Harold C. Bradley House, also known as Mrs. Josephine Crane Bradley Residence, is a Prairie School home designed by Louis H. Sullivan and

George Grant Elmslie George Grant Elmslie (February 20, 1869 – April 23, 1952) was a Scottish-born American Prairie School architect whose work is mostly found in the Midwestern United States. He worked with Louis Sullivan and later with William Gray Purcell as ...

. It is located in the University Heights Historic District of

Madison, Wisconsin Madison is the county seat of Dane County and the capital city of the U.S. state of Wisconsin. As of the 2020 census the population was 269,840, making it the second-largest city in Wisconsin by population, after Milwaukee, and the 80th-lar ...

, United States. A

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...

, it is one of just a few residential designs by Sullivan, and one of only two Sullivan designs in Wisconsin.

History

When

Harold C. Bradley Harold Cornelius Bradley (November 25, 1878 – January 4, 1976) was a professor of biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin. Bradley relocated to Madison in 1906, where he was one of the first three staff members of the new University of ...

, a biochemistry professor at the UW and a founder of the

Hoofers Club The Hoofers Club was an African-American entertainment establishment and dancers' club hangout in Harlem, New York, that ran from the early 1920s until the early 1940s. It was founded and managed by Lonnie Hicks (1882–1953), an Atlanta-born ragt ...

, married Josephine Crane, her grandfather Richard T. Crane built this house for them as a present. Money was not a concern, and Crane hired the prestigious Chicago firm of Louis Sullivan to design a large home in the then-popular Prairie style. The house is two stories with a T-shaped footprint, with distinctive cantilevered sections that hold sleeping porches. (A sleeping porch was a way to deal with hot summer nights before there was air conditioning.) At the back is a

porte-cochère A porte-cochère (; , late 17th century, literally 'coach gateway'; plural: porte-cochères, portes-cochères) is a doorway to a building or courtyard, "often very grand," through which vehicles can enter from the street or a covered porch-like ...

. The architects also designed furniture, rugs, draperies and fixtures inside. Though Sullivan was the principal of the firm, George Elmslie may have designed much of the house and furnishings.

joined the architectural partnership of

Adler & Sullivan Adler & Sullivan was an architectural firm founded by Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan in Chicago. Among its projects was the multi-purpose Auditorium Building in Chicago and the Wainwright Building skyscraper in St Louis. In 1883 Louis Sullivan was ...

in 1888. Following the dismissal of

Frank Lloyd Wright Frank Lloyd Wright (June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright played a key role in the architectural movements o ...

from the firm, and especially once the partnership dissolved, Elmslie's role under

Louis Sullivan Louis Henry Sullivan (September 3, 1856 – April 14, 1924) was an American architect, and has been called a "father of skyscrapers" and "father of modernism". He was an influential architect of the Chicago School, a mentor to Frank Lloy ...

increased. Elmslie was entrusted with the design of the main facade of the

Gage Building The Gage Group Buildings consist of three buildings located at 18, 24 and 30 S. Michigan Avenue, between Madison Street and Monroe Street, in Chicago, Illinois. They were built from 1890–1899, designed by Holabird & Roche for the three milline ...

and of all of the details of the

Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company Building The Sullivan Center, formerly known as the Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company Building or Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company Store, is a commercial building at 1 South State Street at the corner of East Madison Street in Chicago, Illinois. Louis S ...

. The Bradley House was designed at a time when Sullivan's architectural practice was starting to fail. Once considered the foremost designer of skyscrapers, Sullivan now struggled to secure commissions and often sparred with clients. The Bradley House was "designed by Elmslie with only occasional suggestions from Sullivan." All drawings of the building were sketched by Elmslie and many of the architectural details are consistent with the style he would develop later in his career with

William Gray Purcell William Gray Purcell (July 2, 1880April 11, 1965) was a Prairie School architect in the Midwestern United States. He partnered with George Grant Elmslie, and briefly with George Feick. The firm of Purcell & Elmslie produced designs for building ...

. The Bradley House was the last building Elmslie designed while with Sullivan; he left to partner with Purcell in 1909. An elaborate design was initially planned for the Bradley House with a cruciform design. It featured a living room and force to the rear, a library and kitchen on the two wings, and a

on the main entrance. Bays projected out of the house, lined with casement windows. However, the Bradleys rejected this draft as too large. Elmslie reenvisioned the house on a smaller scale and included a pair of cantilevered sleeping porches on the second floor. Sullivan was probably responsible for the idea of the sleeping porches, though Elmslie was responsible for integrating them into the final design. Elmslie was not satisfied with the result when the house was completed. The Bradleys lived in the house only a few years. Even after reducing the size, they still found it too big and expensive to maintain. They hired George Elmslie again, now partnered with William Purcell, to design a smaller Prairie style home with sleeping porches about two miles to the northwest at 2914 Oxford Road in Shorewood Hills. They moved there around 1915. Since then, the first house has been occupied and maintained by the

Sigma Phi Society The Sigma Phi Society () was founded on the Fourth of March in the year 1827, on the campus of Union College as a part of the Union Triad in Schenectady, New York. It is the second Greek fraternal organization founded in the United States.

University of Wisconsin–Madison A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United Stat ...

chapter. The Harold C. Bradley House was entered in the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

in 1973 and declared a

in 1976.
The blueprints of the Bradley House are held in the Illinois History and Lincoln Collections at the

University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the Univer ...

Library in Urbana–Champaign.

Gallery

Bradley House Madison.jpg Bradley House living room.jpg , Living room Bradley House wall lamp.jpg Bradley House dining room.jpg , Dining room Bradley House staircase.jpg Bradley House staircase detail.jpg Bradley House staircase balustrade.jpg Bradley House chair.jpg Bradley House built-in desk.jpg , Built-in desk Bradley House study.jpg , Study Bradley House ceiling lamp.jpg Bradley House study - detail.jpg Bradley House study - fireplace art tiles.jpg , Art tiles in fireplace

References

External links

*
Bradley House blueprints
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bradley, Harold C., House Houses in Madison, Wisconsin Fraternity and sorority houses Houses completed in 1909 Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Wisconsin Louis Sullivan buildings National Historic Landmarks in Wisconsin George Grant Elmslie buildings Sigma Phi National Register of Historic Places in Madison, Wisconsin University of Wisconsin–Madison Prairie School architecture in Wisconsin Historic district contributing properties in Wisconsin

History

Gallery

See also

References

External links