The Richmond Bus Line - 1923.

This is the cover of a small pamphlet I acquired last month. The publication appears to be announcing Richmond's first official bus line - to begin February 1, 1923. Streetcars were still the main public transportation. It was not until 1949 that buses completely took over - when the streetcars were taken off the streets of Richmond.

The route does not appear to conflict with the existing streetcar lines in the city.
Click on the image for a larger view.

This is the third page and back cover of the pamphlet. Who knew that the Sydnor and Hundley building at 108 East Grace Street was the heart of the city?

- Ray

"My God, When Are They Going to Do That?” The Lessons of 1972 and the Future of Capitol Square

With the proposed replacement or renovation of the General Assembly Building, which stands on the edge of Capitol Square, our planners and politicians, our architects and bureaucrats would do well to recall some monumentally bad designs for Capitol Square that came dangerously close to fruition.  Like a proposal to radically modify the seat of government in the early 1970s, today’s discussion is sadly influenced by the need for parking.  We should remember the admonition of Richmond’s pioneer architectural historian and preservationist, Mary Wingfield Scott, from 40 years ago, to beware those “bright little ideas” that forever change the face of our historic buildings and sites.

Almost since the first bureaucrat moved in, found his desk, sharpened his quill pens, and commenced the business of the Commonwealth of Virginia, the State Capitol has been short of room, to the point the State Armory was once housed in the attic.  As early as the 1850s, Richmond architect Albert Lybrock drew up a plan to expand the Capitol to accommodate Virginia’s growing bureaucracy.  The wings added between 1904 and 1906 changed the interior arrangement of the Capitol, but an increasingly complex government called for more State employees and politicians, many of who brought with them a growing number of automobiles.

A breathtakingly bad scheme was proposed in 1949: that the entire Capitol Square complex be abandoned and the State government be moved to the western end of Monument Avenue.  There, on a tract roughly bordered by Glenside Avenue and Three Chopt Road, a campus of brutally unattractive buildings were to be erected for the State government, including an airport.  While this congregation of buildings, incongruously looming above the trees at the end of Monument Avenue became the seat of government, the old Capitol would be converted to a “shrine to the South.”  The proponents of this scheme were soon swamped by a tsunami of outrage and the plan was shelved.

A photograph of a model of the State Capitol, showing the 1953 “four wing” proposal to expand the building.

The next proposal was to simply clone the 1906 wings and stick them behind the original additions.  This drew the immediate ire of Mary Wingfield Scott, who wrote, “This simple and beautiful building would be far more beautiful without the wings added 50 years ago, let alone a second sprouting.”  Her withering condemnation of the quadruple-wing proposal included the politicians who cooked up the idea.  Scott called for the protection of “one of the most beautiful and historic buildings in this country from the bright little ideas of those whose political power is out of proportion to their taste and knowledge.”

In 1972, the assault on the Capitol reached new heights with the allocation of $30 million to “improve” State facilities in, around, and even under Capitol Square.  The plan for Capitol Square at first glance appears to be an attempt to conceal a suburban shopping mall by lifting Jefferson’s Capitol and tucking it in the hillside.  While the 1970s are not a decade famous for architectural sensitivity, nevertheless the reaction to this grotesque insertion of 300,000 square feet of offices, meeting rooms, restaurants, and parking was as adamant as it was vocal.  “In spite of assurances to the contrary from the three architectural, planning and consulting firms that drew up the proposed addition, it is doubtful that Mr. Jefferson would rejoice in the suggestion that his Capitol be plopped atop a cement pillbox,” wrote the Richmond News Leader.  Richmonders, when they saw the perspective drawing of the design, wrote to the newspapers, describing the proposal as “absurd,” “idiotic,” and “just plain dumb.” 

This artist’s conception shows the proposed design, which happily, never came to pass.

