Discovering Buckminster Fuller on Long Island

While I may have heard of Buckminster (more commonly known as Bucky) Fuller in the distant past, what made me grow curious about him was a visit to a Long Island park named for his friend, the author, Christopher Morley. There are far larger and more impressive parks on Long Island, but the distinction this one has is that Morley's Knothole -- a small house in his yard he would escape to to write in peace and quiet -- has been relocated on the park grounds. 

Failing to find the bathroom in the park

While anyone may build a shed of sorts in which to escape the hubbub at home, they are not likely to have it equipped with a Dymaxion bathroom. But as Morley was a close friend of the man who dreamt up the design, he got on for his Knothole. Curiosity about that drove me to visit the park to see this marvel of easy-cleaning engineering that dates back to 1936. Alas, you cannot see anything inside the Knothole, which is kept closed and is falling into a sad state of disrepair.

What it should have looked like is this:

source https://slideplayer.com/slide/4283236/

The bathroom would have been made out of metal in a very compact and efficient design that was meant to be very easy to clean. Fuller did plan to one day render it in plastic for greater comfort, but the ones he did get made were metal.  The bathroom was supposed to be just one component of the highly efficient Dymaxion house that he was hoping would take off but never did. 

Even Morley's Knothole follows very traditional-looking architecture with nothing that would make you expect it houses a revolutionary design. In contrast, the full Dymaxion home was meant to be modern all around, and I do mean round. See the vintage video that showcases it here: 

Reading Fuller

With my curiosity piqued, I checked out several Bucky Fuller biographies from my library last year. But despite being a pretty fast and determined reader, I couldn't make it through them. But in August, my library got in a new bio, and this one I was able to read within the allotted two weeks for new books. It's Inventor of the Future: The Visionary Life of Buckminster Fuller. 

If I were to give it a star rating, I'd probably give it 4/5. It's highly readable despite the geometric details entailed in describing Fuller's concepts and their applications that endure beyond his own lifetime (like the carbon formation that resembles a soccer ball that was named Buckminsterfullerene AKA Buckyballs in his honor).

However, I don't fully buy into the parallels that Nevala-Lee attempts to draw with modern day influential figures and Fuller. Not all people who may be described as visionary or innovative operate in the same way. Certainly, Fuller was never was a major commercial success and really did not have good business sense at all. 

This account of Fuller may upset some people. Other descriptions of him focused on his creativity and presented him as a kind of magnanimous leader. But the take on his personality here is much darker. There are several account of fallouts with people who felt they were shortchanged on credit for concepts or who were cut out of Fuller's organization because he refused to cede control.

Worse than that are the glimpses into his more private life that shatter the romantic story of his marriage. He remained married for over 60 years and was not even parted from his wife in death.They shared a funeral and a grave. Yet he cheated on her repeatedly -- sometimes with women young enough to be his daughter or just barely of legal age. It seems he bought into a kind of myth he created of himself and associated these women with muse-like figures, linking them to particular discoveries, as he wrote in a certain account himself. But the marriage itself reflects some of the Long Island connections that the book brought to light.

Fuller and  Long Island History

What struck me in particular is that Fuller was married at Rock Hall, a colonial house that has been a museum since the middle of the 20th century. But in the early part of that century, it was still being
used as a home by the Hewlett family. Fuller's wife, Anne, was a Hewlett, and her wedding took place in that house. The Fullers even lived in Lawrence for some time and attended a church in Far Rockaway.* As someone who grew up in that area and who has visited Rock Hall a few times, I found it striking that such a famous person had such a strong connection to the place is not featured at the museum at all. 

Fire Island lighthouse: photo by Ariella Brown

But there is yet another location on Long Island that is connected to the Fuller name. That is his great-aunt, Margaret Fuller. If you visit the Fire Island Lighthouse  -- or its site -- you can find an account of the shipwreck that proved fatal to her and her young son when she was returning to the United States from abroad 

Nevala-Lee does make much of the Margaret-Bucky connection, as they both had a strong sense of purpose and conviction that they were particularly endowed with abilities to use to guide the world. Bucky even took a nautical image to express that -- not of a lighthouse but of the small end on a ship's rudder that can determine its direction -- the trim tab. In fact that is what he had inscribed on his gravestone pictured below:

    

                                   https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bucky_TRIMTAB.jpg

*One thing the author does get wrong is the name of the hospital in Far Rockaway. He mentions that Anne went to St. Joseph's in Far Rockaway, but the name of the hospital is St. John's. It's still there.

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Art, Architecture, or Parkland: Contrasting Estates of the Rockefellers

Sculpture-topped fountain at Kykuit. Photo by Ariella Brown (all rights reserved)

If you decide to explore some of  New York's historic Hudson Valley, you can see a study in contrasts between two Rockefeller estates: William Rockefeller's Rockwood Hall in Tarrytown and John D. Rockefeller's Kykuit in Sleepy Hollow. 

Now you see it, now you don't

The first obvious difference is that you can drive right over to the site of  Rockwood Hall and walk about it freely, as it is now a public public park. You cannot just drop in to see Kykuit. You have to first stop at the the Viistor Center at Phillipsburg Manor to meet for the tour there -- even if you have purchased your ticket online to save $2 . (You cannot tour the Phillipsburg Manor freely either, so if you want to work out that tour, budget both the time and the cost to do so on your visit). 

(Below is a picture of the grist mill at Phillipsburg Manor that I took in August 2022. I was on the tour years of the property several years ago. I'd say it's worth doing once but not necessarily doing twice.)

