Property Record
3909 EUCLID AVE
Architecture and History Inventory
| Historic Name: | Dr. James & Jane Wilkie House |
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| Reference Number: | 100038 |
| Location (Address): | 3909 EUCLID AVE |
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| County: | Dane |
| City: | Madison |
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| Year Built: | 1938 |
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| Additions: | |
| Survey Date: | 19832012 |
| Historic Use: | house |
| Architectural Style: | International Style |
| Structural System: | |
| Wall Material: | Wood |
| Architect: | WILLIAM V. KAESER |
| Other Buildings On Site: | |
| Demolished?: | No |
| Demolished Date: |
| National/State Register Listing Name: | Not listed |
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| Additional Information: | WILKIE WAS A DOCTOR AND WAS AFFILIATED WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN. "Th year after Frank Lloyd Wright built the Katherine and Herbert Jacobs House at 441 Toepfer, William Kaeser built a strikingly similar house just around the corner at 3909 Euclid Avenue. Although Kaeser began his professional career as Madison's first city planner in 1935, he left that position a few years later to devote his attention to architectural design. Inspired by the ideals of the Wright's organic architecture, Kaeser designed many structures emulating Wright's buildings, especially his Usonian houses. The plan of the James Wilkie House closely follows that of the Jacobs House. Both the Wilkie and Jacobs House are constructed on L-shaped plans, with the living areas in the main blocks distinguished from the bedrooms in the ell. Both dwellings also turn away from the street with the large windows lighting the living areas oriented toward the private back yards. Although Wright intended his house as a low-cost middle-class home, Kaeser's was even more about cost efficiency; the Wilkie house is downscaled in size as well as materials. Both homes have flat roofs, wide overhanging eaves, and window banding--hallmarks of Wright's prairie style that became pervasive in the work of his Madison followers during the twentieth century." Westmorland Neighborhood Association, Westmorland A Walking Tour, 2012. |
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| Bibliographic References: | CITY OF MADISON ASSESSOR'S RECORDS. MADISON CITY DIRECTORIES. BIEBL, ANN E. THE RESIDENTIAL ARCHITECTURE OF WILLIAM V. KAESER. MADISON: UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN, 1985 (MASTER'S THESIS), PP. 59-60. ARCHITECTURAL FORUM: APRIL, 1940, P. 239. Housing Madison: Where We Live, Where We Work. Ed. Anna Vemer Andrzejewski and Arnold R. Alanen for “Nature + City: Vernacular Buildings and Landscapes of the Upper Midwest,” 2012 Meeting of the Vernacular Architecture Forum (VAF). https://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Records/Image/IM91778 Westmorland Neighborhood Association, Westmorland A Walking Tour, 2012. |
| Wisconsin Architecture and History Inventory, State Historic Preservation Office, Wisconsin Historical Society, Madison, Wisconsin |