The National Register Turns 50!

October 15, 2016 marks the 50^th anniversary of the passage of the National Historic Preservation Act.  The Act was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on October 15, 1966 and was the most significant and wide-reaching preservation legislation ever enacted in the United States.  The date also marked the listing of the first sites on the National Register of Historic Places, created as part of the Act.  In this article, we will look at the four sites in Chicago listed on the National Register that day.

Other preservation legislation preceding the Act included the Historic Sites Act passed in 1935, which empowered the Secretary of the Interior to create preservation programs, including the Historic American Buildings Survey, formed initially to provide jobs for architects and engineers during the Great Depression.  In 1949, President Truman signed the National Trust for Historic Preservation Act to encourage and engage the public in the preservation of buildings and sites, although it did not provide funding. 

During the 1950s and 1960s, the creation of the interstate highway system and urban renewal program destroyed countless historic sites across the country.  In response, a report entitled With Heritage So Rich, coordinated by Lady Bird Johnson, sought to examine the effects of urban renewal and to find ways to protect historically and architecturally significant properties from harm caused by federal projects.  The report was a direct force leading to the passage of the National Historic Preservation Act in 1966.  That Act created the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, State Historic Preservation Offices, the Section 106 review process (to review the impact of federal projects on historic sites), and the creation of the National Register of Historic Places.

The National Register is the official listing of buildings, sites, structures, and objects worthy of preservation, based on a series of four criteria.  Although listing does not prevent alteration or destruction, it does qualify properties for various grants, loans, and tax incentives and raises public awareness of these properties.

The National Historic Landmark (NHL) program existed prior to 1966, and a provision of the Act was that all properties designated National Historic Landmarks were automatically added to the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966.  Four properties in Chicago, all located on the South Side, were National Historic Landmarks as of that date, and will celebrate the 50^th anniversary of their listing on the National Register on Saturday October 15, 2016.

Frederick C. Robie House
Designated an NHL on November 27, 1963

5757 S. Woodlawn Avenue

1908-1909

Frank Lloyd Wright, architect

 “The Robie House has been called Wright’s strongest statement in domestic design.  Its free-flowing interior spaces, overhanging roofs to shade windows and balconies, indoor recreation spaces, and strong horizontal lines forecast trends in house design during the following 50 years.  As sculpture it can be considered an abstraction in lines and planes.  Pictorially the tawny brick and dove-colored concrete trim are pleasing to the eye.  The entrance has been awarded a minor role and treatment of the chimney stack lends drama.  Inside the sensations of security and privacy are enhanced by elevating the principal rooms one story above a raised basement.”  (National Register Nomination Form)

Site of the First Self-Sustaining Nuclear Reaction

Designated an NHL on February 18, 1965

East side of South Ellis Avenue between 56^th and 57^th Streets

The first self-sustaining nuclear reactor, known as Chicago Pile-1, was constructed in a former squash court measuring 30 by 60 feet underneath the west stands of the old Stagg Field at the University of Chicago.  Scientists, including Enrico Fermi, achieved the controlled release of nuclear energy for the first time here on December 2, 1942.  Chicago Pile-1 was part of the Manhattan Project, the Allied forces effort to create the atom bomb during World War II, and consisted of 45,000 graphite blocks.  It was moved the next year to create Chicago Pile-2, and was dismantled in 1954.  

The site is now marked by a sculpture entitled “Nuclear Energy” by Henry Moore, which was dedicated on December 2, 1967, the 25^th anniversary of the first self-sustaining controlled nuclear reaction on the site.  The sculpture is meant to conjure images of both a human skull and a mushroom cloud.

Hull House

Designated an NHL on June 23, 1965

800 S. Halsted Street

1856, architect unknown

1905, Pond & Pond, architects

In the 1960s, the main structure of Hull House was restored to its 1850s Italianate appearance, while the interior was restored to the period after 1890 when it was occupied by Jane Addams.  Addams made numerous additions and alterations to the main building, which were stripped away when the building was restored.  Of the large complex of buildings which surrounded it, designed by architects Pond & Pond, only the dining hall has been retained and restored on a new site close to the main structure.  The significance of Hull House lies in its use as a settlement house founded by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr in 1889 to serve the huge numbers of recently arrived European immigrants on Chicago’s near west side.  The House provided social and educational opportunities for the immigrants, who attended classes in art, history, literatures, crafts and many other subjects.  Hull House went on to establish the city’s first public playground, bathhouse, and public gymnasium, pursued educational and political reform, and actively investigated housing, sanitation, and working issues.  Jane Addams was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1931.

