Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
Speaker 1: and there's Charles w Chuck Bryant, Jerry's here. Uh and
Speaker 1: this is Stuff you should Know. Um, the long awaited
Speaker 1: Frank Lloyd Wright edition sort of yeah, kind of. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, it's not a full biography, but it is
Speaker 1: definitely covers some of his very dark period of his life.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, one of the darker periods that any artiste
Speaker 1: could have. And make no mistake, Frank Lloyd Wright wasn't artiste.
Speaker 1: He was an artiste of architecture. Yeah. Have you ever
Speaker 1: how many houses of his? Have you seen? Our buildings?
Speaker 1: I've seen a bunch. Um. I've been to Holly Hawk
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles, have been to uh Youth Sony and
Speaker 1: I can't remember which one in Wa Washington by the
Speaker 1: one of the I can't remember what other historic house
Speaker 1: it's by. They moved it. Um. I've been to there's
Speaker 1: a Usonian in Alabama. Chuck in Florence, Alabama, which is
Speaker 1: really neat. Been to Falling Water, Um, been to Talius
Speaker 1: in West I think that's it. Yeah. I've been to
Speaker 1: a handful of myself. I've been to one in Tulsa
Speaker 1: and a couple in l A. Of course, the Googgenheim.
Speaker 1: I think we've both been there, and I have not.
Speaker 1: I have not. Really. Yeah, all the times you've been
Speaker 1: to New York and all the museums that you never
Speaker 1: stepped footing the Guggenheim, It's true. I've never been in
Speaker 1: the Googenheims. Sadly enough, I saw a movie where there's
Speaker 1: a shootout in the Googgenheim. I highly recommend going to
Speaker 1: the Guggenheim. It's great. Okay, I thought it was George
Speaker 1: Costanza bit designed the googen him, not franklind Right. M
Speaker 1: that's right. He always wanted to be an architect. That's right.
Speaker 1: He's had. My favorite line for that episode is when
Speaker 1: he talks about the redesign plans at the Guggenheim and
Speaker 1: they go really, he goes, yeah, really didn't even take
Speaker 1: that long. That's right. Yeah, he's saying that he was
Speaker 1: the one who redesigned it, like it's impressive that it
Speaker 1: was just a really quick job. Yeah, that's a classic. Um.
Speaker 1: But we're not talking about the Googgenheim to day, Chuck,
Speaker 1: We're not even talking about Hollyhock House. We're talking about
Speaker 1: specifically tally Essen, which is widely regarded as um Frank
Speaker 1: Lloyd writes genuine bona fide masterpiece, like his greatest work ever. Um.
Speaker 1: I think it was it said that it's his um
Speaker 1: autobiography written in wood and stone, that it's just him
Speaker 1: and not just him in a specific time and place.
Speaker 1: But for like decades were the work, his earliest work
Speaker 1: to his latest work all showed up and appeared over
Speaker 1: time at tally Essen. Yeah, I mean there's a lot there. Um.
Speaker 1: It was his home at times, it was his studio
Speaker 1: of school. Um, an eight hundred acre estate. This was
Speaker 1: family land, it was it was his favorite hill in
Speaker 1: Wisconsin and the river valley there where his Welsh grandparents
Speaker 1: originally homesteaded, and so it was very personal to him.
Speaker 1: So he did things like make the roof so it
Speaker 1: doesn't leak water into the offices below like some of
Speaker 1: his other properties. Exactly. Yeah, he wasn't oneing to just
Speaker 1: move his desk, right. So, UM, this this particular house
Speaker 1: and it was a and it still is. It's a huge,
Speaker 1: enormous house. I think it's twenty one square feet. Um,
Speaker 1: it's a classic example of what's called the Prairie style,
Speaker 1: which is a style of architecture considered to be the
Speaker 1: first genuine American style of architecture UM that Frank Lloyd
Speaker 1: Right founded back in they think the eighteen nineties, maybe
Speaker 1: the late eighteen nineties, and it has it takes its
Speaker 1: inspiration from the surrounding environment. It's been to blend in
Speaker 1: with the environment, work with the environment, rather than to
Speaker 1: dominate it. So there's a lot of horizontal lines, a
Speaker 1: lot of natural materials, a lot of woodworking, and um
Speaker 1: tally Esen is very much in that style. UM. I
Speaker 1: think it has five and twenty four windows, which is
Speaker 1: a lot of windows, and um it also has no gutters.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of cannilivered roofs which kind of overhang
Speaker 1: pretty far. Um, so there wasn't necessarily need for gutters.
Speaker 1: But I read that franklod Right specifically didn't want gutters
Speaker 1: because he wanted icicles to form on the eaves of
Speaker 1: the roof so he could look out of those five
Speaker 1: windows in the Wisconsin winter and see all the icicles hanging.
Speaker 1: Do you like the prairie homes? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I do.
Speaker 1: My problem with Frankloyd Rice work is that it's so
Speaker 1: dated an old timey that it almost like it almost
Speaker 1: makes me um a combination of scared and nauseous. You
Speaker 1: know what I'm talking about. Have you ever looked at
Speaker 1: a wicker wheelchair from like the turn of the last century,
Speaker 1: You just kind of get the creeps from it for
Speaker 1: some reason? Okay, you get that same. I mean this.
Speaker 1: You know, he did the bulk of his work a
Speaker 1: hundred years ago, you know, somewhere in that range. But
Speaker 1: it was also like it was also very technologically um advanced,
Speaker 1: and like he was just doing some really interesting stuff.
