The National Park Architecture Sourcebook by PA Press

The National Park Architecture Sourcebook Harvey H. Kaiser Princeton Architectural Press New York

Published by Princeton Architectural Press 37 East Seventh Street New York, New York 10003 For a free catalog of books, call 1.800.722.6657. Visit our web site at www.papress.com. © 2008 Princeton Architectural Press All rights reserved Printed and bound in China 11 10 09 08 4 3 2 1 First edition No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission from the publisher, except in the context of reviews. Every reasonable attempt has been made to identify owners of copyright. Errors or omissions will be corrected in subsequent editions. Editor: Lauren Nelson Packard Designer: Jan Haux Special thanks to: Nettie Aljian, Sara Bader, Dorothy Ball, Nicola Bednarek, Janet Behning, Becca Casbon, Penny (Yuen Pik) Chu, Russell Fernandez, Pete Fitzpatrick, Wendy Fuller, Clare Jacobson, Nancy Eklund Later, Linda Lee, Laurie Manfra, Katharine Myers, Jennifer Thompson, Paul Wagner, Joseph Weston, and Deb Wood of Princeton Architectural Press —Kevin C. Lippert, publisher Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Kaiser, Harvey H., 1936The National Park architecture sourcebook / Harvey H. Kaiser. —1st ed. p. cm. ISBN 978-1-56898-742-2 (alk. paper) 1. Architecture—United States—Guidebooks. 2. Historic buildings—United States—Guidebooks. 3. National parks and reserves—United States— Guidebooks. I. Title. NA705.K35 2008 725.70973—dc22 2007044230

Table of Contents 6

List of Parks

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Far West and Pacific

Alaska

California

Hawaii

Oregon

Washington

Southwest

313

South

Arizona

314

Alabama

117

Nevada

319

Arkansas

120

New Mexico

327

Florida

140

Texas

344

Georgia

153

Utah

354

Kentucky

361

Louisiana

368

Mississippi

165

Rockies and Plains

166

Colorado

376

North Carolina

183

Idaho

386

South Carolina

186

Kansas

392

Tennessee

199

Missouri

401

Virginia

429

West Virginia

211

Montana

220

Nebraska

225

Oklahoma

433

Mid-Atlantic

229

North Dakota

434

District of Columbia

236

South Dakota

455

Maryland

243

Wyoming

473

New Jersey

479

New York

516

Pennsylvania

265

Midwest

266

Illinois

269

Indiana

543

New England

275

Iowa

544

Connecticut

278

Michigan

547

Maine

290

Minnesota

551

Massachusetts

293

Ohio

591

New Hampshire

307

Wisconsin

594

Rhode Island

597

Vermont

List of Parks Alabama Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site Tuskegee Institute National Historic Site Alaska Klondike Gold Rush National Historic Park Sitka National Historical Park Arizona Casa Grande Ruins National Monument Chiricahua National Monument Fort Bowie National Historic Site Grand Canyon National Park Hubbell Trading Post National Historic Site Montezuma Castle National Monument Petrified Forest National Park Pipe Spring National Monument Tumacácori National Historical Park Tuzigoot National Monument Wupatki National Monument Arkansas Fort Smith National Historic Site Hot Springs National Park Pea Ridge National Military Park California Cabrillo National Monument Death Valley National Park Eugene O’Neill National Historic Site Fort Point National Historic Site Golden Gate National Recreation Area John Muir National Historic Site Lassen Volcanic National Park Manzanar National Historic Site Point Reyes National Seashore San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks Yosemite National Park Colorado Bent’s Old Fort National Historic Site Dinosaur National Monument Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument Hovenweep National Monument Mesa Verde National Park Rocky Mountain National Park Connecticut Weir Farm National Historic Site District of Columbia Ford’s Theatre National Historic Site Frederick Douglass National Historic Site Lincoln Memorial Mary McLeod Bethune Council House National Historic Site National Mall Rock Creek Park Sewall-Belmont House National Historic Site Thomas Jefferson Memorial Washington Monument White House (President’s Park) Florida Biscayne National Park Castillo de San Marcos National Monument Dry Tortugas National Park Fort Caroline National Memorial Fort Matanzas National Monument Gulf Islands National Seashore Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve

Georgia Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park Fort Pulaski National Monument Jimmy Carter National Historic Site Martin Luther King, Jr., National Historic Site Hawaii Kalaupapa National Historical Park Pu’uhonua o Hònaunau National Historical Park USS Arizona Memorial Idaho Nez Perce National Historical Park Illinois Lincoln Home National Historic Site Indiana George Rogers Clark National Historical Park Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial Iowa Herbert Hoover National Historic Site Kansas Brown v. Board of Education National Historic Site Fort Larned National Historic Site Fort Scott National Historic Site Nicodemus National Historic Site Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve Kentucky Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site Cumberland Gap National Historical Park Mammoth Cave National Park Louisiana Cane River Creole National Historical Park Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve Maine Acadia National Park Maryland Antietam National Battlefield Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park Clara Barton National Historic Site Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine Fort Washington Park Hampton National Historic Site Thomas Stone National Historic Site Massachusetts Adams National Historical Park Boston African American National Historic Site Boston National Historical Park Cape Cod National Seashore Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site John Fitzgerald Kennedy National Historic Site Longfellow National Historic Site Lowell National Historical Park Minute Man National Historical Park New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park Salem Maritime National Historic Site Saugus Iron Works National Historic Site Springfield Armory National Historic Site Michigan Father Marquette National Memorial Isle Royale National Park Keweenaw National Historical Park Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore

Minnesota Grand Portage National Monument Mississippi Gulf Islands National Seashore Natchez National Historical Park Vicksburg National Military Park Missouri George Washington Carver National Monument Harry S. Truman National Historic Site Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Ulysses S. Grant National Historic Site Wilson’s Creek National Battlefield Montana Glacier National Park Grant-Kohrs Ranch National Historic Site Nebraska Homestead National Monument of America Scotts Bluff National Monument Nevada Lake Mead National Recreation Area New Hampshire Saint-Gaudens National Historic Site New Jersey Edison National Historic Site Morristown National Historical Park New Mexico Aztec Ruins National Monument Bandelier National Monument Chaco Culture National Historical Park Fort Union National Monument National Park Service Region III Headquarters Building Pecos National Historical Park Salinas Pueblo Missions National Monument New York Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic Site Fire Island National Seashore Fort Stanwix National Monument Home of FDR National Historic Site Martin Van Buren National Historic Site National Parks of New York Harbor Castle Clinton National Monument Federal Hall National Memorial Gateway National Recreation Area General Grant National Memorial Governors Island National Monument Hamilton Grange National Memorial Lower East Side Tenement Museum Saint Paul’s Church National Historic Site Statue of Liberty National Monument Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace National Historic Site Sagamore Hill National Historic Site Saratoga National Historical Park Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historic Site Vanderbilt Mansion National Historic Site Women’s Rights National Historical Park North Carolina Cape Hatteras National Seashore Cape Lookout National Seashore Carl Sandburg Home National Historic Site Wright Brothers National Memorial North Dakota Fort Union Trading Post National Historic Site Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site Theodore Roosevelt National Park Ohio Cuyahoga Valley National Park Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historical Park First Ladies National Historic Site James A. Garfield National Historic Site Perry’s Victory and International Peace Memorial William Howard Taft National Historic Site

Oklahoma Chickasaw National Recreation Area Oregon Crater Lake National Park Lewis and Clark National Historical Park Oregon Caves National Monument Pennsylvania Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site Eisenhower National Historic Site Fort Necessity National Battlefield Friendship Hill National Historic Site Gettysburg National Military Park Gloria Dei (Old Swedes’ Church) Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site Independence National Historical Park Steamtown National Historic Site Thaddeus Kosciuszko National Memorial Valley Forge National Historical Park Rhode Island Touro Synagogue National Historic Site South Carolina Charles Pinckney National Historic Site Fort Sumter National Monument South Dakota Jewel Cave National Monument Mount Rushmore National Memorial Wind Cave National Park Tennessee Andrew Johnson National Historic Site Fort Donelson National Battlefield Great Smoky Mountains National Park Texas Fort Davis National Historic Site Guadalupe Mountains National Park Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park San Antonio Missions National Historical Park Utah Arches National Park Bryce Canyon National Park Capitol Reef National Park Cedar Breaks National Monument Zion National Park Vermont Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park Virginia Appomattox Court House National Historical Park Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial Booker T. Washington National Monument Colonial National Historical Park Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania County Battlefields Memorial National Military Park George Washington Birthplace National Monument Maggie L. Walker National Historic Site Manassas National Battlefield Park Petersburg National Battlefield Richmond National Battlefield Park Shenandoah National Park Wolf Trap Park for the Performing Arts Washington Fort Vancouver National Historic Site Mount Rainier National Park Olympic National Park San Juan Island National Historical Park West Virginia Harpers Ferry National Historic Park Wisconsin Apostle Islands National Lakeshore Wyoming Devils Tower National Monument Fort Laramie National Historic Site Grand Teton National Park Yellowstone National Park

