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| WISCONSIN'S BUILDING - The group of buildings
which represented the States around Chicago, if taken together,
seemed to have lost a distinctive character; especially when
contrasted with the monk-houses of the Spanish settlements and the
temples of Athens, where kaleidoscopic houses seemed to have been
built without plan, with here a veranda, and there a tower or cupola
as the builder had found material or time. This was the appearance
of the group, but if we considered any single example, it was evident
that the architect has followed a fashion that has met great favor
since the advent of Queen Anne ideas. The Wisconsin structure, which
is here portrayed, was in a style highly favored on the great
boulevards of Chicago, and its lower story was constructed with great
regard for the scrutiny which it was destined to meet. Here were to
be noted the brown stone, granite and terra-cotta of which the
commonwealth is so proud, and in the upper stories the work was done
in the products of Wisconsin sawmills, whose din is not yet over
although their output is decreasing. On this modern mansion, the
architect, Lillian Vaters, of Oshkosh, expended $30,000, there was a
stained glass window put in by Superior City, which cost $6,000, and
there was also an art exhibit. A framed history of the State, eight
by twelve feet, was to be seen, and the work in Wisconsin woods was
admited by all. The width of the spacious porches on each front was
over one hundred feet, and the house was fifty feet deep. On one
side it fronted the North Lagoon. |