Speaker 1: So the way that a very dated, once technologically advanced
Speaker 1: piece of work can kind of call that weird feeling
Speaker 1: out of you. But at the same time, I'm like
Speaker 1: in genuine awe of this stuff you did. Like Falling
Speaker 1: Water is one of my favorite houses in the entire world.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just amazing. What about you? I like them,
Speaker 1: all right, They're they're fine, um some of them. And
Speaker 1: you know, I have some here in the neighborhood that
Speaker 1: pop up every now and then. Some newer builds are
Speaker 1: in the prairie style, and I like them more than
Speaker 1: some other kinds and less than some other kinds. Let's
Speaker 1: just say that you you like craftsmen, Well, sure, I
Speaker 1: live in a craftsman That's that's my favorite. But I
Speaker 1: like craftsman too. I think they're good. I appreach. I mean,
Speaker 1: I love a highly slick modern home. I don't want
Speaker 1: to live in one, but I love them. I would
Speaker 1: not want to live in one. Either those are hit
Speaker 1: or miss with me, Like, some of them are just
Speaker 1: too just god awful. Some of them are just when
Speaker 1: they hit the nail on the head, you're like, wow,
Speaker 1: that's one of the best houses anyone's ever designed and built.
Speaker 1: But they miss. It's almost like documentaries and horror movies.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of them, but only very very few,
Speaker 1: like are truly great. That's my that's my impression of
Speaker 1: modern homes. Yeah, i'man. We're in architecture though, as a
Speaker 1: as a couple, Emily nine, we watch a couple of
Speaker 1: you might hear me, great, well that's two. It's a triad. Well,
Speaker 1: I guess they're uni in there, and I guess, but uh,
Speaker 1: we we have a couple of shows that we love
Speaker 1: to watch that are this one called Grand Designs on
Speaker 1: Netflix that I highly come in. Uh and oh man,
Speaker 1: what's the other one? There's this cup not a married couple,
Speaker 1: but a pair that travels the world. The British architecture
Speaker 1: bake off. No, that's not it. I can't remember what
Speaker 1: it's called. But Grand Designs is really good. I mean,
Speaker 1: and they follow these, you know, sort of impossibly built
Speaker 1: houses designed and built by these incredible lunatic dreamers who
Speaker 1: are obsessed with sort of a thing. It seems to
Speaker 1: be the common thread as these obsessives, and it leads
Speaker 1: to something beautiful and great, you know, usually for sure. Yeah, so, um,
Speaker 1: what are the things about Frank Lloyd Wright is that
Speaker 1: he is including during his lifetime he's considered one of
Speaker 1: the greatest architects ever lived, certainly the most popular, popularly
Speaker 1: well known, maybe, I guess you'd put it like anybody
Speaker 1: who's ever heard of any kind of architecture, even vaguely,
Speaker 1: is probably familiar with Frank Lloyd Wright agreed. So when
Speaker 1: he when he um put all of himself into Tallys
Speaker 1: and he was building a home for himself, and I
Speaker 1: think it was completed in nineteen eleven, and like it's
Speaker 1: worth pointing out, he was returning to his childhood home
Speaker 1: to the valley where his his clan like settled, Like
Speaker 1: if you if you look around spring Green, Wisconsin, everybody's
Speaker 1: got the name Lloyd in there somewhere, like his maternal
Speaker 1: ancestors settled the area. And he was literally building on
Speaker 1: this hill, his favorite hill when he was a child,
Speaker 1: like you were saying, but he was doing this in
Speaker 1: the midst of one of the biggest scandals like any
Speaker 1: architect's ever gone through. Yeah, so uh, as you'll see
Speaker 1: through this show. And if you know anything about the man,
Speaker 1: Frank Lloyd Wright had a bit of a wandering eye
Speaker 1: and a bit of a philandering habit, and he had
Speaker 1: a an extramarital affair with a woman name m A
Speaker 1: m a h Mama, mama four huh. I don't know,
Speaker 1: I've I've been testing it out too, I said, Mama, Mama,
Speaker 1: sure bourth Wick and she was, um, you know. They
Speaker 1: met in nineteen oh three, right, was in his mid
Speaker 1: thirties at the time. He was already really famous as
Speaker 1: an architect, and he was commissioned to design a house
Speaker 1: for her and her husband, Edwin Cheney, and they were
Speaker 1: it was going to be built there in Wisconsin pretty
Speaker 1: close to Chicago, where Frank Lloyd Right was at the time.
Speaker 1: She was pregnant in her mid thirties at the time
Speaker 1: with her second child, and got really involved in in
Speaker 1: sort of working with Frank Lloyd Right very closely, and
Speaker 1: that sort of you know, the the classic story. At first,
Speaker 1: it starts out platonic. One thing leads to another, and
Speaker 1: before you know it, they're bumping uglies. That's right, smashing,
Speaker 1: as the younger kids say, from what I just heard
Speaker 1: that for the first time the other day, I didn't
Speaker 1: know that was a thing. So it's a thing though.
Speaker 1: Um So, frankloud Right by this time had six kids
Speaker 1: of his own, and he had made a name for
Speaker 1: himself like around Chicago building homes, designing homes for um
Speaker 1: the well to do, especially in the Oak Park neighborhood.
Speaker 1: Apparently just between nineteen hundred and nineteen he designed fifty
Speaker 1: prairie houses. So he'd made a name for himself. But
Speaker 1: apparently by the time I think nineteen o eight was
Speaker 1: when he no. Nineteen o seven when they started their affair.
Speaker 1: By the time nineteen o seven rolled around, he was
Speaker 1: getting kind of tired of doing the same thing. It's
Speaker 1: kind of like he was cursed like this. This school
Speaker 1: of architecture that he developed was so popular that he
Speaker 1: that's all anybody wanted, and he had gotten bored with
Speaker 1: it by that time. So he seems to have been
Speaker 1: unfulfilled professionally and kind of took it out on his family.