Far West and Pacific  Alaska (p. 16)  California (p. 21) 

Hawaii

(p. 57)

 Oregon (p. 64)  Washington (p. 74)

Far West and Pacific

Alaska  Klondike  Sitka

Gold Rush National Historical Park (p. 17)

National Historical Park (p. 19)

Yukon

BERING SEA

er Riv

FAIRBANKS

ANCHORAGE

Klondike Gold Rush NHP JUNEAU GULF O F ALASKA Sitka NHP

PA C I F I C O C E A N

Far West and Pacific 

Alaska

Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park Skagway, Alaska  www.nps.gov/klgo  The park’s main unit is located in the Skagway area of the Alaska panhandle. Other Alaska units include

the White Pass and the Dyea-Chilkoot Trail, both located nearby. A separate unit is in Seattle. The Skagway unit is eighty miles north of Juneau by air or water and one hundred ten miles south of Whitehorse by road.

Golden North Hotel (courtesy NPS)

The discovery of gold in August of 1896 by Skookum Jim Mason, Dawson Charlie, and George Washington Carmack in a tributary of the Klondike River in Canada’s Yukon Territory set off the last of the great gold rushes. The route to the gold-bearing streams near Dawson started six hundred miles away at Skagway and crossed into Canada at the top of either the White Pass Trail or Chilkoot Trail to the Yukon River’s headwaters at Bennett. From there the army of gold seekers built boats to haul their year’s supply of food—an absolute must—and gear down the Yukon River to the goldfields at Dawson. By 1897–98, Skagway was at its peak population of eight to ten thousand. The previous population of mostly transients staying at Moore’s homesteader cabin, built in 1887, and prospector tents quickly grew into a frontier mining town with hotels, saloons, and stores. Almost as quickly as the town grew, it shrank to a population of fewer than three thousand by 1900 after an 1899 gold discovery across Alaska near more accessible Nome on the Bering Sea. Skagway’s decline continued to about five hundred in 1930 and was later revived as a World War II supply base. Revival of the mineral industry in the Yukon in the 1960s, with resources shipped through Skagway and the restored White Pass, allowed the Yukon Route Railroad (a Gold Rush legacy) to reopen by 1988

Sourcebook of National Park System Architecture

as a popular tourist attraction. Through all the vicissitudes of time, a core of late 1890s buildings remained intact, many restored by the National Park Service (NPS). The Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park’s thirteen thousand acres authorized in 1976, after more than forty years of efforts, includes the Skagway historic district and portions of Chilkoot and White Pass Trails. Broadway is at the center of the historic district—two city blocks by six. The architecture is in the vernacular of frontier America—mostly false fronts, an imposing hotel with onion dome (the Golden North, 1898), and a former railroad depot (also 1898) serving as the National Park Service (NPS) visitor center. The architectural legacy is modest. More important than any individual building is the character of the place. Found here, as captured in the words of Robert Service and the twenty-one-year-old Jack London, are the spirit of the Yukon and the experiences of miners on the bone-chilling climbs over the Chilkoot and White Pass Trails. One gold rusher, Ezra Meeker crossing the Chilkoot Pass in 1898, wrote: Frequently every step would be full while crowds jostled each other at the foot of the ascent to get into single file, each man carrying one hundred to two hundred pounds on his back....As we looked up that long trough of glistening ice and hard-crusted snow, as steep as the roof of a house, there was not one of us who did not dread the remainder of the day’s work. Meeker made it over the pass to reach Dawson with nine tons of his “outfit.” There is no record of his luck at gold mining. Prominent with its golden dome at Broadway and Third Avenue, the Golden North Hotel, built in 1898, is no longer operating as a hotel. Originally two stories, the building was moved in 1908 by horse and capstan to its present location. A third story and was also added at that time. Purchased privately in 1997, a renovation restored the structure; each of the thirty-one rooms were dedicated to gold rush families and filled with their mementos and antiques. Captured in a display of photographs are memorable views of chains of climbers over the Chilkoot Pass. The restored old Railroad Depot and General Office Building symbolize Skagway’s durability and permanence. Originally two separate buildings, the depot opened in 1898 and the office building was completed in 1900. The buildings were joined to handle the expanding baggage and freight business. The hectic times of 1898 produced a hurriedly constructed depot building. From the second-floor bay windows the dispatcher could see the tracks that once wrapped around the cut-away southwest corner and headed north on Broadway. Unlike the depot, the later office building was carefully designed by an architect, originally with walls and ceilings of plaster on lath. Quality woodwork, stained and varnished, provided a handsome restored interior. A fascinating architectural curio—and possibly Alaska’s most photographed—is the two-story Fraternal Order of the Arctic Brotherhood building. Founded by eleven goldfield-bound travelers en route from Seattle to Skagway, “Camp Skagway No. 1”

