Benjamin Marshall designed and lived in this luxury apartment building at 49 E. Cedar Street with his family for many years. Photo by Julia Bachrach.
I often highlight the work of historical Chicago architects who are virtually forgotten today. Some practitioners I’ve written about, like Huehl & Schmid; Alexander Levy; and Michaelsen & Rognstad were well known and quite busy in their own day, but can be thought of as “lesser-known” firms of our time. This month, I’m doing something a little different by focusing on some of the “lesser-known” or smaller projects of a talented Chicago architect who is well remembered today, Benjamin H. Marshall.
Marshall & Fox’s South Shore Country Club (now South Shore Cultural Center). Photo by Eric Allix Rogers.
Postcard view of Edgewater Beach Hotel and Apartments.
Regardless of whether you know Benjamin Marshall’s name, if you are a fan of Chicago architecture, you certainly know much of his work. His impressive catalogue of buildings in and near Chicago includes the South Shore Country Club (now South Shore Cultural Center); the Edgewater Beach Hotel (demolished) and Apartments; the Drake and Blackstone hotels; luxury apartments at 199 and 209 E. Lake Shore Drive, 999 N. Lake Shore Drive, and 1550 N. State Parkway; the Mayslake Peabody Estate; and the Samuel Insull Mansion (now Cuneo Mansion) in Vernon Hills. And the list goes on.
Marshall’s work references historical architectural styles, however his buildings stand out from other early 20th century eclectic revivals. Built of high-quality materials, his structures are well-proportioned and beautifully detailed. Though often quite lavish, they aren’t at all garish. In fact, they are quite elegant both inside and out.
South Shore Country Club (Cultural Center) Interior View. Photo by Eric Allix Rogers.
Thankfully, Benjamin Marshall’s work has received substantial scholarship and popular attention. Architectural historians John Zukowsky and Jean Guarino authored a wonderful book entitled Benjamin H. Marshall: Chicago Architect. There is even a Benjamin Marshall Society that seeks to heighten awareness of the man and his legacy and to revive Marshall’s “dialogue on the role of architecture in a civic and urban environment.” Despite the rich body of literature on the noted architect, I often feel surprised when I stumble across buildings I hadn’t realized he designed.
1550 N. State Parkway. Photo by Eric Allix Rogers.
Benjamin H. Marshall, 1912. From Chicago: Its History and Its Builders, A Century of Marvelous Growth by Josiah Seymour Currey.
Born in Chicago, Benjamin Howard Marshall (1874-1944) was the son of Caleb H. and Celia F. Marshall, easterners who had come west to make their fortune. Caleb Marshall found success in milling and baking, and, in the 1890s, the family settled on Chicago’s fashionable South Side.
The couple sent their son to the prestigious Harvard School for Boys, a private academy that was affiliated with the University of Chicago. While at the Harvard School, Marshall’s classmates included Dexter Fairbank, son of a millionaire soap manufacturer; Fred Mandel, whose father owned a downtown department store; and Edgar Rice Burroughs, future author of the Tarzan series.
“Display Ad,” Chicago Tribune, August 21, 1891.
Benjamin Marshall did not graduate from his posh prep school. According to the Book of Chicagoans, Marshall left school at the age of 17 to work as an office boy for the wholesale clothing company Clement Bane & Co. He soon learned cutting and became involved in clothing design. But, having had a fervid interest in architecture since early childhood, Marshall decided to change careers. In 1893, he began working as an office boy for architects Marble & Wilson, a firm known for creating fine residences for well-to-do-Chicagoans. Within a short time, Oliver W. Marble left the practice. Marshall became a valued apprentice to Horatio R. Wilson and, in 1896, the senior architect brought him into partnership.
Horatio and Lillie Wilson House at 4936 S. Ellis Avenue. Photo by Julia Bachrach.
Marshall must have exhibited extraordinary talent. As John Zukowsky explains, he catapulted “from office boy to partner” in only two years, “without formal architectural training.” Wilson & Marshall’s work included a number of large Georgian style houses for wealthy Chicago families—many on the city’s South Side. Among them was a new home for Marshall’s partner. Completed in 1899, this stately house provided comfortable living quarters for Horatio and Lillie Wilson and their three live-in servants.
“Salsbury Apartment Building,” Inland Architect and News Record, 1899.
Marshall & Wilson produced some of the first luxury apartment buildings in Chicago. Although the city’s elite had long shunned multi-family dwellings, luxury apartments had become quite popular in New York City. Enterprising Chicagoans such as real estate agent and investor Edward H. Salsbury thought they could be successful here. Salsbury hired Marshall & Wilson to produce a high-end South Side apartment house. In August, 1899, the developer ran Chicago Tribune ads for the building’s 10-room units headlined “To Rent— Something New.”
“Classified Ad,” Chicago Tribune, August 6, 1899.
“Miss Elizabeth Walton Weds Benjamin Marshall,” The Inter Ocean, February 2, 1905.
In 1900, the architects produced the Raymond Apartments, an eight-story-tall luxury apartment building overlooking the lakefront at N. Michigan Avenue and E. Walton Place. The developer, Harry Raymond, suggested this would be the “finest” multi-family residence “west of New York.” Although some owners of nearby mansions were horrified by the construction of an apartment building on the lakefront, the concept quickly caught-on. (Neither the Salsbury nor the Raymond Apartments exists today.)
