Sunday, November 6, 2011Cincinnati, Ohio

GREAT HOUSE TOURAlberly ManorIndian Hill, Ohio

Event ChairJay Schuermann

Parking LogisticsNick Rosian

CateringChristine Schoonover

Jamie HumesMario San Marco

Visitor ToursGary Volz

Visitor PamphletMichael Kelley

The Architectural Foundation of Cincinnati would like to extend a special than you to Robert Garretson (Brush Creek Homes) for his tremendous assistance with this “Great House Event,” and for sharing his vision and discoveries during the restoration of this very important part of Cincinnati’s architectural history.

EVENT COMMITTEE

Architectural Foundation of CincinnatiBoard of Trustees

PresidentDavid S. Arends, AIA

Past President/Advisory Board ChairChristine Schoonover

Vice PresidentMichael P. Kelley, IIDA

SecretaryJohn C. Krug, Esq.

TreasurerNick Rosian

TrusteesJ. Wickli!e Ach

Noah C. BergmanRobert GraceJamie Humes

Mario San MarcoGary Meisner, FASLA

Mark SchlachterJay SchuermannKeith G. Smith

Gary R. Volz, ASIDWilliam A. Woodward, PE

Douglas Richards, AIA

EmeritusGary L. Herfel, Esq.Donald Junker, AIA

H.C. Buck Nieho!, Esq.Alice Weston

Executive DirectorKit H. Anderson

Great Stone Houses of Tudor Period Copied in Home of Mr. and Mrs. William H. Albers on Vast Indian Hill Estate.

“Alberly Manor,” the spacious 97-acre estate of Mr. and Mrs. William H. Albers, is located on Shawnee Run Road in Indian Hill, Ohio. Modeled after the stately manors of England during the Tudor period, by Architect Bloodgood Tuttle, the 17 room great stone house is surrounded by many acres of flowers, grass terraces and shrubbery, meticulously kept and artistically arranged, by Landscape Architect Albert D. Taylor.

There are informal and formal gardens, intersecting pools and lakes, rock gardens, miniature waterfalls, stone bridges spanning small streams and large wooded areas, o!ering such a variety of landscaping that each part of this broad estate o!ers something delightfully di!erent and lovely.

The large swimming pool is surrounded by grass terraces of the Creeping Bent variety. From the stone bathhouse at the western end, a vine-covered pergola leads to the side entrance of the house.

Clear pools and lakes added much to the beauty of the grounds. A pool with floating lotus blossoms adjoins the arched entrance way. A narrow path through formal gardens at the rear and a wooded area beyond leads to swan lake, a delightfully cool retreat, surrounded by rock gardens and huge trees.

A genuine dipping well centers one of the intimate gardens, ablaze with the color of many flowers during the summer, which is one of the favorite spots of the household.

On the left as one enters the entrance and Great Hall, wide steps lead down through the carved wooden screen, with organ chambers on either side, into the lofty music room. On the right a similar flight of steps leads through a balancing screen and down a wide hall to the octagonal fountain room.

On either side of this hall are the library, card room and billiard room, the latter with an arched balcony looking down into the Great Hall.

Of particular interest are the windows on either side of the main entrance. In stained and leaded glass, they depict symbols of the religious, recreational and business life of the owners.

Straight ahead as one enters is a huge double stone stairway, curving up to a landing over the garden entrance, the floor of this room is a slate mosaic laid in various patterns and colors. The walls and vaulted ceiling are in antique plaster stained a parchment color. The woodwork is carved and waxed bird’s-eye maple.

ALBERLY MANOR

Music room

Garden

From the ceiling hang medieval lighting fixtures in hand-wrought bronze and brackets of similar workmanship and design adorn the walls.

Just outside of the circular bay of the formal dining room is an intimate little garden formally planted with brilliant flowers in the summer and evergreens and with grass paths and stepping stones sunk into the turf.

In the center of the garden stands the “Monk’s Bath” in wrought-iron, lead and stone. It derives its name from the sturdy little supporting monks in cast lead which surround it, but it really is a bird bath.

These beautifully-modeled, but simple statuettes are replicas of those surrounding the Tome of the Dukes of Normandy and possess a simplicity and charm entirely medieval.

The second floor is designed for family privacy and comfort. The Master bedroom chamber has a private study, dressing room and Rookwood tile bath. There are three large additional bed chambers with adjoining bathrooms. Of significant importance on the second floor is a small family chapel with intricate mosaic work. The Servant’s wing of the structure contain on the ground floor a five car garage, servant’s dining room, servant’s porch, kitchen and butler’s pantry. The second floor contains two servant’s rooms with adjoining bathrooms.

Some of the text provided in this pamphlet was taken from notes that are assumed to have been prepared for ”The Architect” magazine July 1929 issue, this article contained the photographs of the W.H. Albers home and gardens captured by Margaret Bourke-White. It appears that this article was redrafted by Adele Slade in 1935 for the Saturday Evening edition, Society Page, of the Cincinnati Post newspaper.