Far West and Pacific 

Alaska

was erected in 1899. For reasons unknown, the next year, fraternity members created the intricate facade decorated with 8,333 pieces of driftwood. Today, thousands of tourists arrive by cruise ship or by the long overland highway route to walk the site connected with Alaska’s gold rush days. Camera-toting travelers now visit the places where once miners jostled their way over the Chilkoot Trail and White Pass Trail and on to the goldfields. The NPS preservation of the Skagway Historic District and White Pass National Histsoric Landmark and the Chilkoot Trail and Dyea Site National Historic Landmark offer a glimpse into this exciting episode of American history.

Sitka National Historical Park Sitka, Alaska  www.nps.gov/sitk  The park is located in Sitka in the southeast Alaska panhandle on Baranof Island (on the outer coast of

Alaska’s Inside Passage). Access is only by sea and air.

The park preserves and interprets an exotic combination of Russian-American Colonial architecture, the site of a fortification from the 1804 battle between the Russians and Tlingit Indians, a collection of Alaskan totem poles, and a scenic rainforest. The 113-acre park located in and adjacent to Sitka is Alaska’s oldest and Russian Bishops House (courtesy NPS)

smallest national park unit (established as a national monument in 1910, and des-

ignated a national historical park in 1972). Russian influence in this part of Alaska originated in 1799 with the establishment of a fur trading post by Aleksandr Baranov, chief manager of the Russian-American Company, at Redoubt Saint Michael located seven miles north of Sitka. In 1802, the native Tlingit Indians moved to end Russian colonization and attacked and wiped out the Russian outpost. Two years later the Russians returned with a force of nearly one thousand Russian and Aleut Indians and defeated the Tlingits at Kiksádi Fort. The new company headquarters in New Archangel (today’s Sitka) became the capital for Russian America and the shipping point for the company’s trade in furs, fish, ice, and lumber until depletion of the fur seal and sea otter population by the mid-nineteenth century. The United States’ 1867 Alaska Purchase ended Russian presence in North America. One unit of the park located on a heavily forested peninsula projecting into Sitka Sound and divided by the Indian River contains the site of the 1804 Battle of Sitka fort

Sourcebook of National Park System Architecture

and a self-guided totem pole trail. Fascinating Tlingit and Haida cedar totem poles rise above the grand spruce and hemlock trees along the scenic coastal Totem Trail, leading visitors to the fortification and battle site on the shore of Sitka Sound. Among the poles are originals installed in 1902 and 1906; others are copies by the Civilian Conservation Corps between 1939 and 1942, and others are done more recently. The park’s second unit interprets the National Historic Landmark Russian Bishop’s House, one half-mile from the park visitor center. The two-story building, completed in 1843 by the Russian American Company, served as the seminary and offices for the Russian Orthodox Church in Alaska. A National Park Service restoration completed in 1988 returned the building to its 1853 exterior appearance, interior spaces, and furnishings. The house is easily recognizable by its bright yellow paint, evenly spaced white-painted window frames, and red standing-seam metal hip roof. The main section of the sixteen-room building (42 by 63 feet in plan) is a squared-log structure with an unused roof truss system; two attached side galleries of timber frame construction, under sloping shed roofs, have vertical board-and-batten siding. The first floor displays exhibits interpreting the Orthodox Church, the Russian-American colonial period, and the house’s history. On the second floor, restored with original and period furnishings, are the bishop’s living quarters, and Chapel of the Annunciation, the private worship place of the bishops. The house is one of only four surviving Russian colonial structures in North America. The others are in Sitka (Building 29/Tilson House); Kodiak, Alaska (Erskine House/Russian-American shop); and California (the Rotchev House at Fort Ross State Historic Park). The park’s visitor center contains interpretive exhibits on Tlingit history and cultural traditions, and houses the Southeast Alaska Indian Cultural Center with artists at work. The visitor should experience other historic structures in Sitka’s Russian Bishops House, Chapel of the

business district about a half-mile from

Annunciation (courtesy NPS)

the main park unit. A replica of onion-

domed 1848 Saint Michael’s Cathedral, destroyed by fire in 1966, contains a remarkable collection of icons, and the Sheldon-Jackson Museum and Isabel Miller Museum reward the visitor with a view of native Alaskan, Russian, and American cultures.

