As we’ve been biking and reading some of the historic markers along the roads, I’ve been thinking about how old Frank Lloyd Wright was during these events and how he might have thought about them as a child or young adult.  He was born on June 8, 1867 and we and lots of other organizations and institutions, including MOMA, will be celebrating his 150th birthday next year. It was fun to try to put myself in his shoes and imagine what I would have thought about some of the following events at his age. Newsworthy events included battles between Native Americans and US troops and the subsequent promises of reservations, discoveries of gold, the expansion of the railroad into and across western states and statehood.

We haven’t seen a lot of FLW designed structures so far, but hope to see the Willey House in Minneapolis next week and will be biking to Taliesin in Spring Green Wisconsin toward the middle of the month.  There’s no doubt that the times in which FLW was living influenced his thinking about buildings and architecture and I look forward to visiting his works with a new perspective gained from our ride.

WASHINGTON

• Washington statehood in 1889.  FLW was 22 years old.  All in all, FLW witnessed the creation of 12 states during his lifetime, from Colorado to Alaska.  His death preceded Hawaii’s statehood by 4 months.
• Klondike Gold Rush in 1897-99.  FLW was in his early 30s and was probably too well established by that time to be tempted.  But who knows?

IDAHO

• Population. When FLW was 3, Idaho’s population was 18,999 and there was a mini gold rush going on.
• 1870s.  Throughout the 1870s, when FLW was a boy, numerous Indian Reservations were established in Idaho and the railroad first entered the state, a momentous occasion in any of the western states’ histories.
• Statehood.  Of the four states we’ve biked through to date, Idaho was the last to become a state in 1890.

MONTANA

• Yellowstone.  In 1872, when FLW was just 5, Congress created Yellowstone National Park.
• Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce Indians retreated across Montana in 1877 after their surrender at Bear’s Paw Mountain.
• Railroad.  The railroad entered Montana in 1880.
• Statehood.  On Nov. 8, 1889, Montana became the country’s 41st state.

NORTH DAKOTA

• Custer’s last stand on June 25, 1876.  FLW would have just turned 9, an age when boys and girls were playing Cowboys and Indians when I was growing up.  At age 70 he was finding Native American petroglyphs at Taliesin West and giving them prominence in his new home in Scottsdale, Arizona.
• Statehood in 1889.  North Dakota entered the Union as a State on Nov. 2, 1889 when FLW was 22.  In the intervening years the State had welcomed thousands of homesteaders and the railroad, which was a constant companion during our ride, entered the state.