Speaker 1: And about the worst way you could possibly take things
Speaker 1: out on your family, short of cutting them up with
Speaker 1: the machete. Yeah. By nineteen o eight, it was a
Speaker 1: pretty much well known open secret in Chicago and that
Speaker 1: high society in Chicago that this affair was going on,
Speaker 1: and he was sort of looked down on from his
Speaker 1: friends and his neighbors and his peers, different colleagues. His
Speaker 1: poor wife, Kitty was a long suffering because she kind
Speaker 1: of stood by a side anyway. Uh. And he'd realized
Speaker 1: that he really wanted to leave his family, and he
Speaker 1: did so. He said, I did not know what I wanted.
Speaker 1: I wanted to go away, and he did in September
Speaker 1: of nineteen o nine. Uh, Frank left with her, went
Speaker 1: to Europe, left his wife and his six kids behind. Uh.
Speaker 1: And here's one of the more selfish quotes I've ever
Speaker 1: seen from a husband and father. Uh. And this was
Speaker 1: in his autobiography. So when family life in Oak Park
Speaker 1: in that spring of nineteen o nine conspired against the
Speaker 1: freedom to which I had come to feel every soul entitled,
Speaker 1: I had no choice. Would I keep my self respect
Speaker 1: but to go out of voluntary exile. So he really
Speaker 1: felt um and you know, those were his words in
Speaker 1: his autobiography. So he wasn't he had no illusions about himself,
Speaker 1: but he very much felt that. You know what, Um,
Speaker 1: Frank Lloyd right, and I'm a man, and I deserve
Speaker 1: this by my right. Yeah, So those are two key points.
Speaker 1: He's a man, so he deserved it. But more than anything,
Speaker 1: he was a legend in his own mind, which was
Speaker 1: sustained and verified by the public at large. But he
Speaker 1: was Frank Lloyd right, So more than anybody, he deserved
Speaker 1: that to to go do whatever he wanted, and you know,
Speaker 1: whatever the consequences were for other people emotionally, to hell
Speaker 1: with that. Um. One other thing that I think is
Speaker 1: worth pointing out is that he had money problems basically
Speaker 1: his entire life, despite the fact that I mean, this
Speaker 1: man designed the Google him. He designed some of the
Speaker 1: most iconic UM buildings and houses in the United States
Speaker 1: and he had money just coming in by the truckload,
Speaker 1: but he would spend it as fast as he could
Speaker 1: get it and then some. So at this point in
Speaker 1: time when he was um, when he left his family,
Speaker 1: he apparently left them in financial straits as well. There
Speaker 1: there was there's a biographer named um Paul hendricks and, uh,
Speaker 1: Paul Hendrickson, I'm sorry, and he points out that there
Speaker 1: was a nine grocery bill that was laying on the
Speaker 1: kitchen counter when when Frank Lloyd Wright walked out on
Speaker 1: his family, which I mean, at least pay the grocery bill,
Speaker 1: so the family that you're leaving an alert can eat,
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah. So his his mistress left her two
Speaker 1: kids with her husband. Uh, she went on a train
Speaker 1: to New York City, met Frank at the Plaza Hotel.
Speaker 1: They had a few days there of I guess smashing,
Speaker 1: and then went to Europe and uh, you know, he
Speaker 1: was famous the world over, so it's not like he
Speaker 1: could lay low, very famous face, very a dresser of
Speaker 1: fine clothing and those hats, so he didn't exactly blend
Speaker 1: in anywhere he went. So he was found out in Berlin. Uh,
Speaker 1: Chicago Tribune had a headline that said, leave families, semi colon,
Speaker 1: nice little switch there, Elope to Europe and this whole time,
Speaker 1: poor kitty, She says, it appears like any other ordinary,
Speaker 1: mundane affair with the trappings of what is low and vulgar.
Speaker 1: But there's nothing of that sort about Frank. Right, He
Speaker 1: is honest and sincere I know him, my heart is
Speaker 1: with him now. I feel certain that he will come back.
Speaker 1: And that's that's one of the saddest parts about all
Speaker 1: this is she was sort of like, he's just flandering
Speaker 1: a bit and he'll come back to us. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: is sad, but also, you know whatever his kids were
Speaker 1: thinking too, like, well, I guess dad didn't love us
Speaker 1: enough to stick around. Um another I think kind of
Speaker 1: telling clue about Frank, Lloyd writes, enormous arrogance. Was he
Speaker 1: called um his and um uh, what are we going
Speaker 1: to call her, chuck mama, I'm calling her mamma his
Speaker 1: and mamma's um flight to Europe to after a banding
Speaker 1: their their families. He called it a spiritual hegaraga, and
Speaker 1: I had not seen that word before. And it turns
Speaker 1: out hegira or hegora h g g i r a
Speaker 1: is what um Mohammed's exodus from persecution in Mecca was called,
Speaker 1: and he left Mecca to go to Medina where he
Speaker 1: founded Islam. And to Frank Lloyd, right, this is what
Speaker 1: he and his mistress were doing when they abandoned their
Speaker 1: families and fled to Europe. Yeah, he thought a lot
Speaker 1: of himself. He was an s ob man, plain and simple.
Speaker 1: I don't like he's a classic example of like having
Speaker 1: to compartmentalize the genius of the work and just to
Speaker 1: complete horrible nous of the person. You know, But it
Speaker 1: can be done. It can be done. I I disagree
Speaker 1: with anybody who who says, you know, there's certain exceptions,
Speaker 1: I'm sure, But anybody who says, well, this person held
Speaker 1: some pretty pretty terrible views, so we shouldn't pay any
Speaker 1: attention to their work from that point on, I disagree
Speaker 1: with that. I think that there are tons of exceptions
Speaker 1: to that rule. Although there are tons of exceptions to
Speaker 1: the exception to that rule too. If that's not confusing enough, well,
Speaker 1: I think it's a personal decision. If someone wants to
Speaker 1: never gaze upon falling waters again, then that's their choice totally.