California  Cabrillo

 Eugene

O’Neill National Historic Site (p. 27)

Point National Historic Site (p. 30)

 Golden  John

Gate National Recreation Area (p. 32)

Muir National Historic Site (p. 35)

 Lassen

Volcanic National Park (p. 37)

 Manzanar  Point

Reyes National Seashore (p. 42)

Francisco Maritime National Historical Park (p. 45)

 Sequoia

and Kings Canyon National Parks (p. 47)

 Yosemite

National Park (p. 52)

Goose Lake

Lassen Volcanic NP

Point Reyes NS

Lake Tahoe

SACRAMENTO John Muir NHS Eugene O’Neill NHS

SAN FRANCISCO Fort Point NHS Golden Gate NRA San Francisco Maritime NHP

Mono Lake

Yosemite NP

Death Valley NP

Sequoia and Kings NP Manzanar NHS

LOS ANGELES

PACIFIC OCEAN

Riv e

 San

National Historic Site (p. 40)

Salton Sea Cabrillo NM

SAN DIEGO

Colorad

 Fort

National Monument (p. 22)

Valley National Park (p. 24)

Far West and Pacific

 Death

Sourcebook of National Park System Architecture

Cabrillo National Monument San Diego, San Diego County, California  www.nps.gov/cabr  Cabrillo National Monument is within the city of San Diego at the end of Point Loma. Driving from

Interstate 5 or Interstate 8, take the California 209 (Rosecrans Street) Exit; turn right on Cañon Street; turn left onto Catalina Boulevard. Follow signs to the park.

Old Point Loma Lighthouse

San Diego’s 160-acre Cabrillo National Monument, established on October 14, 1913, celebrates the first landing of Europeans on what is now the western shore of the United States. Sailing under the Spanish flag, explorer Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo ventured up the West Coast of North America and arrived at San Diego Bay on September 28, 1542. Protecting San Diego Harbor on a headland reaching out into the Pacific Ocean, Point Loma was long occupied by the military and is the site of one of the last of the eight original West Coast lighthouses built in the 1850s. In the days of intensive whaling (1850s to 1885–86), the lighthouse served as a beacon at the entrance to San Diego Bay, and increasing traffic north up the coast to San Francisco. The site selected by the U.S. Coastal Survey in 1851 as one of a chain of navigational aids along the Pacific shore is 422 feet above sea level, overlooking the bay and the Pacific Ocean. Construction on the lighthouse started in 1854. The lantern containing a Fresnel lens arrived from Paris in August 1855. Although visible for

Far West and Pacific 

California

almost thirty miles in clear weather, the location had a serious flaw: coastal fog and low clouds often obscured the beacon. On March 23, 1891, the keeper, Robert Israel, extinguished the lamp for the last time. After thirty-six years, the old lighthouse was abandoned and a new light station went into operation at the bottom of the hill closer to sea level as a beacon for mariners. The Cape Cod style, two-story, whitewashed sandstone keeper’s house (20 by 40 feet), with a brick central lighthouse tower was the typical design for the original West Coast lighthouses. Gable-end chimneys symmetrically frame the dwelling, although only the south chimney contains first- and second–floor fireplaces. The 22-inch-thick sandstone outer walls rise from a basement level containing the 1,240-gallon cistern and the brick base of the 38-foot-high lighthouse tower. The original basement floor tiles may have came from Fort Guijarros. Emerging from the dwelling on a 10-foot diameter brick cylinder, 6 feet above the roof ridgeline, the glass-and-wood-ribbed lantern rises another 15 feet to the pinnacle. An entrance to the first floor from an exterior porch accesses the first floor living and dining rooms and the tower. A wooden kitchen wing at the building’s rear was removed sometime after 1913 and replaced with a stucco exterior lean-to in the mid-1930s. The second floor is divided into two bedrooms and a “watch room” for the keeper and his assistant. Tower access is up a spiral staircase that turns into a metal ladder, which opens onto the lantern floor. The Point Loma Lighthouse houses a third-order Fresnel lens. Invented by French physicist Augustin-Jean Fresnel in 1822, the U.S. Lighthouse Board resisted using his design until the 1850s. Fresnel lenses are like a glass barrel whose outer surface is made up of prisms and bulls-eyes. They were classified in seven orders; generally, the larger a lens the greater its range. In a revolving or flashing light, the bulls-eyes are surrounded by curved, concentric prisms, concentrating the light of a central lamp into several individual beams, radiating like the spokes of a wheel. In a fixed, or steady light, the bulls-eyes become a continuous “lens belt,” with the prisms parallel to it, producing an uninterrupted, horizontal sheet of light. The Point Loma third-order lens stood over 5 feet high and 3 feet in diameter. In the center, a lamp with three circular wicks, one inside the other, produced a flame of 168 candlepower. The lamp used rapeseed oil (Brassica napus) from 1855 to 1867, lard oil from 1867 to 1882, and kerosene from 1882 to 1891. The lens magnified the flame to about 19,000 candlepower and was reported in 1862 as visible in clear weather from a mast height of 20 feet above the sea at a distance of twenty-eight miles. Disuse of the lighthouse and ravages of time, weather, and vandals brought about a recommendation in 1913 to tear it down. With a change of heart, the army made modest repairs in 1915. In an effort to stabilize the structure, the army encouraged soldiers and their families to live in it. In the 1920s the lighthouse was used briefly as a radio station. Restored in 1935 by the National Park Service and later

