William Wesley Peters
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William Wesley Peters (June 12, 1912 – July 17, 1991) was an American architect and engineer, apprentice to and protégé 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 ...
.


Early life

Wes, as he was known to friends and associates, was born in Terre Haute, Indiana on June 12, 1912. He was the elder of two children born to Frederick Romer Peters and Claire Adelaide ( née Margedant) Peters. His sister, Margedant Peters, was the wife of S. I. Hayakawa, the 9th President of
San Francisco State University San Francisco State University (commonly referred to as San Francisco State, SF State and SFSU) is a public research university in San Francisco. As part of the 23-campus California State University system, the university offers 118 different ...
who served as a
United States senator The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States. The composition and powe ...
from California. His mother was an editor and activist and his father, an Ohio native and son of a Methodist minister, was the founding editor of the ''
Evansville Press Evansville is a city in, and the county seat of, Vanderburgh County, Indiana, Vanderburgh County, Indiana, United States. The population was 118,414 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the state's List of cities in Indiana, ...
'' and ''Terre Haute Post'', and was later inducted into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame. He was educated at
Evansville College The University of Evansville (UE) is a private university in Evansville, Indiana. It was founded in 1854 as Moores Hill College. The university operates a satellite center, Harlaxton College, in Grantham, England. UE offers more than 80 diff ...
(now the University of Evansville) and went on to two years at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...
.


Career

Instead of returning to MIT, Peters went to Spring Green, Wisconsin, to join Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin Fellowship as, apparently, its first apprentice when it began in 1932. Wright wrote about Peters in his own autobiography:
Among the very first to come in to the Fellowship, a tall dark-eyed young man turned up at Taliesin. He was the son of an Evansville editor…. The lad came from a course in engineering at Massachusetts Tech, was a fountain of energetic loyalty to the ideas for which Taliesin stood. He soon took a leading hand in whatever went on. His mind was alert, his character independent and generous. He was young—about nineteen….Frank Lloyd Wright. ''An Autobiography'', in ''Frank Lloyd Wright Collected Writings, volume 4'': 1939-49. Edited by Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer, introduction by Kenneth Frampton (Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., New York City, 1994), 176.
He remained extremely loyal to the Wright organization throughout his entire career. Among his accomplishments were assisting Wright in the construction of
Fallingwater Fallingwater is a house designed by the architect Frank Lloyd Wright in 1935 in the Laurel Highlands of southwest Pennsylvania, about southeast of Pittsburgh in the United States. It is built partly over a waterfall on Bear Run in the Mill R ...
and the Johnson Wax administration building in
Racine Jean-Baptiste Racine ( , ) (; 22 December 163921 April 1699) was a French dramatist, one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France, along with Molière and Corneille as well as an important literary figure in the Western traditi ...
. Peters was responsible for the structural designs of the
Guggenheim Museum The Guggenheim Museums are a group of museums in different parts of the world established (or proposed to be established) by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation. Museums in this group include: Locations Americas * The Solomon R. Guggenhei ...
and for the laboratory tower at Johnson Wax, among many other projects. Peters and
Taliesin Associates Taliesin Associated Architects was an architectural firm founded by apprentices of Frank Lloyd Wright to carry on his architectural vision after his death in 1959. The firm disbanded in 2003. It was headquartered at Taliesin West in Scottsdale, A ...
are credited with the design for the
Kaden Tower Kaden Tower is a 15-story office building at 6100 Dutchmans Lane in suburban Louisville, Kentucky. The building opened in 1966 as the headquarters for Lincoln Income Life Insurance Company and was originally named Lincoln Tower.Encyclopedia of Lo ...
in
Louisville, Kentucky Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border ...
, the
San Jose Center for the Performing Arts The San Jose Center for the Performing Arts is a performing arts venue located in Downtown San Jose, California. It opened in 1972 and is now home to San Jose Dance Theatre and Broadway San Jose. History The theater opened in 1972 the architect w ...
in
San Jose, California San Jose, officially San José (; ; ), is a major city in the U.S. state of California that is the cultural, financial, and political center of Silicon Valley and largest city in Northern California by both population and area. With a 2020 popu ...
, and the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall in
Sarasota, Florida Sarasota () is a city in Sarasota County on the Gulf Coast of the U.S. state of Florida. The area is renowned for its cultural and environmental amenities, beaches, resorts, and the Sarasota School of Architecture. The city is located in the sou ...
. Peters also designed the
Pearl Palace ) , native_name_lang = Persian , former_names = Kakh-e ُMorvarid ( fa, كاخ مروارید) , alternate_names = Kakh-e Shams, Shams Palace, Morvarid Palace , image = Pearl Palace -Kakh e Morvarid- Karaj Iran.jpg , image_alt = , caption = ...
in
Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
on request from Princess
Shams Pahlavi Shams Pahlavi ( fa, شمس پهلوی; – ) was an Iranian royal of the Pahlavi dynasty, who was the elder sister of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran. During her brother's reign she was the president of the Red Lion and Sun Soc ...
.


