This study looks at the architectural transformation of Cleveland during its "golden age"--roughly the period between Civil War reconstruction and World War I. By the early twentieth century, Cleveland, which would evolve into the fifth largest city in America, hoped to shed the gritty industrial image of its rapid growth period. Encouraged by the spectacle and enthusiastic response to the Beaux-Arts buildings of the Chicago World's Exposition of 1893, the city embarked upon a grand scheme to construct new governmental and civic structures known as the Cleveland Plan of Grouping Public Buildings, one of the earliest and most complete City Beautiful planning schemes in the country. The success of this plan led to a spillover effect that prompted architects to design all manner of new public buildings that adopted similar Beaux-Arts architectural characteristics over the ensuing decades.
In half a century Toledo was transformed from a fever-ridden swamp into a prosperous town with all the amenities of a major Midwestern city. The 1890s signaled the beginning of Toledos greatest architectural era, with new-fangled skyscrapers being constructed up and down Madison Avenue (without any power tools), grand theaters, a new luxury hotel, and the most lavish mansions in the Old West End. New inventions gave Toledoans more time to visit Walbridge Park, shop at Tiedtkes, or attend a Mud Hens game at Swayne Field. Toledo: A History in Architecture 18901914 looks at the cities most notable buildings and at the personalities and institutions of a long vanished era. Innovations like steel framed and reinforced concrete construction were revolutionizing architecture, and Toledos architects were working overtime on what would be their most important commissions, including the Nasby Building, Valentine Theater, and Lucas County Courthouse. Elegant churches rose on Collingwood Avenue, and in 1912 the white marble Toledo Museum of Art, the citys glittering jewel, was built.
During its more than a century as a Cleveland suburb, Cleveland Heights has been shaped by the natural topography, technology, enterprising developers, elected officials, and its residents of many backgrounds. The result has been a rich mosaic of places and people. In the 1890s, wealthy Clevelanders began to leave the city's smoky factories and congested neighborhoods for the "heights" in East Cleveland Township. In 1901, the heights became the hamlet of Cleveland Heights. As its population changed, so did the suburb's homes, shops, schools, parks, and places of worship. Today, Cleveland Heights is as diversified as its citizens, its eclectic architecture and neighborhoods, and its unique history.
As in other cities, Cleveland has developed through the evolution of its European ethnic neighborhoods and their various religions. Many of these neighborhoods built their own churches, which became the focus of community development and unity. For decades, these churches thrived, but the new millennium has brought with it huge changes in the economy. Large membership institutions, like the Catholic Church, have had to make the toughest of decisionsclosing churches that were thought to be a permanent part of the local landscape. The authors of this book feel it is important to preserve the memory of these significant religious, cultural, and social institutions so that the current and future generations do not forget them. The pictures of these incredible places take on a whole new meaning when coupled with the fact that they will soon be gone. These pages celebrate the architecture, art, and artifacts of these sacred structures in high-quality photographs and explanations.
At the center of American history is a hole—a gap where some scholars’ indifference or disdain has too long stood in for the true story of the American Midwest. A first-ever chronicle of the Midwest’s formative century, The Good Country restores this American heartland to its central place in the nation’s history. Jon K. Lauck, the premier historian of the region, puts midwestern “squares” center stage—an unorthodox approach that leads to surprising conclusions. The American Midwest, in Lauck’s cogent account, was the most democratically advanced place in the world during the nineteenth century. The Good Country describes a rich civic culture that prized education, literature, libraries, and the arts; developed a stable social order grounded in Victorian norms, republican virtue, and Christian teachings; and generally put democratic ideals into practice to a greater extent than any nation to date. The outbreak of the Civil War and the fight against the slaveholding South only deepened the Midwest’s dedication to advancing a democratic culture and solidified its regional identity. The “good country” was, of course, not the “perfect country,” and Lauck devotes a chapter to the question of race in the Midwest, finding early examples of overt racism but also discovering a steady march toward racial progress. He also finds many instances of modest reforms enacted through the democratic process and designed to address particular social problems, as well as significant advances for women, who were active in civic affairs and took advantage of the Midwest’s openness to women in higher education. Lauck reaches his conclusions through a measured analysis that weighs historical achievements and injustices, rejects the acrimonious tones of the culture wars, and seeks a new historical discourse grounded in fair readings of the American past. In a trying time of contested politics and culture, his book locates a middle ground, fittingly, in the center of the country.
More than fifteen years after the success of the first edition, this sweeping introduction to the history of architecture in the United States is now a fully revised guide to the major developments that shaped the environment from the first Americans to the present, from the everyday vernacular to the high style of aspiration. Eleven chronologically organized chapters chart the social, cultural, and political forces that shaped the growth and development of American towns, cities, and suburbs, while providing full description, analysis, and interpretation of buildings and their architects. The second edition features an entirely new chapter detailing the green architecture movement and architectural trends in the 21st century. Further updates include an expanded section on Native American architecture and contemporary design by Native American architects, new discussions on architectural education and training, more examples of women architects and designers, and a thoroughly expanded glossary to help today's readers. The art program is expanded, including 640 black and white images and 62 new color images. Accessible and engaging, American Architecture continues to set the standard as a guide, study, and reference for those seeking to better understand the rich history of architecture in the United States.
The era from 1890 to 1930 constituted a building boom for American art museums designed in a monumental, classical style; both the proliferation of the buildings and the ubiquity of the style seem to indicate an architectural as well as a sociocultural phenomenon. The present work is an attempt to place the American art museum building of this period into its historical milieu, and employs over one hundred illustrations and sociocultural analysis to explain the significance of both the institutions and the structures housing them to those who came into regular contact with them, including architects, patrons, journalists, and museum personnel.
How does knowledge of everyday environments foster deeper understanding of both past and present cultural life? Traditional studies in this field have been of rural life. Here, contributors explore aspects of the emergent field of urban cultural landscape studies--with the challenging issues of class, race, ethnicity, and subculture--to demonstrate the value of investigating the many meanings of ordinary settings. 67 illustrations.
