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Illustration 4. Dwight Heald Perkins' Albert G. Lane Technical High School

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Illustration 5. Dwight Heald Perkins' George Tilton School

As architectural historian Wayne Andrews has noted, Kahn may also have been studying contemporary works by the Chicago architect Dwight Heald Perkins (1867-1941), who executed many high school designs for the city's school board at this time. [4] A number of Perkins's school buildings demonstrated a similar blend of Classical and Prairie Style influences. Perkins's Albert G. Lane Technical High School, (Chicago, ca.1907) shared Hill's Classical, symmetrical plan and elevations segmented by limestone courses into discrete base, shaft and cornice sections. (See Illustration 4) Roof lines were topped with Classical antefixae, and fenestrations were punctuated by pilasters. The pilasters had a simplified character to them, however, lacking accurate Classical capitals; this use of pilasters to edge bands of tall, thin windows was consistent with Wright's work. Like many Prairie Style efforts, both buildings had very simple forms and were composed of dark brick, rather than limestone. Classical gable roofs were not utilized, nor projected porticos. The use of the brick polychromy to edge entryways, a distinctive contrasting element at Hill, can also be seen in Perkins's schools, as at his George Tilton School (Chicago, IL, ca. 1908). (See Illustration 5)

Kahn and his longtime associate Ernest Wilby (1868-1957) [5] did not utilize this stylistic merger of Beaux-Arts Classical and Prairie Style elements much after the design of Hill Auditorium. (Wilby, a Professor of Architecture at the UM from 1922 to 1943, [6] may have exerted primary influence on Hill's design, as his initials can be found on the building's working drawings.) The reasons why he and Kahn chose not to pursue this Prairie Style element in their work were probably associated with Sullivan's growing unpopularity among architects between 1910-1930. Many architects viewed Sullivan as an eccentric, particularly in the wake of the Chicago Columbian Exposition of 1893, which triggered national enthusiasm for Beaux-Arts principles of city planning and architectural design. (Kahn toured the Columbian Exposition, and was deeply affected by the ensemble planning of Classically-styled buildings.) The refined reinterpretations of Classical precedents by the New York firm of McKim, Mead and White, attracted architects of this time, including Kahn. [7] The architect's use of a correct Classical vocabulary suggested his erudition and skills of draftsmanship A Classical choice also revealed the sophistication and status of the owner. Kahn deeply admired McKim, Mead and White's work, cribbing from their Metropolitan Club (New York, NY, 1893) [8] for his Detroit Athletic Club (Detroit, MI, 1915), for example. Still, architects in Southeastern Michigan retained close ties with practitioners in Chicago, especially through the Ann Arbor native Irving K. Pond, and Sullivan was held in higher esteem at the UM than in other parts of the country, particularly the East Coast.

4. Wayne Andrews, Architecture in Michigan, (Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 1982), p. 97.

5. Who was who in America: a companion biographical reference work to Who's who in America. (Chicago: Marquis Who's who, 1966), vol. 3., p. 916.

6. Ibid.

7. Kahn writes of his strong response to the 1893 World's Fair and his attraction to the Beaux-Arts methods of planing and design typified by Charles Follen McKim in "Architectural Trend," Journal of the Maryland Academy of Sciences, v. II, April 1931, p. 113, 119.

8. The Midtown Book, The Metropolitan Club, http://www.thecityreview.com/metclub.html. (Accessed 29-Jan-2000)