Great Hall

StablesSwimming pool

1927 ARCHITECTURAL SOURCESOriginal Light Fixtures - Midwest Metal Art Company

Mosaic Work - Albert D. Simmons

Inside Painting & Decorating - J. H. Greiwe & Sons, Inc.

Weather vane - Arthur Todhunter of Cleveland, Ohio

Well Head - C. A. Selzer Company

Living Room Mantel - Cleveland Art Metal Company, Cleveland, Ohio

Pipe Organ - The Skinner Organ Company

Bird Bath - Jensen Art Forging Company

Plastering - The Stern Plastering Company

Rugs - Hermes Carpet Company, New York

Breakfast Room Furniture - Incorvaiva Studios, Cleveland, Ohio

Breakfast room

Card room

Chapel

LEADED GLASS WINDOWSLiving Room

1. Painting, Architecture and Sculpture2. Music, Dance & Poetry3. Comedy, Tragedy & Literature4. Pottery, Printing, Fine Metals

Great Hall - Stair Window - The Field of the Cloth of Gold

1. Ladies and Pages2. Knight in Armor3. Knight in Armor4. Ladies and Pages

End of Living Room (Initials)1. IMA – Irene Marie Albers

(Daughter, March 1, 1906)2. WHA - William Henry Albers (Husband)3. DBA – Dorthy Brown Albers (Wife)4. JDA – Jeanette Dorthy Albers

(Daughter, July 13, 1908)

Billiard Room1. Hockey, Baseball & Golf2. Tennis, Polo & Swimming

Card Room1. Jack of Hearts2. Queen of Hearts3. King of Hearts

Library1. Travel2. Science3. Romance4. Biography5. Poetry6. History

Dining RoomBay 1–13 The Shield of Mediaeval Cities

in Italy

Breakfast RoomBays 1–6 Swallows and Branches

Pointed Windows1. The trees of the Material - Recreation and

the five shields are as follows; Golf Sticks - Golf Tennis Racket - Tennis Saddle - Riding Winged Tire - Motoring Pipes of Pan - Music2. The tree of the Material - Business, and the

five shields are as follows; Administration - Ink Well and Pen Industry - Ant Banking - Bee Manufacturing - Chimneys Transportation - Truck3. The Tree of the Spiritual - Religion, and the

five shields are as follows; Dove - Annunciation I.H.S - Baptism in Jordan Crown - Birth of Christ Crosses - Crucifixion Lilies - Resurrection

Great Hall

ADDITIONAL PHOTOS

Dining Room

Card RoomLeaded Glass Window

Motor Court Gate

Port Cochere Looking towards Stables

Rear Facade

Chapel

ADDITIONAL PHOTOS

Rear Facade Entry Doors

Garden View to Motor Court

Garden Detail

Rear Facade Staircase

Library

Pergola Fountain Room

William Henry Albers, Estate Owner

Born in Cincinnati on May 23, 1880 to Henry and Anne Albers, William Henry Albers was educated at St. Joseph Parochial School and Hughes High School. He entered the grocery business by working as a clerk at his father’s market (1902), and later (1908) became associated with the Kroger Grocery and Baking Company. Albers married Caroline Plogman in 1902, and they had two daughters, Irene and Jeanette. His first wife died in 1908, and in 1913 he married Dorothy Brown of Chicago.

In 1928, Albers became President of the Kroger chain and quickly started expanding the company. That same year, 138 Piggly Wiggly stores were acquired in Ohio and Kentucky, and 166 grocery stores were added from Michigan. By 1930 Kroger had expanded from 190 to 5600 stores. There were di!erences between Albers and the company’s Board of Directors however, so in 1930 Albers resigned. In 1933 he founded Albers Super Markets, Inc. The flagship store was located at 4500 Montgomery Road. It was the first grocery store to use the name supermarket, and had many innovations as well as lower prices than independent grocers. This appealed to Depression-era shoppers. Albers was the first chain to use florescent lighting and provide grocery carts for customers. Fully self-service, with wide aisles, the stores had a variety of nationally-recognized brands (rather than private label merchandise), which saved money for housewives. Albers’ stores were the first to price every item so customers could see exactly what the cost was. Another innovation was cash registers with one-half cent keys. The grocery chain was a phenomenal success.

William Albers was a civic-minded citizen, and served the Community Chest, CYO, Xavier University Lay Advisory Committee, and Lay Committee on Scouting. He was awarded the Silver Beaver, Silver Antelope and Silver Bu!alo Awards by the Boy Scouts of America and served on the National Executive Board of the Boy Scouts for 11 years. He was active in the Mt. Alverno Home for Boys and served on numerous food boards and supply control committees during World War II. He was a Director of the Second National Bank, Board Chairman of Sperti, Inc. and a member of the Art Museum, Ohio Chamber of Commerce, the Historical and Philosophical Society, the Queen City Club and the Camargo Club. He was a Knight Commander in the order of St. Gregory XVI, a director of the National Council of Catholic Men and the Cincinnati chapter of the Conference of Christians and Jews awarded him for his contributions to mutual understanding of peoples.