Aside from the cost of free vs. $20, $40, or $60 (depending on whether you go for 90 minutes, 2.25 hours or a full 3 hour tour) to see Kykuit, the most striking difference between the two is that in one you get to see a house, and in the other the house is gone. Below is all that remains of the 204 room Gilded Age tour de force built in "castellated Elizabethan style," which was demolished in 1941.  Alas, no Escape to the Chateau style revival is possible. (The fact that the estate was designed to be self-sustaining with all the food grown and/or bred on it to serve the family, servants and guests reminded me of the Strawbridges'  ambition to use the Chateau's property in the same way).  

These structures pictured above  were not part of the building itself but a front area for tennis, etc. It does give off quite an Ozymandias vibe when you know the history of the house. In fact, the hiking tour that is offered for this -- a mere $4.02  expenditure with EventBrite's fee -- offers visitors a sticker with a picture of the house that is conspicuously absent shown below:

                    

William Rockefeller was not the first one to scope out that site for an impressive mansion. There was already one there when purchased the property. But as he expanded his holding to a full thousand acres and hired Frederick Law Olmsted -- famous for the design of both Central Park and Prospect Park -- , to design the landscape, he also expanded the house. It's not clear if he tore down the existing structure or added to it. You can read more about that and see some (not color)  photographs of the interior decorated in the "more is more" style that defined the Gilded Age here:

parks.ny.gov/documents/parks/RockefellerRockwoodHallHistory

Crazy Rich Baptists

While William went for the over-the-top look of a castle, his brother John settled for a mere 40 rooms in his mansion that didn't even boast a ballroom. The largest room in the house is the music room, which was used for playing the organ and piano but not for dancing. Nor was alcohol served under John's domain because he was devout Baptist. However, that level of observance didn't last too long, and his son met his wife at a dance (according to the account of our tour guide) and also invested in wine glasses. on display in the butler's pantry when he gained control of the house. 

If you zoom in on the picture below, you can notice a great deal of detail on the front of the house -- from the eagle on top to the carvings below -- including representation of the arts and agriculture around the center windows. but aside from the art of the architecture, the house is home to many pieces of art --placed in various rooms, set out in the art gallery below the first floor, and scattered throughout the extensive and meticulously manicured grounds.  

 

The Oceanus fountain holds a prominent place in the front of the property. It is a copy of the fountain that Giovanni Bologna designed for the Pitti Palace at the Boboli Gardens in Florence.

There is a great deal of detail on the architectural structures that warrants noting -- like a slogan appearing on top of a gate, or the year building began  on top of one and the year it concluded on another. Below is a close -up of some of the ironwork that shows lifelike grape appearing among the vines:

There are many fountains around the grounds, but not all of them were on, as you can see from what's pictured above. Even the fountain that was the parallel one to the one in front of the front entrance shown below wasn't on. 

Kykuit: The gate shown here notes the year of construction. the one opposite it notes the year of completion.

Below is one of the many outdoor sculptures. The one below is by  Karl Bitter.

            This is the back part of the house with a wide porch that offers wonderful views of the Hudson

The picture above is one I took on a tour several years ago, though it was also in August. We saw more of the grounds on that tour and I took this picture of the view, sculpture and space that also frames garden views. 

On this visit, we got to see the inside of the garage with a vast collection of carriages for horses and a section of the automobiles that were used by the succeeding generations of people who lived in the house, ranging from a Ford Model S (earlier than T) to cars made in the 60s. Many of them still retained inspection stickers form 1981-1984, indicating they were still used about a decade before the house was turned over to the National Trust for Historic Preservation in 1992. 

Use it or lose it

And that is really why this house remained standing. It was occupied and used as a home for several generations and then turned over to a trust to be preserved a historic home that also functions as an museum. In contrast, the vast castle that William built was not kept as a family home, and so it became a white elephant of a property turned to use as a country club but not a residence. When that use failed, the lack of maintenance caused the crumbling property to become a potential hazard, which is what prompted the 20th Century heir of Rock Hall to demolish it and supposedly throw its parts into the Hudson. 

Related: 

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Restoring a garden and some history in Yonkers

A grand vision of Victorian architecture and engineering 

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The Llama of the Lake

On Sunday, I rented a paddle boat to venture out in Meadow Lake at Flushing Meadows Corona Park. I espied in the distance a creature sticking out of the water and paddled toward it to get a closer view.  As it came into focus, it became clear that it was an inflated llama. 

What is not clear is why it was placed in this body of water where swimming is prohibited and why there is a canister put in in its center. If any of you should know the answer, I'd love to hear it.

Should you be in the Flushing area of Queens, you can visit Meadow Lake in person, though the llama may not be visible from the shore. Measuring 95 acres, Meadow Lake's claim to fame is the distinction of being "the largest fishable freshwater body in New York City," as per New York State's Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC).

The aquatic life that confer the fishable status on the lake  include: Alewife, American eel, bluegill, brown bullhead, common carp, goldfish, gizzard shad, silverside, largemouth bass, mummichog, Northern snakehead, pumpkinseed, white mullet and white perch  The DEC mentions all of the above, though it fails to mention inflatable plastic llamas.

I do have to give a shout-out to Wheel Fun Rentals, which supplied our boat for $30 plus tax per hour. We did get there before noon when the park was nearly empty and the lake completely so, so were able to use the coupon you can find  on the link. However, it takes great stamina to keep going for more than 90 minutes and we did not use up the full second hour you get free with the coupon. 

The shout-out is for calling me to let me know I forgot to pick up my license that is held while you take the boat. As there is no official procedure for the return, I forgot about it. But I did get it back after they called me to let me know.

If exertion is not your thing, you can choose to do what this visitor did and bring your own swing seat to attach to a shady tree to give yourself the best seat outside the house.

Related post:

Going for the brass ring