but Martin’s wife didn’t like it because it was too dark and she had carte blanche on this house. Apparently Wright was more amenable to things she wanted than he was for any of his other clients because Martin was one of the people who constantly supported Wright and lent him money when times were bad. Greycliff is named for the grey cliffs on the edge of Lake Erie and the house is built to frame views of the lake. The house originally cost $75,000, and was sold to a religious order in the 50s for $53,000. They added buildings, and made some changes but the Wright foundation (whichever one it is that manages this place) has $4 million to make repairs and restoration. When the religious order decided to give it up, they sold it for $400K which still seems like a steal, and they seem to have $4 million for the restoration. I’m continually surprised by how much all these non-profits just throw these amounts of money around that they seem to have. There is also a tower that goes down to the lake for picnics and the like. A footbridge goes out to it, but it is suffering the effects of erosion. The Wright society has been successful so far in keeping the bridge from actually falling down, in case at some point they can actually fix it, but if it falls down before they can figure out what to do, they won't be able to fix it at all, because it would then be new. ********
We had lunch at a place called Hoak’s which is right on Lake Erie, and is famous for its Heck bread, which is some kind of a roll that’s really salty on top. We had ordered ahead, and had ordered salads (which came with the top covered with an 8-inch square of beef, an 8-inch square of ham, an 8-inch square of beef, an 8-inch square of jack cheese and an 8-inch square of cheddar. There was a decent amount of lettuce on the bottom and a few good tomatoes. Overall, I wasn’t particularly impressed with the place, but I imagine if we had ordered off the menu it would have been a bit more fun. One of the disadvantages of going with a tour group.
We had some free time this afternoon, so John went up to rest (he’s still not feeling very well) and I took a walk downtown. It was slightly more interesting than when we went to town on Sunday, but only because the thrift store was open. I did get a nice picture of Vidler on the Roof. Vidler is the owner of the five and dime and there’s a statue of him on the roof of the store. Cutesy. We had a tour of the old blacksmith shop today, which became a print shop and is now undergoing restoration and is mostly a gift shop with really, really nice (and expensive) stuff. But it’s all made by craftsmen and it’s all real quality stuff.
After that tour we sent to Ellen’s house (Ellen being one of out tour guides, a former president of the historical society, a Roycrofter, etc., etc.) She lives in an original Roycroft house which they have added an “arts and crafts” addition ontoELLEN the back which I thought was really nice but which John didn’t like much
We had a very nice wine and cheese event there. In her back yard, the neighor’s garage is one wall of her back yard, and they painted a mural on the garage. Very simple, and done over lap siding.
Our dinner at the hotel tonight was a pasta buffet which was really good, and followed by an awful concert by teenagers from the Waldorf school, and then a discussion of the Olmstead-designed park system in Buffalo. It was a marginally interesting presentation to me, though probably more interesting to people who live in Buffalo. It really is a string of jewels system, but many of the parks have been allowed to go downhill. Buffalo is the only city in the U.S. whose entire public park system is managed by a non-profit corporation.
We took a short walk afterwards and stopped by Millard Fillmore’s house, which I walked right past when I was looking for it the other night.
Just a note, if you click on the pictures, they will come up bigger in another window. I still have not managed to make the pictures show up where I want to in the blog.
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