Midway Studios

Designated an NHL on December 21, 1965

6016 S. Ingleside Avenue

1906

Pond & Pond, architects

The sculptor Lorado Taft (1860-1936) and a group of fellow artists and students lived and worked in this building, consisting of converted carriage house that was added on to and enlarged over time.  As noted in the National Register Nomination Form, “Lorado  explained that he built like a chambered nautilus, cell after cell, until there were 13 studios occupied by himself and associated sculptors and many assistants – at least 20 in all.  Most of these private studios opened on to a large roofed court to which in time was added a fireplace and a fountain; a marble-cutting room and a stage for plays were built later . . . Below Taft’s own private studio, which today contains many of his original models and studies, was what he called the “Dream Museum” room, containing an enormous table of time replicas in plaster of the great masterpieces of the world arranged according to the plan for his Dream Museum.”  Taft was a sculptor of realistic works often on a monumental scale, including the Fountain of Time at the west end of the Midway Plaisance, and the Fountain of the Great Lakes, outside the Art Institute.   Through his works, his writings, and his years as an art teacher and lecturer, he greatly influenced American sculpture in the first decades of the 20^th century.  Today the building now provides studio and gallery space for the University of Chicago’s studio art program.

Lorado Taft, Sculptor

On Tuesday March 12, 2013 at 7:00pm, the museum will host author Lynn Allyn Young, who will present a lecture on her recently published book, Beautiful Dreamer: The Completed Works and Unfulfilled Plans of Sculptor Lorado Taft.  (Tickets are $10 per person and $8 for museum members.  For more information or to make reservations, call 312.326.1480.)

Lorado Taft (1860-1936) was a prominent American sculptor, respected writer and educator, teaching for many years at the Art Institute of Chicago.  His massive Fountain of Time, located in the southeast corner of Washington Park at the west end of the Midway Plaisance is among Chicago’s best known public works of art. 

Taft was born in Elmwood, Illinois and received both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees (1879 and 1880 respectively) from the University of Illinois, where his father was a professor of geology.  Taft later attended the École des Beaux-Arts where he received high praises for his work and twice was asked to exhibit at their annual Salon.  After returning to Chicago in 1886, he accepted a position to teach at the Art Institute of Chicago, a post he retained until 1929. 

During the planning of the World’s Columbian Exposition, Daniel Burnham approached Taft about his concerns that the sculptural decorations on the various buildings would not be completed in time.   Taft suggested the use of a number of his female students to work as assistants to which Burnham famously replied “Hire anyone, even white rabbits if they’ll do the work.”  Several of the female sculptors, who became known as the “White Rabbits,” achieved later fame, and Taft is generally credited with helping to advance the status of women as sculptors.

In 1903, Taft published a comprehensive survey of American sculpture entitled The History of American Sculpture.  The study was revised in 1925 and remained the standard reference on the subject until the late 1960s.  In 1921, he published Modern Tendencies in Sculpture, a compilation of various lectures given at the Art Institute, still regarded as an important work in recording the perspectives on American and European sculpture in the first decades of the 20^th century. 

In 1906, Taft moved his main studio to a converted carriage house at what is now 6016 S. Ingleside Avenue, immediately south of the Midway Plaisance (entrance shown above).  The firm of Pond & Pond was hired to significantly expand the building, known as the Midway Studios, to include a total of thirteen studios and dormitory spaces for Taft and other sculptors.  (The complex, designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, is now used by the University of Chicago as studio and gallery space for its studio art program.)

Taft’s commissions were numerous and not surprisingly several of them can be found today in Chicago.  His Fountain of the Great Lakes, completed in 1913, stands in the south courtyard of the Art Institute of Chicago.  Two prominent monuments at Graceland Cemetery, Eternal Silence (Dexter Graves monument, 1909) and The Crusader (Victor Lawson monument, 1931) remain favorites on walking tours of the cemetery, the latter being used as the cover image of the new guide to the cemetery, written by Barbara Lanctot for the Chicago Architecture Foundation. 

But it is the massive Fountain of Time in Washington Park, 110 feet long and 24 feet high, that remains Taft’s most famous work in Chicago.   (A detail of the fountain is shown on the book cover at top).  It is interesting to note that John Glessner was involved in the planning for this project as noted in an entry in the Glessner journal dated February 2, 1913:

“I have had several meetings with the committee to help place Lorado Taft’s monument, The Passing of Time, on the Midway, in commemoration of 100 years of peace between the U.S. and England, for which the Art Institute gave Taft the commission.  Now the South Park Commissioners must agree to the placing of it.  At least five years will be required to complete the model.”

World War I intervened in the planning and execution of the fountain, so it was not officially dedicated until November 1922.  A $2 million restoration of the fountain and reflecting pool was completed in 2005, returning this treasure to its original glory.