presbyterian Church. 

The weekend concluded on Sunday morning with a visit to Graceland Cemetery, where family members visited the final resting place of John and Frances Glessner and their infant son John, along the west shore of Lake Willowmere. 

The reunion was one of the most significant events of the 125^th anniversary celebration.  In spite of the architectural significance of the house, first and foremost the house was a family home, a place of gathering for generations of the family and their friends.  The warm and cozy interior, a stark contrast to the bold rusticated granite exterior, was a specific request of the Glessners, who wished for their family and friends to always feel welcome when visiting.  A few excerpts from The Story of a House, written by John Glessner in 1923 for his children, give a glimpse of the Glessners’ idea of home:

“This story is addressed to my son, John George Macbeth Glessner, and my daughter, Frances Glessner Lee, for whose pleasure and profit it has been my pleasure and their mother’s to do many things, and especially to give them a happy home and a happy childhood, and to fit them for the responsibilities of living.”

“Mankind is ever seeking its comforts and to achieve its ideals.  The Anglo-Saxon portion of mankind is a home-making, home-loving race.  I think the desire is in us all to receive the family home from the past generation and hand it on to the next with possibly some good mark of our own upon it.  Rarely can this be accomplished in this land of rapid changes.  Families have not held and cannot hold even to the same localities for their homes generation after generation, but we can at least preserve some memory of the old.” 

“The description of this home may give some indication of how a man of moderate fortune would live in the latter part of the 19^th century and the earlier part of the 20^th – an average man with a modicum of this world’s material possessions, but by no means rich, except in family and friends.”

“We have lived with (our possessions) and enjoyed them; they are a part of our lives.  We don’t realize how many they are and how much a part of us they are until we begin to catalogue them in our minds.  We don’t know what we should do without them nor what we can do with them.  The best we can do now is to make this imperfect record, together with these photographs, to perpetuate or at least suggest the spirit of the home.  That home was ever a haven of rest.  It was no easy task to make it so, but it was so made and so kept by the untiring and devoted efforts of your mother.”

(A full reprint of The Story of a House, including the full text and more than sixty illustrations, was produced in 2011 as part of the 125^th anniversary celebration and is available for sale in the museum store).

The Glessners' final home - Graceland Cemetery

On Thursday February 23, 2012 at 7:00pm, the museum will present a lecture on Chicago's historic Graceland Cemetery by Barbara Lanctot, author of the recently revised A Walk Through Graceland Cemetery.   The following is brief history of the Glessners' plot.

Graceland Cemetery was not the first cemetery that the Glessners selected as their final resting place.  When their infant son John Francis Glessner died on June 30, 1875 at the age of eight months, the Glessners purchased a plot at Rosehill Cemetery.  By the early 1900s however, correspondence from Frances Glessner indicates that they were unhappy with the plot and the condition in which it was kept.  As such, they sought a new location for their burial plot.  Graceland Cemetery was a natural choice.  This was the cemetery of choice for many of their friends and Prairie Avenue neighbors, and they were close friends with several of the officers and board members, including president Bryan Lathrop. 

On December 9, 1909, the Glessners purchased Lot 2 in the Willowmere Section, along the western shore of Lake Willowmere.  The lot contained 2,758 square feet and cost $8,274.00. 

Frances Glessner died on October 20, 1932.  At that time, the remains of her infant son John were exhumed from his grave at Rosehill and placed in her casket.  By early December, John Glessner had selected the Harrison Granite Company to make the memorial stone.  The company, founded in 1845, was based in New York, but maintained a local office in Room 739 of the Fine Arts Building.  A letter to John Glessner from Harry L. Davis, the company’s resident associate, sheds light on the design of the stone:

“I feel that elements of refinement should enter into the Ledger stone and still retain a quiet dignity, thus to typify the interests of Mrs. Glessner, in life.  A perfectly plain slab would seem to me to depart from the interests in art and architecture which were her’s.”

Another letter, dated December 28, reveals the one and only change made to the original design:

“I appreciate the call of your daughter, Mrs. Lee, upon me today and in accordance with her request I have sent a requisition by Air Mail tonight to our studio to have them prepare symbols of a Celtic character in place of the cross as shown on our presentation sketch.”

The stone was completed by the beginning of March 1933 and installed later that month.  Made of Westerly granite, the total cost, including foundation, was $587.50.  John Glessner was very pleased with the stone, as indicated in a letter from him to Harry Davis dated April 3:

“I went to Graceland Cemetery on Wednesday of last week, to see the memorial stone for Mrs. Glessner set up for me by the Harrison Granite Company.  I was much pleased with the stone and the way it is set.  Its appearance will be still further improved when the grass has been made to grow about it.  The stone seems all right.  (Please do not publish this as a testimonial.)” 

By the spring of 1934, John Glessner was pursuing the establishment of a perpetual care fund.  Correspondence from the cemetery indicated that the annual cost of maintenance was $30.00 for a lot of that size which included $10 for mowing, $15 for watering, and $5 for washing the stone.  The fund had not been established by the time John Glessner died on January 20, 1936.  (A second matching memorial stone was installed for him later that year).

In May 1937, R. M. Johnson, the executor of the estate of John Glessner, paid the amount of $1,000 to the Trustees of the Graceland Cemetery Improvement Fund for the establishment of a perpetual care fund.  The document further stipulated that no other persons were to be buried in the lot. 

Visitors to the Glessner plot today cannot help but be impressed with the beautiful and serene setting of the Glessner plot along Lake Willowmere, and the simple but elegant design of their stones.

NOTE:  The Glessners’ two other children, John George Macbeth Glessner and Frances Glessner Lee were both interred at the Maple Street Cemetery in Bethlehem, New Hampshire near the family’s summer estate.  The virtually identical design of their memorial stones would strongly indicate that they were also executed by the Harrison Granite Company, although the symbols used are different - a cross for George and his wife and a honeybee for Frances.