By late 1902, Benjamin H. Marshall had launched a solo practice. He was soon designing some prominent downtown theaters. Among them was the Iroquois Theatre, which suffered one of the deadliest fires in the nation’s history shortly after it opened in November of 1903. Although Marshall was exonerated during an inquest the following year, the devastating fire burdened the young architect, and it may have prompted him to find a partner. The following year he formed a partnership with Charles Eli Fox (1870-1926), an MIT graduate who had been working for Holabird & Roche. In February of 1905, when Benjamin Marshall married Elizabeth Walton, the daughter of a successful South Side banker, Charles Fox was part of the wedding party.
49 E. Cedar Avenue. Photo by Julia Bachrach.
In 1905, Marshall & Fox produced a luxury apartment building on Lake Shore Drive for Benjamin’s father, Caleb Marshall. (This was later replaced by a high-rise.) Located at the corner of E. Cedar Street, the eight-story structure provided a single spacious unit on each level. The apartments originally rented for $4,200 per year (roughly $140,000 today), and each included an enormous living room, dining room, and four bedrooms, as well as a reception hall, an orangery, , and three servant’s rooms. Many other splendid multi-family residences soon followed, including 49 E. Cedar Avenue, a four-story structure developed by Benjamin Marshall, Charles Fox, and grain broker James Pettit in 1908. Benjamin and Elizabeth Marshall lived in a full-story unit of this building for many years. By 1920, the couple resided in their Cedar Avenue apartment with their son, two daughters, and four domestic servants.
Morrison Apartments on N. Astor and E. Division Streets. Photo by Julia Bachrach.
Close-up of Entryway to Morrison Apartments. Photo by Julia Bachrach.
By 1908, Marshall & Fox had many high-profile projects, including the Blackstone Hotel on S. Michigan Avenue. But they were also producing a number of apartment buildings at various scales and levels of opulence. William M. Morrison, a successful theatrical portrait photographer, and his wife, Alice, hired the firm to create plans for a somewhat modest project by the firm’s standards—a six-flat at the corner of E. Division and N. Astor Street.
With a symmetrically-placed front entryway which has an impressive columned portico and front door topped by an exquisite fan light window, the red-brick building resembles a grand Classical Revival style mansion. But in fact, the structure provided six 7- and 8-room units, each with three bathrooms, a wood-burning fireplace, and a balcony that originally provided a view of the lake. (Today tall buildings obscure the view.)
Bode Apartments at 5825 S. Blackstone Avenue. Photo by Julia Bachrach.
In 1909, the architects created a somewhat more lavish, three-unit apartment building at 5825 S. Blackstone Avenue for Frederick Bode, President of Gage Brothers, a wholesale millinery company. Bode, a member of the original board of governors for South Shore Country Club, had the firm design the Parisian style three-flat for himself and his second wife, the former Esther Ellen Simpson. Bode married Esther, a department manager in his millinery company, only a few days after his daughter’s wedding. The two couples honeymooned together in Europe, and the Bodes’ new residence was ready upon their return. According to the Economist, the fine apartment structure was built at a cost of $73,000 (over $2 million in today’s dollars).
Harry B. and Elisabeth McNally Clow House. Photograph courtesy of the Lake Bluff History Museum.
Marshall & Fox were well-established as the go-to firm for elite Chicagoans by the 1910s. Wealthy families often had a city and a country home, and the firm designed both kinds of luxurious residences. Harry Beach Clow, President of Rand, McNally & Co., and his wife, Elisabeth McNally Clow, selected Marshall & Fox as architects for their second home in Lake Bluff, Illinois. The mansion was part of a 22-acre estate known as Landsdowne. Renowned Prairie style landscape architect Jens Jensen designed the grounds. The property had an orchard, several gardens, a ravine spanned by a bridge, and Lake Michigan frontage. The designers took full advantage of the spectacular site in their plans for the 24-room house.
Schuttler & Rollins Apartments, 2355 N. Commonwealth. Photo by Julia Bachrach.
Soon after completing the Lake Bluff mansion, Marshall & Fox created a three-unit residence for Walter Schuttler and Charles Rollins which was much smaller than the Clow House, though far from modest. Schuttler, heir to the nation’s premier wagon and carriage manufacturing firm, and Rollins, owner of a large insurance brokerage firm, had been friends since childhood. The two were both married—Rollins to a young widow, Bertha Hollenbeck Ortiz, and Schuttler to Florence Tatham, an heiress. For the two friends and their families, the architects created a distinctive low-rise with a Tudor Revival flair. Standing across from Lincoln Park, the building is on the corner of W. Fullerton and N. Commonwealth avenues. The full-story, 5,000-square-foot apartments each had 14 rooms, and with large, beautifully detailed entertaining spaces facing the park. The structure had its own elevator and a garage that provided space for two cars per unit.
“Wisconsin Resort to Rival Famous Lake Placid,” This Chicago Tribune rendering shows Marshall’s Lawsonia Country Club, now Roger Williams Inn, Green Lake, Wisconsin.
Marshall & Fox remained in partnership for just over a decade more. Despite having achieved extraordinary success together, their 1924 split seems to have been bitter. Both went on to practice independently, however Fox suffered a stroke in 1925 and died the following year. Benjamin Marshall remained busy throughout the 1920s, often investing in projects he designed. Among his later works are a number of out-of-state projects, including the Lawsonia Hotel (now Roger Williams Inn) in Green Lake, Wisconsin, and the Park Place Hotel in Traverse City, Michigan.
Postcard view of Park Place Hotel, Traverse City, Michigan.
Benjamin Marshall produced such an extraordinary collection of work. And though some of his great buildings have been lost to the wrecking ball, many are still in-use and enjoyed—even celebrated—today. I hope I’ve introduced you to a few that have been under the radar.