One of the most searing comments on the proposal to revamp Capitol Square was written by Pete Wyrick in his “Art and Urban Aesthetics” column in the News Leader in January 1973.  Wyrick sarcastically proposed awards for missteps in Richmond planning and architecture, but reserved special recognition for the plan to undermine the Capitol that “eclipsed, by a substantial margin, any other examples of architectural banality, environmental desecration and just plain bad taste that has been previously seen or discussed in 1972.”  Terming the design a “neo-Babylonian monstrosity,” Wyrick said the entire south slope of the Square “would be effaced, and in its place would be a Cecil B. De Mille inspired ziggurat crowned by the present capitol building.”  “If this plan is put in effect it probably will have the single most disastrous effect upon Richmond’s architectural heritage since the conflagration of 1865,” Wyrick wrote, and that it represented “a thoroughly distasteful assault upon the sense and sensibilities of the citizens of Virginia.”

When one of the consulting architects boldly maintained that the proposal would actually enhance and preserve the Capitol and that Jefferson himself would probably approve of the scheme, Wyrick countered by urging the combined architects and politicians who proposed this mess be awarded “the International King Nebuchadnezzar II Architectural Medal.”

This model of the 1972 Capitol Square modifications is now in the collection of the Library of Virginia.

Mercifully, the plan to butcher Capitol Square was never put in place and the idea, despite backing by some powerful members of the legislature, died unmourned and unloved.  The model of the proposal, showing its tiny toy trees groping through the concrete mesa above them and minuscule Virginians staggering through the shimmering heat of what was once the shady slopes of Capitol Square, was put in storage.  In 1999, the model was moved to the collection of the Library of Virginia as being a very real, albeit unbuilt, part of the history of Capitol Square. Virginia Cavalcade magazine recorded the reactions of Richmonders who peered down through the Plexiglas lid while the model was wheeled across Broad Street.  “”My God, when are they going to do that?” was the generally horrified reaction, a fitting epitaph for the latest in a series of plans for the Capitol Square that never was.”

Hopefully, those who steer the proposal to replace or modify the General Assembly Building will recall the horrid design from the early 1970s, lest they be doomed to repeat the missteps their predecessors so heartily endorsed 40 years ago.  A “high rise” design has been mentioned as the replacement for the existing buildings.  A tall building on the edge of Capitol Square will create a shadow that will fall across some of Virginia’s most important architecture and further hide the works of our lawmakers in a gloom ironically created by their own lair.  If anything at all is needed in the halls of power in Capitol Square, it’s more sunshine - and the resolve to avoid the stupidities of the past.

- Selden.

A Day in Rock, Friday, Dec. 15th, 1989 - Richmond's entry. From Spin Magazine, April, 1990.

 

I remember this item from Spin Magazine from years ago (24 years ago to be exact). I had ripped it out of the magazine to save. That didn't work out - lost it years ago.  So I recently found it through Google Books. It is from the April 1990 issue of Spin Magazine - from a larger article called "Rock Around the Clock: A Day in the Life of Rock and Roll" - that day being Friday, Dec. 15, 1989. The article includes entries from across the nation for that particular day - focusing on well known and local rock acts, on large and small venues, recording studios, etc. They even included Richmond.

The Richmond entry:

5:30 - Flood Zone - Richmond, Virginia.  

The Good Guys whipped into "Right Back at You" during their sound check. The horns wailed, the bass throbbed, Jimi Gore sweated. The executive types unwinding at the bar hollered for more. 

While Tom Brokaw did his segment on hard rock college on his TV broadcast, White Heat unloaded their equipment.

The Sun went down. It got cold. Dirt Woman, Richmond's replacement for Divine, strolled down Grace Street in the "battle zone" outside Newgate. Friday night was officially underway.  

To see the original article, click HERE. 

- Ray 

Carl Lindner Designs A New House for Mr. Brady

James P. Brady, Deputy Clerk of the United States District Court, joined the ranks of the affluent Richmonders moving to what was then considered the far reaches of the West End.  Brady bought a lot in Hampton Gardens, a neighborhood laid out in 1913 between Grove and Patterson Avenues. Brady’s was to be the first home built on Oak Lane.  A glimpse of the rest of the Hampton Gardens neighborhood where the house was constructed can be seen in a photo of that appeared in the July 1924 issue of a trade magazine called American Builder.  In the photo a small tree has been planted in the front yard of the new Brady residence, but in the background there is nothing other than former farm fields stretching south toward Grove Avenue.