‘Then and Now’ article, Indian Hill Historical Society, Indian Hill Village Bulletin, June 3, 2011, Number 5.

BIOGRAPHIES

Music Room

Bloodgood Tuttle, Architect 1880/1889-ca.1935/1936

According to an undated volume of Who Was Who, Tuttle was born in New York City on January 23, 1889, although other sources indicate that he was born in 1880. Trained at the Chicago Illinois Manual Training High School; studied art at the Art Institute of Chicago, and attended the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris (although not listed in the 1907 EBA); he began practice in New York in 1914, and was listed as practicing there 1915–1922, and later in Cleveland, Ohio, and perhaps Detroit, Michigan. His major known works are the Gates of Heaven Cemetery of St. Patrick’s Roman Catholic Cathedral in N.Y.; the Midland County Courthouse in Midland, Mich. (1925–1926, with a 1958 addition by the individualistic Wrightian Alden B. Dow); and a Kroger Building in Cleveland, Oh. Between 1923 and 1925, and again in 1935, Tuttle designed 36 houses in the admirably planned and developed Shaker Heights sub-division of Cleveland, virtually all of architectural interest. Tuttle was inducted into the Cleveland Chapter of the American Institute of Architects in 1920.

This brilliant, if (perhaps deliberately) obscure architect designed at least two spectacular mansions in Cincinnati: the Otto and Catherine Holabird Luedeking house on Keys Crescent, E. Walnut Hills (1928–1930; one of the last important Cincinnati residences built before the Depression), and the William H. Albers estate, “Alberly Manor,” Indian Hill (1926–1928), with grounds by noted Cleveland landscape architect Albert D. Taylor, like many places in Indian Hill in the 1920s. Photographs of the Albers house and gardens by Margaret Bourke-White were published in The Architect in July 1929.

Architectural Foundation of Cincinnati’s Biographical Dictionary, author Walter E. Langsam.

Aerial Photograph

Albert Davis (“A.D.”) Taylor, Landscape Architect 1883–1951

Taylor was an American landscape architect and author, notable for his many gardens and his promotion of garden shows. He designed parks and other public works, subdivisions and private estates, primarily in Ohio.

Born in Carlisle, Massachusetts to Nathaniel A. and Ellen F. (Davis) Taylor, he received an A.B. from Boston College in 1905 and an M.L.A. from the College of Agriculture at Cornell University in 1906, where he taught until 1908. He then joined the o"ce of Warren H. Manning, where he was influenced by Manning’s informal and naturalistic approach to landscape design as he worked on such projects as Stan Hywet Hall in Akron.

In 1914 Taylor established his own practice in Cleveland, eventually opening a second o"ce in Florida. His firm provided landscape design for the Van Sweringens’ Daisy Hill Estate in Cleveland, J.J. Emery’s Peterloon Estate in Cincinnati, the H.H. Timken Estate in Canton, and Julius Fleischmann’s Winding Creek Farm. The o"ce also designed the Avondale subdivision in Akron and the Rookwood subdivision in Cincinnati. During the Depression, Taylor participated in a number of CWA projects.

Excerpts from online biographical data, multiple sources.

Margaret Bourke-White, Photographer 1904–1971

Margaret Bourke-White attended several universities throughout the United States while pursuing a degree in Herpetology (the study of reptiles). They included Columbia University in New York, the University of Michigan, Purdue University in Indiana, Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, and she received her degree in 1927 from Cornell University in Ithaca, NY.

Margaret began to study photography as a hobby while a very young woman. She developed the styles and techniques that she needed for various formats on her own. Her father was also somewhat of a camera enthusiast and he exposed her to the wonders of the photographic lens as a youngster.

Margaret Bourke-White is a woman of many firsts. She was a forerunner in the newly emerging field of photojournalism, and was the first female to be hired as such. She was the first photographer for Fortune magazine, in 1929. In 1930, she was the first Western photographer allowed into the Soviet Union.

Henry Luce hired her as the first female photojournalist for Life magazine, soon after its creation in 1935, and one of her photographs adorned its first cover (November 23, 1936). She was the first female war correspondent and the first to be allowed to work in combat zones during World War II, and one of the first photographers to enter and document the death camps. Her images of the Albers’ Estate in Cincinnati Ohio were published in “The Architect” in July 1929. She wrote six books about her international travels. She was the premiere female industrial photographer, getting her start in Cleveland, Ohio, at the Otis Steel Company around 1927.

Excerpts from online biographical data, multiple sources.

BIOGRAPHIES

Landscape Plan

Swan Lake Garden Feature Garden Ornament

Mission

The Architectural Foundation of Cincinnati enriches the Greater Cincinnati community by connecting people with the places where we live, learn, work and play. Through our programming and educational outreach, we inspire public engagement in shaping the built environment.

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Cincinnati, OH 45202(513) 421-4469

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ABOUT THE AFC

The Architectural Foundation of Cincinnati would like to extend a special thank you to Nancy Long Hogan (granddaughter of W. H. Albers) for providing a glimpse into the history of her family’s home through images, documents, colorful memories and her passionate love for Alberly Manor.