Frank LINCOLN Wright

[DRN]

I recently corresponded with Paul Hendrickson, who is writing a biography of Wright, asking him if in his research he found any definitive proof or disproof of the Lincoln middle name. Hendrickson described it as a thorny issue, for which he has found no definitive answer. He noted that his upcoming book will address the Lincoln name with a caveat.

[SDR]

(I'm everywhere at once, it seems.) So we've established an earliest appearance of the Lincoln middle name, have we ?

SDR

[DRN]

Gill’s “Many Masks� seems to be accepted as the first published appearance of Lincoln as Wright’s birth middle name.

Mr Hendrickson noted that he found “numerous factual errors� in Gill’s book as well as “notes (that) are frustrating in the extreme�. He does give Gill credit for doing “other things that are quite valuable�.

[Roderick Grant]

I would like to hear those valuable things.

[DRN]

I’m reading Ron McCrea’s excellent “Building Taliesin�. On page 57, In the list of notes:

“3. The 1880 census lists among the residents at James Lloyd Jones farm “Hired hands: John William Kritz, Frank Loyd Wright.�

Wright had his 14th birthday in 1880. That is five years before William and Anna’s divorce. Do children under the age of 14 typically change their names?

[Roderick Grant]

I missed that note, which refers to page 35, where Ron writes: "As a teenager, he [FLW] had worked on his Uncle James's farm and added the "Lloyd" in his mother's family name to his own." I guess Ron is on the hot plate now to justify the origin of that claim?

In Thomas Hines' paper, "Frank Lloyd Wright - The Madison Years, Records vs. Recollections," he writes: "The United States Census of Madison for 1880 lists the names and ages of the family of William C. Wright and his wife Anna, giving the age of a son, Frank, as being thirteen...." He does not say that "Lloyd" was listed on the census record as the middle name. Of course, he was looking for the birth year, not middle name.

Could it be that different census takers talked to both Wright and Jones households and listed Frank's name on both?

[DRN]

That may have happened. Possibly a verified instance of an error in the 1880 Census? Situations such as this may have led to the mailed census forms beginning in the 1960’s and the more explicit definition of the term “reside�.

[Roderick Grant]

Errors certainly are not uncommon, I am sure. The 1940 census has my parents renting a house they actually owned, and my uncle, who rented space in the house during his bachelor days, as his sister's husband. I, on the other hand, have never received a census questionnaire in all of the census years of my life.

[DRN]

My thanks to fellow Chatter HOJO for noting a passage from this link:

http://www.daily-journal.com/news/local ... 110d2.html

Here’s something most people don’t know. Wright’s original name was Frank Lincoln Wright. He changed it when his parents divorced. His son, John Wright, was the creator of Lincoln Logs. There is the pure emotional suspicion that he named it after his dad.

1. We know from the 1880 Census cited in Ron McCrea's book that Wright (or his uncle?) called himself Frank Lloyd Wright 4 or 5 years BEFORE his parents divorce.

2. "Emotional suspicion"?! I believe the owners of a 1940's pilot's lounge in Texas have emotional suspicion that Wright designed their Quonset hut.

How about the legend of iconic and revered President Lincoln being born and raised in a LOG cabin....kinda catchy for the name of a children's toy, eh? But that may just be "emotional suspicion" on my part.

[SDR]

I looked at the JLW/Barry Byrne book; coverage of the Lincoln Logs is perfunctory, with no indication of how John arrived at the name. Lincoln in a log cabin seems a perfectly adequate explanation.

Nice photo of the Bradley interior. Did Wright ever use bright brass ?

SDR

[SREcklund]

A quick Google search leads me to believe that Professor Hendrickson could well bring the chops necessary to do a proper biography of a controversial subject, unencumbered by a personal Wright history or ax to grind - two things that seem to plague most previous attempts. That said, I hope he documents his statements in a way that leaves us hip-deep in references as we read ...

[Roderick Grant]

I watched a rerun of "That Far Corner" on PBS last night. (No matter what you miss on PBS, wait awhile and it will pop up again 12 times.) I noticed something I missed the first time: There was a shot of Mamah's grave with the dates 1869-1914. We have all speculated about FLW's reason for insisting that he was born in 1869, even though, since his sister Jane was born that year, it could not have been correct. Perhaps it was his subtle, private tribute to the love of his life? That may be a bit outré, but it's worth considering. (Meanwhile, TFC is worse than I originally thought. It adds more mythology to FLW's history than explication.)

[Tom]

Not having seen TFC, I just watched the first 20 min.
Laying aside the psycho/death/mourning thesis -
it does put a certain a sequence of events in clear order for me for the first time.

I'll see it through to the end at some point.

[Roderick Grant]

Careful, Tom. Even the chronology is messed up. Do not take anything therein at face value.

[DRN]

FLASH! This just in, FLLW alumni of the Bauhaus!
https://architectureau.com/articles/ger ... centenary/

From the article:

The Bauhaus manifesto called for artists to “return to craft,� and for equality between artists and craftsmen. The school counts Alvar Aalto, Le Corbusier and Frank Lloyd Wright among its alumni.

I'd love to see their yearbook photos!