Speaker 1: It's not like I'm gonna you know, grab them by
Speaker 1: their hair and like making them look but I would
Speaker 1: disagree with them and in in a lot of cases, yeah,
Speaker 1: like Manson's music fantastic, just beautiful, stuck, really good stuff.
Speaker 1: So uh, Frank Boyd Wright Um returns to Chicago nineteen ten. Uh,
Speaker 1: Mimall stayed behind. She stayed there in Europe for another
Speaker 1: year because she was getting a divorce from Dwin Cheney. Uh.
Speaker 1: And so she stayed there wrapping that up for Rank
Speaker 1: moved back with Kitty. He had no intention of staying. Uh.
Speaker 1: And I think it was pretty clear to Kitty at
Speaker 1: this point because she said Mr Wright. I wonder if
Speaker 1: he made her caller in that Mr Wright reached here
Speaker 1: Saturday evening October eight and he has brought many beautiful things,
Speaker 1: everything but his heart, I guess, And that he has
Speaker 1: left in Germany, but he came back a bit of
Speaker 1: a pariah. Oh, just to Tad, they were. They were
Speaker 1: pariah's before. There was a woman who grew up living
Speaker 1: next door to Mamma and her children, and she Um,
Speaker 1: years later, in her diary, recounted a time when her
Speaker 1: mom refused to give Frank Lloyd right cream when he
Speaker 1: came over next door from next door to borrow some
Speaker 1: and said that they were sinners and she wasn't going
Speaker 1: to help them out at all. Um. So when they
Speaker 1: left for Europe, made headline news for leaving their families.
Speaker 1: And then he returns moves back in with his family
Speaker 1: just long enough to plan his next home for him
Speaker 1: and mamma um like. Yeah. The people in his social
Speaker 1: orbit did not take very kindly to that. Professionals, neighbors, friends,
Speaker 1: gossip colonists, basically everybody in the Midwest who had anything
Speaker 1: to do with anything like we're rejected him in mamma yeah,
Speaker 1: and to boot when he gets back because he needed
Speaker 1: seed money for uh for his new home. He had
Speaker 1: a benefactor named Darwin Martin, and he said, hey, listen,
Speaker 1: I want to build this great cottage, uh, and this
Speaker 1: affair is long over and this is going to be
Speaker 1: a cottage for my mom, and I promise it's not
Speaker 1: going to be our little smash shack, and so give
Speaker 1: me twenty dollars to get this project going. He got it.
Speaker 1: He moved into the home with his mistress and I
Speaker 1: think by Christmas nineteen eleven they were officially living together
Speaker 1: there in Green Spring. Yeah, he said thanks chump, thanks
Speaker 1: for the money. And because just trashing Frank Lloyd Wright
Speaker 1: as a person is a lot of fun, I want
Speaker 1: to add this detail too, um Darwin Barton, his benefactor,
Speaker 1: over the course of Frank Lood Wright's career, lent Frank
Speaker 1: Lood right grand total and when the stock market crashed
Speaker 1: in Darwin Martin lost everything like he was flatbrook was
Speaker 1: went from an extraordinary, extraordinarily wealthy man to just flat
Speaker 1: broke for the rest of his life. Frank Lloyd Wright
Speaker 1: never repaid any of that money, but he made sure
Speaker 1: that when his autobiography came out that Darwin Martin got
Speaker 1: a free copy. Oh that's nice. Yeah, he really, he
Speaker 1: really pulled that out at the last minute, didn't he.
Speaker 1: All Right, So let's take a break and we'll come
Speaker 1: back and talk about things taking a turn for the
Speaker 1: worst a few years later in August of laws stuff
Speaker 1: you should know, okay, Chuck. So let's just go ahead
Speaker 1: and get in the way back Well I don't want
Speaker 1: to see this. We'll just talk about it. We'll leave
Speaker 1: the way back machine out of this one, okay. So
Speaker 1: on on Saturday, August fifteen, around lunchtime, actually exactly at
Speaker 1: lunch time. Um, Mama Borthwick. Uh, Frank Lloyd writes, Mistress,
Speaker 1: longtime mistress, Um was sitting down for lunch on a
Speaker 1: terrace at tally es In with her two kids. Uh.
Speaker 1: To his great credit, Edwin Cheney, her ex husband by
Speaker 1: this time, was not interested in keeping Mamma from seeing
Speaker 1: her children as punishment, so they went to visit Um
Speaker 1: pretty frequently. Uh. And this was a time when they
Speaker 1: were visiting. So the three of them were sitting down
Speaker 1: to lunch. John I think he was ten, and her
Speaker 1: daughter Martha, who was eight, and Mama, Mama, We're sitting
Speaker 1: down to lunch on the terrace. Okay, just put that
Speaker 1: in your your pin, put that p in your hat
Speaker 1: and smoke it. So that wow, really mixing metaphors. So, uh,
Speaker 1: they're out on the terraces. Inside in the dining room
Speaker 1: there are five of Franklin Dwright's employees, h Emil Burdell,
Speaker 1: Thomas Brunker, David Lyndblom, Herbert Fritz, and William Weston and
Speaker 1: then Weston's son Ernst. So they were all sitting down
Speaker 1: to eat. Um. I think put a pin and maybe
Speaker 1: both of these scenes and we'll tell you a little
Speaker 1: bit about the handyman of the property named Julian Carlton,
Speaker 1: who in the weeks and months leading up to this
Speaker 1: date had been acting really weird. Uh. He was aggressive,
Speaker 1: he was getting in arguments with other people. Um, he
Speaker 1: was acting very strangely. He started sleeping with a hatchet
Speaker 1: and a sack beside his bed. He was married, and
Speaker 1: his wife, you know, verified this stuff. Um. He was
Speaker 1: talking about killing people. And there was rumor that he
Speaker 1: was being let go, and that there was that he
Speaker 1: and his wife were already had a basically a trained
Speaker 1: book to Chicago to look for other jobs. So this
Speaker 1: is sort of the mindset of what's going on with
Speaker 1: Julian Carlton at the time of this lunch, right. Um,
Speaker 1: so Uh, Julian was actually so he was a handyman,
Speaker 1: but at this point he he also helped out, helped
Speaker 1: his wife Gertrude when she was cooking. He would serve.