Sourcebook of National Park System Architecture

refurnished as used by the light keeper and his family, the lighthouse is now open to visitors. Today, the Old Point Loma Lighthouse stands as a symbol of the first successful efforts to obtain aids to navigation for the west coast of the United States. The view from this centerpiece of Cabrillo National Monument is a spectacular seascape of a great harbor. Every January and February the Whale Overlook, one hundred yards south of the Old Point Loma Lighthouse, provides superb views of the whale migration.

Death Valley National Park Inyo County, California, and Esmerelda and Nye Counties, Nevada  www.nps.gov/deva  The park is located in southeast California, with a portion in Nevada. US 395 passes west of Death Valley

and connects with California 178 and to the park. US 95 passes on the east and connects with Nevada 267, 374, and 373 to the park. Interstate 15 passes southeast through Baker, California, on its way from Los Angeles to Las Vegas. The park is about a two-and-a-half-hour drive from the Las Vegas airport.

Scotty’s Castle chimes tower

Death Valley is the hottest, driest, and lowest place in the contiguous United States with fascinating geology, canyons, and salt flats; desert surrounded by mountains; extremes of elevation (Badwater at 282 feet below sea level; and Telescope Peak at 11,049 feet above sea level); and amazingly abundant flora, fauna, and wildlife. The 3.336 million acres of Death Valley National Park, established as a national monument in 1933 and redesignated a national park in 1994, is one and one-third times the size of Delaware.

Far West and Pacific 

California

Within this unique combination of heat, landscape, history, and natural life there are ruins of gold and borate mines, and a remarkable historical structure called Scotty’s Castle located in the northern part of the park, three miles northeast of Grapevine

Wildrose Canyon charcoal kilns

Scotty’s Castle adobe walls

in Grapevine Canyon, and fifty-three miles north of the Furnace Creek Visitor Center. Some of the sites are identifiable only by markers and accessible only by unpaved roads. The vastness of the park means locating the architectural sites beforehand. Furnace Creek Visitor Center is a good starting point after entering the park. Along the way there are opportunities to see the remains of once-thriving Wild West mining towns scattered throughout Death Valley National Park or within a few miles of the park’s boundaries. Discoveries of silver, gold, lead, and other minerals are memorialized in mines, dumps, tunnels, ruins, cabins, graves, and sometimes only markers within the park at Greenwater, Panamint City, Harrisburg, and Skidoo. A side trip to the ruins at Rhyolite, a mining town of five to ten thousand people during its heyday from 1905 to 1911, is a worthwhile experience. The ruins are located outside the east-side park boundary off Nevada Highway 374, four miles west of Beatty on US Highway 95. Approaching from Los Angeles, past Wildrose at the end of Wildrose Canyon Road is a picturesque row of ten masonry beehive-shaped charcoal kilns. Built in 1877 to produce charcoal for two silver-lead smelters in the Argus Range, twenty-five miles to the west, the kilns shut down in 1878 when the Argus mines’ ore deteriorated in quality. The structures are approximately 25 feet tall and 30 feet in circumference. Each kiln held forty-two cords of pinyon pine logs and would, after burning for a week, produce two thousand bushels of charcoal. The durability of the kilns is attributed to fine workmanship and short duration of use. Near the visitor center are remnants of the Harmony Borax Works. A historic footnote is the phrase “Twenty Mule Team,” coined for the Pacific Coast Borax Company by Stephen T. Mather (later to become the National Park Service’s first director) for the teams hauling the 36 half-ton loads of milled ore (borax) 165 miles to Mojave, a one-way trip of ten to twelve days. The Keane Wonder Mine, one of the most productive gold mines in the Death Valley area, is a four-level ruin of buildings, machinery,

