Frank Lloyd Wright's Buffalo Venture Revisited

The enduring account whereby Darwin Martin brought Frank Lloyd Wright to Buffalo in 1902 to design the Larkin Administration Building, the Martin House and several other Prairie houses was first published by Grant C. Manson in his pioneering 1958 study, Frank Lloyd Wright in 1910. Manson began his work in the late 1930s as a graduate student at Columbia University and was one of the rare early scholars to work directly with Wright, who sometimes referred to him as "my historian." Completion of the study was delayed by Manson's service in World War II, and the full project, which was intended to be a three-volume study of Wright's entire oeuvre, was further derailed by Manson's decision to involve himself in academic administration rather than scholarship. Nevertheless, Manson's study, which is still in print, remains a solid introduction to Wright's architectural principles, to the influences in his formative years, and to the development of the Prairie house.

Manson's second chapter, "The Buffalo Venture," bears witness to the considerable significance of Buffalo in Wright's early career, but documentation has recently surfaced in the Wright-Martin papers in the Archives of the University at Buffalo that demands a revision of the Manson version of the story....

To read more of Jack Quinan's story, see page 44 of the Fall 2002 Heritage Magazine. Subscribe now!

Frontier Telephone

After Alexander Graham Bell invented and patented the telephone in 1876, he displayed it to the public at the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia. Wealthy Boston investors realized its potential and established the American Bell Telephone Company. The company held all of Bell's patents, and the company successfully challenged over 600 patent infringement suits. This kept competitors out of the telephone business for 18 years. American Bell Telephone Company, whose name was changed to American Telelphone & Telegraph Company, issued franchises to local investors, who established telephone exchanges in their cities.

A group of Buffalo investors acquired a Bell franchise and established the Bell Telephone Company of Buffalo, with service starting on November 23, 1878. The central office was located in the Arcade Building, now the site of the Brisbane Building on Lafayette Square. According to a Buffalo News article of 1936, "Willard W. Saperston, a prominent attorney in this city, was its first telephone operator. The switchboard, he racalls, was the size of a small picture. It was equipped with a small bell, connected with the subscribers' lines...the telephone was so much of a novelty, Mr. Saperston says, that people would point out the operator on the street as a curiosity." Among the first to have telephones installed were Charles W. Miller, who operated Miller's Livery Stable at 204 Pearl St. and Dr. Roswell Park, the famous surgeon.

To read the rest of the excerpt from Norman C. Bauman's article see page 52 in the Fall 2002 issue. Subscribe now!

Fall 2002 Magazine Centerfold

The centerfold image is of a new painting called "Commercial Street at the Terminus of the Erie Canal." It is by maritime artist Robert Averill, A.S.M.A. His studio, Buffalo Marine Art, is located in Niagara Falls. See his ad on page 37 of the Fall 2002 Heritage Magazine.

Click on this image to view a larger version.