Speaker 1: So he served lunch to Mamma, and then he served
Speaker 1: lunch to the five employees in the dining room. And
Speaker 1: then as they were they started to eat, he approached
Speaker 1: Um William Weston, the foreman of the whole jam William
Speaker 1: Weston was a pretty important guy around tally Essen and
Speaker 1: asked if he could go get some gasoline out of
Speaker 1: the shed. I guess because he was going to clean
Speaker 1: some rugs with it with gasoline. It was with gasolene y, then,
Speaker 1: sure that's some old timey rug clinging if I've ever
Speaker 1: heard of it. But UM, so so western. Sure, sure
Speaker 1: of course, go ahead, and um things went really things
Speaker 1: went downhill really quickly from from that moment on. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I appreciate you leaving this part to me. Um
Speaker 1: Carlton comes back, Oh, I'll fill in. Don't worry. He's
Speaker 1: got the gasoline and he also has an ax. And
Speaker 1: the sequence is a little bit unclear. I've seen both
Speaker 1: ways of which happened first. But he slaughtered uh Mama
Speaker 1: Borthwick Borthwick and her kids on the porch and then
Speaker 1: poured gasoline under the dining room doors and uh trapped
Speaker 1: them in the room and set the dining room and
Speaker 1: therefore the house on fire with everyone trapped inside. It
Speaker 1: gets even worse than that, though. Um. After he had
Speaker 1: slaughtered Mama and her kids with the axe and um
Speaker 1: set the house on fire, he went around two window,
Speaker 1: a dining room window where the people who are in
Speaker 1: trapped in the dining room that had just been set
Speaker 1: on fire. We're jumping to safety from and as they
Speaker 1: jumped to safety, he ran after him and killed them
Speaker 1: with the axe. He would finish them off there. Sometimes
Speaker 1: they were on fire and he would hit them in
Speaker 1: the head with the axe and killed them. And there
Speaker 1: were nine people who were dining that day, and he
Speaker 1: managed to kill seven of the nine. Um three people
Speaker 1: survived the initial assault, the fire, and then the picking
Speaker 1: off of the axe. The first guy who got away
Speaker 1: was named Herb Fritz. He was a draftsman, a younger guy.
Speaker 1: I think he's still a teenager who went on to
Speaker 1: become an architect, I believe. But he he was the
Speaker 1: first one to jump through the window, and so he
Speaker 1: was able to get pretty far away from Julian Carlton
Speaker 1: before Carlton noticed that people were jumping through the window
Speaker 1: and came around to pick him off with the axe.
Speaker 1: That's right, William Weston got out of the window. Carlton
Speaker 1: hit him with the axe, thought he was dead, but
Speaker 1: he wasn't dead. In the meantime, Fritz, like you said,
Speaker 1: he didn't even Carlton didn't know he was gone. So
Speaker 1: he actually managed to get to the neighbors and contact authorities,
Speaker 1: which in a up being you know, ended up sort
Speaker 1: of saving a lot of the house because they helped
Speaker 1: put it out. And the other guy who managed to
Speaker 1: at least get out the window was David Lindblom. Uh.
Speaker 1: He escaped with Fritz, So Fritz and Limblom. Like when
Speaker 1: they ran into that house, it was like a half
Speaker 1: a mile away, which was really significant that Limblom was
Speaker 1: able to do it, because he was burned so badly
Speaker 1: that he died from his burns, and yet one of
Speaker 1: the last things he did on Earth was to run
Speaker 1: a half a mile to to get help at the house,
Speaker 1: the nearest house with a phone. Yeah, so, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: people get there, they put out the fire. Um hours later,
Speaker 1: Uh they Carlton was discovered in the basement of the
Speaker 1: house in an asbestos lined boiler room. Uh. He went
Speaker 1: down there to to die in the fire, but also
Speaker 1: doubled up by drinking a bottle of hydrochloric acid to
Speaker 1: make sure he did the job. And neither one of
Speaker 1: them work. He actually survived both of those things. I
Speaker 1: actually saw that he was in the furnace because he
Speaker 1: was trying to survive the fire, and he didn't drink
Speaker 1: the acid until he knew he was discovered. Oh see,
Speaker 1: I saw the opposite that he went down to the
Speaker 1: furnace because he wanted to die in the home. Huh. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the reason the furnace made sense to me, or that
Speaker 1: he was trying to survive in the furnaces that if
Speaker 1: he couldn't escape from the house, that would be the
Speaker 1: safest place because it was the middle of August and
Speaker 1: the furnace wasn't on, so it would have conceivably protected him,
Speaker 1: or else they would have turned into that that bronze
Speaker 1: bowl torture thing, you know, the bronze bowl that you
Speaker 1: put a human being in then light a fire under
Speaker 1: the bull the bowl. Remember that sounds like a pretty
Speaker 1: horrible way to die either way. Yes, it should be
Speaker 1: restated that Julian Carlton drank what he thought was a
Speaker 1: lethal dose of hydrochloric acid, Like that's how he chose
Speaker 1: to try to end his life. Yeah, so there was
Speaker 1: never any motive really rooted out. Um Uh. Clearly, looking
Speaker 1: back now, he suffered from some kind of mental illness.
