Biographical Note
Mark Lyons Peisch (b. 1921) received
his B.A. in History and History of Art from Dartmouth College
in 1944. At Dartmouth, he was introduced by Professor Hugh
Morrison, noted scholar of Louis Sullivan, to the work of Chicago
School architects Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin.
After his release from military service in 1947, Peisch taught
briefly at Dartmouth before entering Columbia University in
1949 as a graduate student in the Department of Fine Arts and
Archeology. While researching his doctoral thesis on the Griffins
and their contemporaries, Peisch counted as his mentors such
noted historians and scholars as William Bell Dinsmoor, Talbot
Hamlin, Adolf Placzek, Jacques Barzun, Meyer Schapiro, and
Rudolph Wittkower. While a graduate student, Peisch also held
various positions within the university's administration and,
under the direction of Everard Upjohn, regularly taught the "Masterpieces
of Fine Arts" course within the Core Curriculum program of
Columbia College. Peisch was awarded his Ph.D. from Columbia
in 1959 with the completion of his dissertation The Chicago
School and Walter Burley Griffin, 1893-1914, Growth and Dissemination
of an Architectural Movement and a Representative Figure,
which was published in 1964 by Columbia University Press and
Random House as The Chicago School of Architecture. Early
Followers of Sullivan and Wright. Although Peisch primarily
held positions in academic administration at Columbia University
and other institutions throughout his career, he continued
his interest in the architects of the Prairie School, writing
entries on Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin
for Macmillan Encyclopedia and serving as a consultant for
the 1999 documentary Walter Burley Griffin: In His Own Right.
Scope and Content
This collection contains primarily
correspondence related to Peisch's Ph.D. thesis on the work
of Chicago architects associated with the Prairie School movement.
Much of the material is about Walter Burley Griffin and Marion
Mahony Griffin's work in the United States and Australia and
includes letters from and about Marion Mahony Griffin, Francis
Barry Byrne, William Gray Purcell, William L. Steele, and George
Grant Elmslie. The collection also includes some photographs,
clippings, lectures, and papers related to the later publication
of Peisch's thesis in book form as The Chicago School of
Architecture : Early Followers of Sullivan and Wright (New
York : Random House, 1964). Lastly, the collection contains
a small number of reference files, some gathered long after
the completion of Peisch's thesis. Includes:
correspondence, typescript papers, carbon typescript papers,
holograph papers, printed papers, photographic prints, sound
recordings, maps, drawings, architectural reprographic prints,
postcards, postage stamps. From:
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Subjects
Architects--United States. Architecture--Australia--20th
century. Architecture--United States. Authors. Byrne,
Francis Barry, 1883-1967. Chicago school of architecture
(Movement) Correspondence. Elmslie, George Grant, 1871-1952.
Griffin, Marion Mahony, 1871-1962. Griffin, Walter Burley,
1876-1937. Historians. Peisch, Mark Lyons, 1921- .--The
Chicago school of architecture : early followers of Sullivan
and Wright. Prairie school (Architecture) Purcell, William
Gray, 1880-1965. Sullivan, Louis H., 1856-1924. Wright,
Frank Lloyd, 1867-1959.
Related Material
Avery Drawings and Archives also
hold related material in the Francis Barry Byrne Papers; Walter
Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin Papers ; The Office
of the Avery Librarian Records; Louis H. Sullivan Drawings;
and the Frank Lloyd Wright Architectual Drawings and Papers.
Bibliography
Peisch, Mark L. The Chicago school of architecture;
early followers of
Sullivan and Wright. Columbia University studies in art history
and archaeology ; no. 5. New York: Random House, [1964].
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