Sourcebook of National Park System Architecture

tanks, piping, and waste tailings north of the visitor center off the Beatty cutoff road, between California Highways 190 and 374. Death Valley Ranch (Scotty’s Castle) rises out of the desert like an apparition of a Spanish Mediterranean hacienda, complete with red tile roof and towers, a chimes tower, and other outbuildings. Through the entrance gate and past the incomplete swimming pool, the visitor arrives at an entry plaza. The main house is to the left, the annex is to the right; the wrought-iron-decorated east gate with intricately stonecarved abutments is aligned with the freestanding clock tower. Built during the 1920s as a vacation retreat by Albert Johnson, a Chicago insurance executive, the multibuilding complex is in good condition and offers living history tours throughout the historic house museum, an additional small museum, which functions as a visitor center, a bookstore, and a snack bar. Construction of Death Valley Ranch began in 1922. Throughout the ten-year construction period Walter “Scotty” Scott, a friend of Johnson, referred to the building as “my castle,” and it soon became known as “Scotty’s Castle.” In 1926, Los Angeles architect Charles Alexander MacNeilledge was hired to redesign the main house, including many of its furnishings and ornaments. His work continued throughout the construction period. When work ceased in 1931, the complex contained more than 31,000 square feet of floor space, with the castle, swimming pool, and other features left unfinished. The two-story-high castle buildings are a mix of wood frame, concrete structural tiles, and concrete construction; stucco walls and red Mission-style roof tiles complete the motif of Spanish Mediterranean exteriors. The castle is adorned with imported handcrafted furniture, European artwork, tile flooring throughout, wrought-iron hardware, and exposed timber structure with hand-adze marking, ceiling planking, and redwood trim. Many of the custom designed furnishings and fixtures crafted in California for the Death Valley Ranch reflect a desert motif by incorporating the images of regional fauna and flora in their design. Ties from an abandoned railroad fueled the fourteen fireplaces. The guesthouse, stable, cookhouse, and the majority of other support buildings maintain the same motif of Spanish Mediterranean character with stucco walls and red Two-story living hall

Mission-style roofs. The main house contains a two-story living

hall with an elegant central chandelier soaring up to the redwood-planked ceiling. At opposite ends of the approximately 32-foot-square room is a fireplace and a grotto fountain framed in decorative tiles, respectively. A second-floor gallery surrounds the

Far West and Pacific 

California

room. On the north wall of the living hall, the large door of redwood with elaborate wrought-iron hardware opens onto the 116-foot by 24-foot patio extending the full length of the building. Other rooms on the first floor are Scotty’s bedroom, the lower music room, solarium, dining room, kitchen, and porches. The main house’s second floor contains the Johnsons’ living quarters, a guest suite, a verandah, and stairs to the tower mounted with a mule team weather vane. The annex’s first floor contains Mr. Johnson’s office and apartment, Mrs. Johnson’s apartment with kitchen, enclosed patio, refrigeration room, and a commissary. The second floor contains two guest bedrooms with random-patterned tile flooring, an upper music room, an “Italian Room” with intricately patterned tile flooring, and a separate open-air lanai. The music room is enriched with a custom-built theater organ, elaborately carved arched redwood roof trusses, and Spanish gothic-inspired woodwork details. An internal spiral staircase provides access to the three-story Moorish tower. The Johnsons died without heirs in the 1940s and willed the castle to a charitable organization called the Gospel Foundation. The foundation operated the property by providing tours through the castle and renting out some rooms in the castle for overnight accommodations. This foundation also took care of Scotty until his death in 1954, selling the property and donating the historic furnishings to the National Park Service in 1970. Visitor accommodations and services are available in the park at Furnace Creek Ranch, Furnace Creek Inn, and Stovepipe Wells Village.

Eugene O’Neill National Historic Site Danville, Contra Costa County, California  www.nps.gov/euon  The Eugene O’Neill National Historic Site is located in Danville, California, twenty-six miles east of San

Francisco in the San Ramon Valley. Visits to the site are by reservation only with the National Park Service.