Speaker 1: I don't think you can just all chalk it up
Speaker 1: to a grudge over being fired because of his behavior
Speaker 1: of their previous weeks and months. Um. And you know,
Speaker 1: it's just one of those things. It was a time
Speaker 1: where they weren't diagnosing things like that. So he clearly
Speaker 1: had some form of mental illness, I think. And uh,
Speaker 1: they never conclusively determined a motive. But like I said,
Speaker 1: his wife Um testified that said, you know, we were
Speaker 1: headed to Chicago, we were going to get work Um
Speaker 1: and he ended up dying. Uh. But he couldn't eat
Speaker 1: basically because he had torn up his stomach, lining in
Speaker 1: his throat so badly with that hydrochloric acid. He died
Speaker 1: seven weeks later in jail from starvation. Yeah. And another
Speaker 1: interpretation I saw is that he Um had purposefully starved
Speaker 1: himself because the acid didn't work. That it wasn't just
Speaker 1: that he couldn't eat, but that he wouldn't eat, and
Speaker 1: that he he died from self imposed starvation. Either. One's
Speaker 1: pretty pretty terrible stuff. Just a brutal, brutal crime. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I mean, I agree with you. I think he
Speaker 1: clearly Um was mentally ill, not just from the act
Speaker 1: that he carried out, but also the the fact that
Speaker 1: he'd been ranting and sleeping with an ax for weeks
Speaker 1: leading up to it. But I think his perceived treatment
Speaker 1: or outright treatment around tally Essen coupled with the idea
Speaker 1: that they had been dismissed and that was going to
Speaker 1: be their last day. Um, is I guess what drove
Speaker 1: him over the edge. Yeah, so Frank you mentioned where
Speaker 1: You've noticed we haven't mentioned him. He was in Chicago
Speaker 1: at the time. He was working, uh, kind of finalizing
Speaker 1: everything on the construction of Midway Gardens there in Chicago,
Speaker 1: working with his son, John Lloyd Wright, who is his
Speaker 1: second oldest and in the autobiography of John Wright called
Speaker 1: my father who was on earth, uh said he remembered
Speaker 1: an unnatural silence when the phone call came in, except
Speaker 1: for his father's labored breathing, and then he came back
Speaker 1: in the room and said, he said, what's happened? Dad?
Speaker 1: And his father said, John, a taxi tali Essen is
Speaker 1: on fire, right, And if you're not too big on
Speaker 1: Frank Lloyd, right, you, um, you might be well, what
Speaker 1: about the people who were murdered in his defense? He
Speaker 1: apparently hadn't learned about that yet, and he learned that
Speaker 1: there were some gruesome grizzly murders of a lot of
Speaker 1: people he cared about, Um, but from reporters who were
Speaker 1: shouting questions to him as he was going to the
Speaker 1: train station to take the train from Chicago over to
Speaker 1: uh Spring Green. Yeah. So Chicago newspaper headline reads the
Speaker 1: end of lawless loves Um, you know, sort of a
Speaker 1: sort of a sensational and cold way to treat these murders,
Speaker 1: I think, Um, but they had been you know, they
Speaker 1: had been all over their affair for years now. And
Speaker 1: then chuck one other thing about Julian Carlton. Have you
Speaker 1: ever been on that site find a grave dot com? Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: so I was on fine grave dot com. Part of
Speaker 1: part of the purpose, for those who don't know, is
Speaker 1: like to kind of memorialize, like leave a tribute or
Speaker 1: something to to the person, the dead person. Um. And
Speaker 1: sometimes it's very sweet, but other times it's very awkward.
Speaker 1: And this was an awkward case because there was like
Speaker 1: a little icon clearly shows up on every page on
Speaker 1: Finding Grave, but it said, what's one thing you'll always
Speaker 1: remember when you think of Julian? I'm like, probably the
Speaker 1: ax murder slash arson killing of seven people always remember
Speaker 1: he could really get a stain out of a rug
Speaker 1: right with gasoline. Yeah, very very good at that. You
Speaker 1: want to take a break, Yeah, let's take a break
Speaker 1: and we'll talk a little bit about Frank's later years.
Speaker 1: Right after this stuff you should know, h stuff you
Speaker 1: should know. So this murder really uh and of course
Speaker 1: the fire really really took a toll on Frank Lloyd right,
Speaker 1: Um for the next you know, twenty years, he really
Speaker 1: struggled with his work. Um, he struggled for uh, for
Speaker 1: his freedom from the press obviously, I mean, he was
Speaker 1: always in the press, but this it was worse now
Speaker 1: than ever. And he did not suffer long. Romantically though,
Speaker 1: he took up very quickly, uh with a woman named
Speaker 1: maud Miriam Hicks Noel. She went by Miriam, and she
Speaker 1: was an artist. She was a morphine addict. Um, she
Speaker 1: was a fan girl. She they had a terrible, terrible,
Speaker 1: abusive relationship. It seems like kind of both ways, like
Speaker 1: a bit of a Sid Nancy type thing, going from
Speaker 1: everything I could read. There were terrible people on both sides. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So they he met when she was very young. She
Speaker 1: said he hadn't been with me ten minutes before. He
Speaker 1: said your mine. And they had a tenure courtship that
Speaker 1: was very very dysfunctional, very mis bull And when he
Speaker 1: got divorced in nineteen twenty two from Kitty, uh, he
Speaker 1: decided at some point to marry I think about a
Speaker 1: year later, to marry Miriam with that old mistake, thinking
Speaker 1: things would be different once they get married. And that's
Speaker 1: not at all how it went. They ended up splitting
Speaker 1: up I think six months later, something like that. Um.