Brady hired Carl M. Lindner (1895-1973), one of several cousins who were Richmond architects. Lindner was said to have learned his craft in the office of his uncle, the popular architect Carl Ruehrmund.  As early as his mid-1920s, Lindner had been hired for some impressive commissions, not the least of which was St. John’s Evangelical Lutheran Church (1920-1928) on Stuart Circle.  By 1924 Lindner had numerous homes, commercial buildings and apartments to his credit all around Richmond.

 Photo of Brady house from American Builder, 1924.

American Builder reviewed Lindner’s design for James Brady, and commented that the design was a successful exercise in “making established architectural types conform to the requirements of the modern age.”  Although the article declares the Brady home was “…was conceived in the best Colonial Tradition by the architect…” the house is an eclectic blend of several Revival styles with Classical and Craftsman touches thrown in.  A handsome building, the interior arrangement reflects the affluence of the owners, with rooms labeled “Butler’s Pantry” and “Maid’s Room,” indicative of the social status of the Brady family. Unlike many of its contemporaries built in Richmond during the period, the columned entry porch on the house is oddly shallow, but two side porches were no doubt a welcome feature in the heat and humidity of summer.  

Detail of Brady house front entrance from American Builder.

The exterior combines clapboard and stucco, and American Builder noted the “irregular and rectangular texture of the roofing material is one which blends well with the substantial character of the home and one which will retain its characteristics indefinitely.”  Lindner appears to have admired the rustic effect of  irregular roof shingles as he used them on several of the homes he designed in the 3100 block of Monument Avenue.

 Carl Lindner’s open-air catalog of his designs,

located in the 3100 block of Monument Avenue. 

The ten houses designed by Lindner take advantage of a very narrow block bounded by Monument and Cleveland Avenues and West Franklin Streets.  The homes are uniquely positioned on a north and south axis, which positions their fronts stepped at an angle to Monument Avenue.  The block of houses form an outdoor gallery of Lindner’s abilities to craft beautifully detailed urban villas in various Revival styles.  Ranging from Tudor Revival to Spanish Revival to Colonial, the variety of styles collected in such a compact display is a delight.  The house at 3123 is an exercise in the Spanish Revival style whose arched open porch and decorative black iron balcony are similar to those on the Brady house.  

 Lindner’s design for 3123 Monument has some of the same Spanish Revival elements found in the house he designed for Mr. Brady.

Carl Lindner himself lived at 3129 in the row of houses on Monument Avenue he designed, a nicely detailed example of the Tudor Revival.  Just as his cousin Max Ruehrmund designed the Halifax Apartments at 3009 Monument and resided next door in a home Ruehrmund designed, Lindner’s elegant 1923 Lord Fairfax Apartments anchors the eastern end of the block where Lindner lived in the center of a showcase of his considerable skill.  The Lord Fairfax Apartments, on the pointed end of the block overlooking the Matthew Fontaine Maury monument, overcame the problems presented by this radically narrow lot and as a consequence defied the usual Richmond apartment house model.  Lindner reserved the Monument Avenue side of the building for formal entrances leading into small lobbies.  On the opposite side of the building overlooking West Franklin Street, classical columns frame elegant porches while service entrances are concealed in interior courts.

Carl Lindner’s own Tudor Revival house the architect designed for himself, located at 3129 Monument Avenue.

Ninety years ago the American Builder termed Lindner’s design for Mr. Brady “…construction of the sort which will withstand the test of years and meet the approval of succeeding generations.”  This has apparently proven to be true, and the house on Oak Lane appears to be as loved and well maintained as it was when James Brady received the keys from the builder.  While the landscape has matured and softened, the house itself is still just as resplendent in white stucco and clapboards as it was ninety years ago.  

The Brady house that was pictured in American Builder in 1924, seen here ninety years later.

- Selden.