Wright Chat

I just saw a news story this morning that a fire engulfed the Wynant house in Gary, IN. The footage was taken at night and the fire was out in the footage, but I could not see how much damage was done. No other stories on the news services yet.

Thanks for posting this. Since late 2004, Wright & Sullivan buildings have had their annum horribilis. So, let's see: the Carr cottage, late 2004. The Sullivan and Charnley homes in Hurricane Katrina. Adler & Sullivan's synagogue/Pilgrim Baptist Church just the other night. Now this.



I thought you had to be messing with our minds until I found an article in the Post Tribune. This is truly unbelievable.



happy new year. 2006 looks to be off to a great start. man.

Is it a total loss?

The article says it has suffered "extensive damage," and that the building was "gutted." It also mentions damage to the exterior plaster, which had just been redone.



Here's a quote from the article:

"Joe Eakins, 8th Battalion Chief for the Gary Fire Department, said the house was all but gone by the time firefighters arrived.



'It was completely involved,' Eakins said. 'Every window of the house had fire coming through it; plus the fire was through the roof when we arrived.'"

This is a link to the story in the Gary Post-Tribune:



http://www.post-trib.com/cgi-bin/pto-st ... ws_07.html



Mark Hertzberg

Tribune staff reports

Published January 10, 2006, 10:40 AM CST



For the second time in less than a week, fire has destroyed a Chicago-area architectural landmark. This time, it's a Frank Lloyd Wright house that burned overnight in Gary, CLTV reported.



Fire was reported about 8:30 p.m. Monday at the Wynant House, 600 Fillmore St., officials said.



By the time firefighters arrived, the residence -- a single-family home -- was fully involved, with fire breaking through the roof, CLTV reported. Eventually, the building's second floor collapsed on the first.



No injuries were reported. Fire investigators remained at the scene today seeking the cause of the blaze.



The Wynant House was built about 1915 for the president of a local insurance company.



It was believed to be one of the few remaining houses built to Wright's designs by a short-lived Wisconsin prefabricated housing company, American System-Built Houses.



A not-for-profit organization acquired the home in February 2000. It was being renovated by a local historical foundation for cultural tours and community events, CLTV reported.



Last Friday, fire destroyed the Pilgrim Baptist Church at 33rd Street and Indiana Avenue on Chicago's South Side. Designed by Chicago architect Louis Sullivan, the 115-year-old building was a landmark in the city's historic African-American neighborhood of Bronzeville.



Gov. Rod Blagojevich on Monday pledged up to $1 million in state funds to help fund rebuilding of the church's school and administrative offices.



Copyright

Here is a link to a photo of the damage,







http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/loca ... i-news-hed

I have seen some pictures of the damage. It looks pretty bad. The roof is gone and the interior has to be pretty badly burned also. I will let the experts make final judgement, but I wouldn't be optimistic about it.

This is really sad. Especially after what happened to the Sullivan buildings down south and in Chicago. One is always reminded that natural disasters and fires will always be around to destroy our historic architecture.

Sorry to see the Wyant House burn. I hate to say it. The more FLW houses turn into museums or are destroyed, the more valuable and precious the remining FLW get. These are all wonderful homes that really can't be recreated today.

Anonymous wrote:Sorry to see the Wyant House burn. I hate to say it. The more FLW houses turn into museums or are destroyed, the more valuable and precious the remining FLW get. These are all wonderful homes that really can't be recreated today.

The loss of any FLW Building is a cultural tragedy. I do not believe that the value and significance of other FLW buildings are affected the destruction of other FLW buildings.

While the potential loss of ANY FLW creation is difficult to accept and it is very painful to see photos of the skeletal remains of the burned out Wyant House, let me offer some personal observations.



While on a FLW-inspired road trip I took in Nov. 2004 through Michigan and Indiana, I visited both the Carr cottage in Grand Beach, Mich., and the Wyant House on the same day. I visited the Wyant House first, and while I was there, I took photos of the exterior being "re-plastered". In reality, what was going on was a historically inaccurate modern day stucco application being applied to the building, by a crew who had absolutely no idea of the historical significance of the building they were working on; it was just another stucco job to them, per my conversations with the crew; i.e. "Frank Lloyd Who?"



I talked my way around the chain link perimeter property fence, and peered into the interior of the building, which was discouraging and even appalling to say the least. Portions of the second floor had collapsed into the first floor, among other things, and the attached garage at the rear of the property was falling down upon itself.



In other words, based upon what I saw that day, this building was but a ghost of its original self, and may or may not have been able to be saved, or even worth saving, which is not for me to say.



Later that day, I visited and photographed the Carr cottage (also horribly disfigured and in very poor condition), which was in the preliminary stages of being prepared for demolition, and in spite of my frantic calls and pleas, I was too late to stop.



All in all, quite a fateful trip I took that fall in hindsight. I'm not sure if this helps to soften the blow of the probable loss of the Wyant House, but I thought I would share my fairly recent experiences with the house in the hopes that it might.

Some of you have taken me to task for this in the past, but after seeing the Chicago Tribune story reprinted on the site, I want to point out that it is a copyright violation to simply cut and paste copyright content. I work for a newspaper. We are delighted when people provide links to our stories. They can even cut and paste a few sentences to give the sense of the story, but they should not post the entire piece. Reprinting the story rather than sending the link deprives a newspaper of the opportunity to have the reader go to their site and its links. The number of 'hits' or 'reads' on our sites affects ad revenue, which makes it possible to gather the news for these sites.



Mark Hertzberg

Go here for a history of Wynant House activity:

http://www.chameyer.net/frame8665.html

Christopher Meyer is the person who identified the house as a Wright design.

Here's a link to a story about the Wynant House in Jan. 12's Chicago Tribune: "Fire that gutted Wright home linked to arson"