Last Post Of 2012: A Look At A Lost Wright

For the last post of 2012, I thought I'd share two vintage postcards I recently found from around 1914 that depict a relatively unknown Frank Lloyd Wright-design: The Island Woolen Company Dam Observation Deck (1913) formerly found in Baraboo, WI.

Intrigued that this bizarre design was a Wright, I decided to look it up in the definitive book on the subject, Lost Wright by Carla Lind to learn more.

Read and see more after the jump...

Carla Lind writes that William McFetridge took over the family woolen mill upon his father's death in 1893. In 1913, the McFetridge Lighting Company was created and a dam was built on the Baraboo River to provide power to the company and nearby businesses and residences.

No drawings exist for the structure, but Wright is believed to have designed the geometric cantilevering observation platforms where the concrete meets the earthen banks of the river. Interestingly, the small white ovals seen adorning the structure in the top postcard are inset mollusk shells from the river.

Carla goes on to say that McFetridge was a painter and worked briefly as a draftsman in Louis Sullivan's office while Wright was there in 1892. McFetridge kept up a friendship with Wright through the years and when financial times were tough for Wright in the 1920s, McFetridge purchased portions of the architect's Japanese print collection to help him out.

I did a little more digging around the internet and came up with some great historic photos of the dam's construction and the finsihed observation deck from the Sauk County Historical Society Flickr page that I though readers would enjoy.

The mill was ultimately closed in 1949 and the dam and observation structures were dynamited in 1972 when repairs proved too costly. While it's always sad to lose important architecture structures like this, removing several of the dams (like this one) from Wisconsin's rivers has apparently helped the ecosystems bounce back and endangered fish, like sturgeon, start using the free-flowing waterway again to spawn.

Maybe the good people of Baraboo can commission the The Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture to design a new river side observation deck that follows Organic Architectural tenets as an homage to the town's lost Wright. I know I'd travel to see it!

If anyone has any more information or images they'd like to share about this lost Wright design, please send it to me at eric@prairiemod.com and I'll be sure to share with everyone.

Happy New Year!

Color postcard images via PrairieMod. All other photos from the Sauk County Historical Society Flickr Page.

Comments

[Paul Ringstrom]

I am sorry to report that IMHO the current Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture has shown that they nothing about "Organic Architectural tenants."

[Ron McCrea]

Wow, these are great! They must be from the Taliesin I period, and had I known about them I would have included some of them in my book, "Building Taliesin." The kinship to Midway Gardens is very clear and these have a very stark, German modernist look. I would not have wanted to risk descending those treacherous steps without a railing, however.

As to the comment above, I'm sure the writer meant "tenets" not "tenents," just as he meant "formerly" rather than "formally" found in Baraboo -- and just as Paul Ringstrom meant to include a verb in his comment about Taliesin West. Whatever our architectural preference may be, we live in glass houses when we type.

[Eric]

Thanks Ron, corrections made! Hopefully my typing/spelling gets better in 2013!

[Ron McCrea]

Is there more documentation to the provenance than "it is believed" the designs were by Wright? I notice that FLLW does not include any mention of this design in his comprehensive list of projects from 1911-1914 compiled for the 1914 Chicago Art Institute show, and he is throwing everything in there that he can think of. Are the Sauk photos dated?

[Eric]

Hi Ron,
They don't appear to be dated and Carla Lind does make note that there is definitely a gap in the documentation of this design...but it seems accepted as a Wright design (it also has an "S" number...S143)

Perhaps if you contact the Sauk County Historical Society (who own the photos I posted)they might be able to provide more detailed information on their dates. Let us know what you find out!

[Zonker]

I have a vivid memory of sitting on the top side of the concrete "umbrella" one summer evening in 1971. (Ah, youth.) By that point the observation deck was little used and behind a rusting chain link fence gate, the site overgrown with bushes. It seemed quite strange to us. The large empty mill building with hundreds of empty wooden spools scattered around was also an object of some interest to us. All that remains of the complex now is a small brick office building, which is now used as a park structure.

I was sad that all this was demolished when the dam was removed, and the river channel created to power the Island Woolen Mill disappeared. Yet I do agree, that allowing the Baraboo River to once again flow freely with no dams from the headwaters down the entire length was a very good result.

[Greg Wilson]

Can anyone verify who the gentleman is standing in the one picture? If you look at his posture (slight bend at the hips, and arms up with elbows pointing-out), and enlarge the picture, I would suggest it is FLW himself.

Think about it... look closely and compare it with other pictures of FLW in that time period.

[John Bachman]

William Storrer in his book "The Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright" indentifies him as owner of the mills.