Speaker 1: He said that to oppose her now in the slightest
Speaker 1: degree meant violence. That's how how bad the relationship had become. Um.
Speaker 1: So it was. I get the impression from this. Uh
Speaker 1: this biographer Paul Hendrickson. The book he wrote, by the way,
Speaker 1: is called Dreams and Furies of Frank Lloyd Wright. UM.
Speaker 1: And it's like six hundred pages. I believe, um. But
Speaker 1: he he does not paint a very flattering picture of
Speaker 1: Miriam at all. No, no, not at all. Um. And
Speaker 1: like I said, they were not good for each other.
Speaker 1: It seems like uh Nino, after his divorce from Miriam,
Speaker 1: he gets married a third time, him to uh old Ivanna.
Speaker 1: Her name was Olga Lazovic Hinzenburg. She was married, She
Speaker 1: was a dancer. They met at a ballet where she
Speaker 1: was performing, and they actually had another kid. Frank had
Speaker 1: a seventh child with her, um, a little girl in
Speaker 1: n And Miriam comes back there and kind of tries
Speaker 1: to wreck their marriage too. Yeah. She like when they
Speaker 1: had their baby, she showed up at the hospital and
Speaker 1: made a scene, which is a pretty nasty move. Um.
Speaker 1: She refused to give him a divorce. She like would
Speaker 1: talk to the papers about him. Um. She she uh
Speaker 1: teamed up with Olga's ex husband or soon to be
Speaker 1: ex husband. Um. She she definitely worked against him, but
Speaker 1: I guess eventually either got bored or was bought off,
Speaker 1: or just kind of went away, because from what I
Speaker 1: can tell, Olga and Frank managed to carve out a
Speaker 1: happy married life for themselves. Um. From the nineteen twenties, Yeah,
Speaker 1: ninety four when they got married onward. I guess by
Speaker 1: the time once Miriam left the picture, they were able
Speaker 1: to kind of settle in until Frank's death in nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty nine. Yeah, and Miriam actually got him arrested at
Speaker 1: one point under the Man Act m A n N.
Speaker 1: Which was a law federal law that prohibits transport of
Speaker 1: women and children across state lines for the purposes of
Speaker 1: debauchery or prostitution. And I'm not really sure how that happened. Um,
Speaker 1: it did not stick, obviously. He spent a couple of
Speaker 1: nights in jail and then his the charges were dropped,
Speaker 1: but he went into a long dry spell work wise.
Speaker 1: Um did not get hired a ton over a certain
Speaker 1: period of time, and then from the thirties to fifty
Speaker 1: nine when he died, he did some of his best work,
Speaker 1: maybe perhaps of his career. Absolutely, Um. He it was
Speaker 1: during that time he did tali Us in West, which,
Speaker 1: like I said, you mean and I went to we
Speaker 1: went out to s Dotsdale, Um, and uh visited with
Speaker 1: our friends Blair and Aaron out there, who are Scottsdale peeps.
Speaker 1: And we went to tally Esen and it was just Chuck, dude,
Speaker 1: have you been to that one? Haven't been to Taliessen West? Now.
Speaker 1: It's it's really really cool, just the little just so
Speaker 1: many details about it and there's a lot of fountains,
Speaker 1: which is really refreshing in the desert. Um. It's just
Speaker 1: a really great, neat little place for sure, and a
Speaker 1: little I used that in the absolute wrong way. It's a.
Speaker 1: It's pretty big, it's a it's a very it's a
Speaker 1: charming place for sure. Yeah. And of course he did
Speaker 1: the Google him after that. Um. Yeah, so it was
Speaker 1: very productive period of his life. Um. Maybe should we
Speaker 1: do more in Frank Loord Right in the future as
Speaker 1: this it No, no, we'll we'll do the in true
Speaker 1: stuff you should know style and just chip away at
Speaker 1: different parts about his life and then do a full
Speaker 1: biography on him years down the road. Sounds good. I
Speaker 1: thought of another place I went a Frank Lord Ripe.
Speaker 1: There's a Florida Southern College or university I'm sorry, is
Speaker 1: um Frankloyd Right Design campus. It's amazing. You have to
Speaker 1: check that out too. You should check it out. There's
Speaker 1: like this really great covered walkway that you walk around everywhere,
Speaker 1: and it's just it's it's really neat. You just feel
Speaker 1: immersed in Frankloyd Right. It's not just you know, one
Speaker 1: building or one house, it's a whole whole campus. I
Speaker 1: love it. If you want to know more about franklod
Speaker 1: Right and just go out after the pandemic ends and
Speaker 1: start visiting some of his houses. And since I said
Speaker 1: after the pandemic ends, uh, let's optimistically go on too.
Speaker 1: Listener mail. No, no, sir, no listener mail today. I
Speaker 1: think today we should take a little bit of an
Speaker 1: opportunity to talk for a few minutes about our book.
Speaker 1: Everyone's been really patient while we've plugged the pre sale
Speaker 1: of this book. I think by the time this comes out,
Speaker 1: the book will be out. Is that right? Uh? Afterbably? Yeah,
Speaker 1: Jerry can make it so, I think it is. But
Speaker 1: if not, it's it's just before And uh, I finally
Speaker 1: got the books delivered to my house in hardcover edition
Speaker 1: and I got to hold it in my hand as
Speaker 1: have you, and dude, it's great. I'm really I'm really
Speaker 1: proud of the work that we did, along with Flat
Speaker 1: Iron or co writer Nils, who's just an amazing dude. Yes,
Speaker 1: our in our illustrator Carle Monardo, who did just an
Speaker 1: amazing job throughout the book of bringing like just passages
Speaker 1: that you didn't even think of just suddenly kind of
Speaker 1: came to life through our illustrations. Yeah, I mean, there's
Speaker 1: an illustration of Momo, there's an illustration of my daughter.