Later life

Upon Wright's death in 1959, he became chairman of
Taliesin Associated Architects Taliesin Associated Architects was an architectural firm founded by apprentices of Frank Lloyd Wright to carry on his architectural vision after his death in 1959. The firm disbanded in 2003. It was headquartered at Taliesin West in Scottsdale, A ...
, and in 1985, he became Chairman of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, serving until his death in 1991. In 1990, he gave an interview to Wolfgang von Freeden from
Lübeck Lübeck (; Low German also ), officially the Hanseatic City of Lübeck (german: Hansestadt Lübeck), is a city in Northern Germany. With around 217,000 inhabitants, Lübeck is the second-largest city on the German Baltic coast and in the state ...
, Germany, about his life and work, including his part in realising Tehran's "
Pearl Palace ) , native_name_lang = Persian , former_names = Kakh-e ُMorvarid ( fa, كاخ مروارید) , alternate_names = Kakh-e Shams, Shams Palace, Morvarid Palace , image = Pearl Palace -Kakh e Morvarid- Karaj Iran.jpg , image_alt = , caption = ...
" with the help of glass craftsmen from Murano, Italy.


Personal life

In 1935, he married Wright's step-daughter, Svetlana Hinzenberg Wright (1917–1946), who had just turned eighteen years old. Together, Svetlana and Wes had two children: * Brandoch Peters (b. 1941), a cello prodigy who spent most of his adult life raising sheep. * Daniel Peters (1944–1946), who died aged two in an automobile accident with his mother. Svetlana, who was pregnant with their third child, and their son Daniel died in an automobile accident in 1946, after which Peters raised their other son, Brandoch, though he spent most of his youth with the Wrights since Peters was travelling for work often. Peters later briefly married Svetlana Alliluyeva (1926–2011), the youngest child and only daughter of
Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secretar ...
, in a union arranged by his former mother-in-law,
Olgivanna Lloyd Wright Olgivanna Lloyd Wright (born Olga Ivanovna Lazović; December 27, 1898 – March 1, 1985) was the third and final wife of architect Frank Lloyd Wright, whom she met in November 1924. The two married in 1928. In 1932 the couple founded Wright's ar ...
. Before their marriage on April 12, 1970, Alliluyeva had defected from the
Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
, renounced her father's tyrannical rule and come to the United States in 1967. Before divorcing in 1973, the couple had one daughter: * Olga Peters (later known as Chrese Evans) (b. 1971)


Legacy

The William Wesley Peters Library at
The School of Architecture at Taliesin The School of Architecture is a private architecture school in Paradise Valley, Arizona. It was founded in 1986 as an accredited school by surviving members of the Taliesin Fellowship. The school offers a Master of Architecture program that focuse ...
, which contains a collection of over 32,000 volumes, is named in his honor.


References


External links


William Wesley Peters Memorial Library at Taliesin West

William Wesley Peters Papers
at the Pacific Coast Architecture Database {{DEFAULTSORT:Peters, William Wesley 1912 births 1991 deaths People from Terre Haute, Indiana University of Evansville alumni Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni 20th-century American engineers Frank Lloyd Wright 20th-century American architects Architects from Wisconsin Engineers from Wisconsin Architects from Indiana Engineers from Indiana