Nobel Prize and four-time Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Eugene O’Neill built and lived in Tao House in the hills above Danville, California, from 1937 to 1944. Visitors to the thirteen-acre National Historic Site (also a National Historic Landmark) with a National Park Service (NPS) reservation can view the house and landscaped grounds on a guided tour to learn the story of O’Neill and how he influenced the American theater. The enormously prolific O’Neill wrote nearly sixty plays in a career spanning three decades, received four Pulitzer Prizes, and is the only Nobel Prize for Literaturewinning playwright from the United States. He created exciting plays, often about tortured family relationships and the conflict between idealism and materialism, taxing actors, scenic designers, and audiences with the demands of his imagination. Restless

Sourcebook of National Park System Architecture

and rootless most of his life, the introspective playwright and his wife, Carlotta, were living in a San Francisco hotel in early 1937: “No roots. No home,” she wrote as they searched for a place to live. O’Neill had begun work on a cycle of plays about the history of an Irish American family, planned ultimately as a cycle of eleven plays. The O’Neills sought an isolated place to work so that concentration could be continuous and undisturbed. The isolated 158-acre ranch in the San Ramon Valley east of San Francisco Bay attracted O’Neill and Carlotta with its privacy and climate. Using the Nobel Prize stipend, in 1937 they purchased the ranch and built the Spanish Mission-style house set against the Las Trampas ridge at an elevation of 700 feet. Here, they planned what O’Neill came to call the Tao House his “final harbor.” Surrounded by extensive landscaped grounds, the two-story structure with white baselite brick walls, verandahs, and a black tile roof reflect the Chinese-influenced interior. O’Neill’s interest in Eastern thought and Carlotta’s passion for Oriental art and décor inspired the name Tao House. An interior of deep blue ceilings and red doors, terra-cotta tile, and black-stained wood floors, and a collection of fine Chinese furniture create a cool, dark atmosphere. Drawn shades protected Carlotta’s sensitivity to light. A few rooms of Tao House are completely refurnished, and photographs in other rooms show the O’Neills at home. One of the rooms, known as “Rosie’s Room,” was built especially for the O’Neills’ pea-green player piano adorned with painted roses. A glimpse of the intensity of O’Neill’s labor can be experienced by a visit to the playwright’s second-floor study, which is entered through a sequence of three doors and a closet, sheltered by thick walls, where O’Neill poured out his masterpieces. Carlotta remembered her husband emerging from his study red-eyed and gaunt after working on his “soul-grinding” work. He regarded these plays as his life achievement. Sheltered by the Tao House solitude, O’Neill produced his final and most successful plays: The Iceman Cometh, Hughie, A Moon for the Misbegotten, and his autobiographical Long Day’s Journey into Night. During his years there he turned his back on the theatrical world, giving himself over to transforming his past into the plays that made him America’s most awarded playEugene O’Neill’s Tao House

wright. Wartime unavailability of staff and the inability of either of the O’Neills

to drive forced them to leave the sanctuary. Suffering from a rare degenerative disease and unable to write after 1943, Eugene ultimately moved to Boston with his wife where, at age sixty-five, shorn of his writing ability, he died in a hotel room in 1953.

Far West and Pacific 

California

The NPS continues to improve the visitor’s experience at the Tao House and grounds through the acquisition of Eugene and Carlotta O’Neill memorabilia and original furnishings or period replicas reflective of the house’s character. Seismic ret-

Eugene and Carlotta O’Neill, 1941 (courtesy Bienecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University)

rofit in 2001 ensures the stability of the unreinforced masonry walls. O’Neill plays are produced every spring and fall in the restored historic barn, providing a west coast connection with the resurgence of interest in O’Neill’s plays on Broadway. Few visitors can leave this quiet atmosphere without the desire to reach for a volume of O’Neill’s plays or seek out listings of active productions. Standing in the isolated second-floor study of the playwright recalls Sinclair Lewis’s Nobel Prize lecture (December 12, 1930) about O’Neill, “who has done nothing much in American drama save to transform it utterly, in ten or twelve years, from a false world of neat and competent trickery to a world of splendor and fear and greatness, you would have been reminded that he has done something far worse than scoffing—he has seen life as not to be neatly arranged in the study of a scholar but as a terrifying, magnificent and often quite horrible thing akin to a tornado, earthquake or a devastating fire.”