Speaker 1: They're nice little easter eggs in there. Uh. You know,
Speaker 1: we haven't talked a lot about the contents of the book.
Speaker 1: There are, um, we had a lot of fun with
Speaker 1: the with the notes at the bottom, the footnotes. It's
Speaker 1: really became kind of a fun part of the book.
Speaker 1: We mentioned I don't even have a lost count how
Speaker 1: many podcasts we mentioned, but we've notaate those in the end. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and there were plenty that we we missed, Like I
Speaker 1: did another like I shouldn't have done this, but I
Speaker 1: did another like um like fine tooth comb, like just
Speaker 1: scrape through of every word in the book. Of course
Speaker 1: you did um to see you know what what podcasts
Speaker 1: we needed to link to. And I was like, oh man,
Speaker 1: I found like fifty of these so far. And I
Speaker 1: emailed and was like, is it too late to add
Speaker 1: footnotes or podcast footnotes? And nearly kiss that time has
Speaker 1: come so edition, Yeah, yeah, exactly can we get these reprinted?
Speaker 1: But I have the number here. Actually we have listed
Speaker 1: in the book. We are referenced in the book. We
Speaker 1: have two d seventy four references to other podcasts. But
Speaker 1: here's a few of the chapters. We did. One on
Speaker 1: Murphy Beds, one on back masking, one on aging um,
Speaker 1: one on donuts. That's a great chapter. I love that chapter,
Speaker 1: what else, Kama Kaze, Demolition, Derby's it's like stuff you
Speaker 1: should know in book form. Is definitely And as we've said,
Speaker 1: like none of these are just like an entire podcast.
Speaker 1: It's more like, you know, we took maybe the history
Speaker 1: of something or you know, one just one aspect of
Speaker 1: one of the things and kind of dove into it
Speaker 1: and flesh it out like that. So hopefully we'll be
Speaker 1: able to turn these into full size, like podcast episodes
Speaker 1: one day. That's kind of our intent. But even if
Speaker 1: we don't, I think the book like really covers them
Speaker 1: in an enjoyable way. Totally. Jack Caborcian, that was a
Speaker 1: good one too, Keeping up with the Joneses. That's one
Speaker 1: of my favorite ones. Yeah. Yeah, there's like twenty seven
Speaker 1: just amazing chapters in there. Each one is better than
Speaker 1: the last, and then astoundingly it starts back over and
Speaker 1: somehow chapter one is better than chapter twenty seven. But
Speaker 1: you know, if you haven't bought it yet, I highly
Speaker 1: encourage you to. It makes a great gift. Um, even
Speaker 1: if the person doesn't even know who we are. It's
Speaker 1: it's in the great tradition, I think of the great
Speaker 1: bathroom readers. You can pick it up at any point
Speaker 1: in the book and read any chapter and it's and
Speaker 1: it's just a lot of fun. My daughter even likes
Speaker 1: it because the pictures and she loves looking at the
Speaker 1: back and going, there's you and Josh. I know, it's
Speaker 1: very cute. It is cute. So one other thing I
Speaker 1: want to say is like, we really appreciate you guys
Speaker 1: who have already pre ordered the book or who will
Speaker 1: buy the book, who bought the audio book, Um, that's
Speaker 1: available to um. But if you can't, if you're like
Speaker 1: I just don't have the money right now, or I
Speaker 1: don't feel like spending the money, I just like the podcast,
Speaker 1: that's fine too. Like we're not mad at you, UM,
Speaker 1: but we appreciate the people who have supported us by
Speaker 1: buying the book. UM. So thank you very much to
Speaker 1: everybody who has or will buy our book, because that's
Speaker 1: that's very kind of you and it means a lot
Speaker 1: to us. And you can look forward to a kid's
Speaker 1: version coming soon. Yes, right, yeah, eventually we're taking the
Speaker 1: same twenty seven chapters and kidifying it but without being patronizing.
Speaker 1: So that'll swear books right now. We're taking the swear
Speaker 1: words out the chapter I'm ascal didn't make the cut
Speaker 1: in the kid's book. And um, I think, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think this book is appropriate for kids as young
Speaker 1: as like probably twelve years old. It's not like it's
Speaker 1: it's not like it's dirty or anything. It's um it
Speaker 1: might just be a little advanced for younger kids, but
Speaker 1: we're gonna we're gonna make sure that the younger kids
Speaker 1: have their version too. Yes, it will make every twelve
Speaker 1: year old who reads our our the adult book really
Speaker 1: want mescal. So anyway, thanks to everyone who's bought. It's
Speaker 1: called Stuff you Should Know, an incomplete compendium of mostly
Speaker 1: interesting things. You can get it wherever books are sold.
Speaker 1: Of course, we encourage you to buy from independent bookstores
Speaker 1: if you can, to try and keep them in business. Yep,
Speaker 1: for sure. Um I guess that's it. Huh, that's it. Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: thanks everybody for hearing us out about our book spiel
Speaker 1: and if you bought the book or the audiobook, thank you.
Speaker 1: If you can't get we love you anyway. Um so
Speaker 1: don't worry about it. And if you want to get
Speaker 1: in touch with us, you can send us an email
Speaker 1: to Stuff Podcast at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff You
Speaker 1: should know. It is a production i art Radio. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts for My Heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Speaker 1: M hm hm