A Pictorial History of Architecture in America by G. E. Kidder Smith, Marshall B. Davidson, and: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater: The House and Its History by Donald Hoffmann (review)
1979; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 20; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/tech.1979.a890547
ISSN1097-3729
Autores Tópico(s)American Environmental and Regional History
ResumoTECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 645 tions,” “Transitional Work,” “The Permanent System,” and “Land Frontier Forts.” These illustrations have been carefully selected, and many have both artistic and dramatic quality suitable for framing. The eight lithographs of paintings by noted landscape artist Seth Eastman (an army general and one-time architect of the U.S. Capitol) are particularly compelling, both as art and in what they reveal about fortifications of that period. Most plans are overhead views, and understanding is hampered by the required reduction in size (approximately 6Y2 X 9 inches, in most cases). Additionally, many plans use script rather than printed letters, and are keyed to explanation codes often too small to read as re produced. Obviously, Robinson has selected the best available mate rials for inclusion in his survey volume, and these handicaps are merely another example of the importance of using original sources in research. The only unanswered question occurring to this reviewer was how these forts related to the U.S. Army’s Coast Artillery Corps during the late 19th and early 20th century. Perhaps this issue is more one of ordnance than fortification. But for persons to whom names such as the Presidio of San Fran cisco, Fort Moultrie, Fort Monroe, Fort Sumter, Fort Leavenworth, or Fort Laramie bring nostalgic appeal, this is clearly a book of inesti mable value. Robinson has done his homework well. As an architect, author, historian, illustrator, and scholar he has produced a worthy volume suitable for student, military or architectural historian, and aficionado alike. David L. Woods* A Pictorial History ofArchitecture in America. By G. E. Kidder Smith and Marshall B. Davidson. 2 vols. New York: American Heritage Pub lishing Co., 1976. Pp. 1-412, 421-832; illustrations. $45.00 the set. Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater: The House and Its History. By Donald Hoffmann. New York: Dover Publications, 1978. Pp. xi+ 98; illus trations, bibliographical notes. $5.00 (paper). Except for William Jordy’s monographic series, American Architects and Their Buildings, there is no comprehensive history of American architecture. The works of Kimball, Mumford, and Tallmadge, which aimed either at giving us such a history or at least interpreting it for us, were published more than fifty years ago, and the more recent book by Burchard and Bush-Brown (1961) is so much concerned with social *Dk. Woods has been the special assistant to the Chief of Naval Material since 1970. Last summer, he became enamored of military fortifications during two weeks active duty in Bermuda as a commander with the Naval Reserve. 646 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE and cultural developments as to leave little space for architecture. Re gional, local, topical, and period studies, taken together, are un balanced in coverage to the point where much of the corpus of Amer ican building remains largely undescribed. As a consequence of this deplorable state of affairs, the sumptuous photographic collections before us, however unsatisfactory as historiography, are all we have in the way of a panoramic view of the American art. At the very least the two volumes may be regarded as a fundamental body of illustrations for the book that no one seems to want to write. Smith is a widely honored architectural photographer, and the editors of the American Heritage enterprise made no pretense of offering more than a com prehensive pictorial record that Smith laboriously assembled by traveling 130,000 miles, camera at the ready, in all fifty of the states. The written text, in radical contrast, covers less than 7 percent of the pages. Such a work, clearly aimed at the coffee-table trade, possesses inherent limitations and weaknesses, but it also reveals certain virtues that may serve to satisfy our need until something better comes along. The United States and its colonial antecedents have produced in the four centuries of their history the most diversified volume of building among the nations of the world over a comparable period of time, and that immense diversity is still plainly visible in the con structed fabric that survives at the present day. Perhaps the greatest virtue of the Smith-Davidson volumes is the sweeping revelation they offer of this immense variety of forms, materials...
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