G.L. Norrman.Projected design ofCandler Hall (1901). University of Georgia, Athens.1
The Background
Following a similar article in The Savannah Press, in May 1901, Wallace Putnam Reed wrote the following sketch of G.L. Norrman for his “Random Atlanta Gossip” column in The Macon Telegraph.
Reed recounted remarks attributed to a man from Birmingham, Alabama, about Norrman’s recent work, including the Bienville Hotel in Mobile, Alabama, and Candler Hall at the University of Georgia in Athens (pictured above).
One interesting aspect of the conversation is the speaker’s claim that “we are trying to induce Norrman to move to Birmingham”. Norrman considered moving to Birmingham, Alabama, in 1899,234 but ultimately remained in Atlanta.
Article Excerpt:
A Birmingham man who is a graduate of the University of Georgia called my attention, this morning, to the new dormitory, and mess hall of that institution, designed by Mr. G.L. Norrman, an Atlanta architect, who is somewhat famous throughout the South.
“These will be the handsomest buildings on the campus,” said the visitor from Birmingham, as he pointed to their pictures on the first page of the Constitution. “I don’t know anything of the kind in Europe or America, at the same cost, which is equal to these structures, measured by the standards of beauty and utility. By the way, we are trying to induce Norrman to move to Birmingham. The new Hotel Bienville in Mobile is his work, you know, and it has made him the most popular man in Atlanta. There is something in fine architecture that appeals to the heads and hearts of all classes. I would rather be a great architect than almost anything else.”
In the meantime Mr. Norrman who was standing within hearing walked off without waiting to be introduced to his admirer. Like most men of the genuine artistic temperament, he gets his satisfaction out of the work and cares less for compliments than any man I know.
If he cares for distinction he can easily make himself recognized as one of the foremost architects of this country. The late John Wellborn Root of Atlanta, enjoyed that distinction, but in some lines Mr. Norrman is regarded as his superior.5
G.L. Norrman. Candler Hall (1902). University of Georgia, Athens.
The Background
In April and May 1901, Wallace Putnam Reed wrote at least 3 similararticles about G.L. Norrmanthat were published in different newspapers throughout the Southeast. The first article is included below, written by Reed for his weekly column in The Savannah Press.
Here, Reed identified Norrman as “A Swedish gentleman of aristocratic ancestry”, but that appears to be inaccurate. All evidence indicates he came from an ordinary middle-class family, and if Norrman falsely claimed himself as a descendant of Swedish nobility, it was entirely unnecessary — he was remarkable enough on his own merits.
Article Excerpt:
Mr. G.L. Norrman, the well known Atlanta architect, has a legion of friends in Savannah who will be delighted with his splendid designs for the State University dormitory and mess hall, which were the most notable illustrations in The Constitution the other day.
Mr. Norrman is in love with his profession.He is an original thinker, a scholar, and a traveler who has studied on their sites the best examples of the world’s ancient and modern architecture. When I do not find it convenient to spend a leisure hour in a big library I hunt up Norrman. He is a favorite with our brightest men, and the south is dotted with churches, public buildings, and residences which bear testimony to his skill and artistic taste.
This man is worth a column here if we had the time and space. A Swedish gentleman of aristocratic ancestry, he has made himself the master of our language, and few writers have his happy gifts of expression. Though comparatively a young man, he is a type of our old-fashioned gentleman in his notions of honor, chivalry, and personal responsibility. It is gratifying to me to see his name imperishably linked with our university. His work will help it in more ways than one.1
References
Reed, Wallace Putnam. “Random Georgia Gossip.” The Savannah Press (Savannah, Georgia), April 27, 1901, p. 4. ↩︎
G.L. Norrman. First Church of Christ Scientist (1899, demolished). Atlanta. Photograph from an undated postcard published by Witt Brothers of Atlanta.
The Background
Five months after Wallace Putnam Reed’sanecdote about G.L. Norrman and Mrs. Mims, a much-expanded version of the tale made its way to Washington, D.C., where the story was reported in the “One Woman’s View” column of The Washington Post.
The new version included an additional detail about windows, andreduced Norrman to something of a buffoonish caricature, affecting an exaggerated Scandinavian accent and playing on the “dumb Swede” stereotype that was prevalent in the 19th century.1
Norrman was anything but dumb, of course, speaking at least 3 languages and later described as “one of the best read men in the country and well informed on any and all subjects.”2 But why let truth get in the way of a humorous story, eh?
The revised story was subsequently published in newspapers across the United States.
Article Excerpt:
They have been building a Christian Science church down in Atlanta—I think it’s Atlanta—so a man from Georgia tells me, and the architect they selected to do the thing is a Scandinavian who is as frank in manner as he is artistic in practice. When the building was nearly completed, one of the leading women of the church, mother of a very famous Georgia belle, came to look at it.
“Ah, Mr. Blank,” said she, “it is very beautiful: but you musn’t take too much credit to yourself. Thought has played a great part in bringing this to pass. Not work, but thought. I have put my mind on it since it began to be. I have given you absent treatment to help you. That is why you have been so successful. I have helped you greatly, with my thought.”
“Dank you, madam; I dank you much,” responded the architect. “But I wish you had told me about dis sooner yet. I vould haf tole you what to do. Myself, I can build churches. I do not need your thoughts. But it is that man that puts in the glass. Why you not put your mind on him? He haf put in the most tam bad glass whatever I did see.”
When that Christian Science church in Atlanta was completed, the chief woman member of the congregation gazed at it admiringly.
“It is a thought of God materialized,” she said—I don’t pretend, by the way, to have her phraseology exactly, but I think I convey her meaning. “It is thought made manifest. It is mind made visible. What a pity it is not in marble.”
“Ach, madam,” said the architect, “whose fault is that? I haf no thought; I haf only bricks. I build it with bricks. You haf the thoughts. Why did you not think marble while you were thinking?”3
Thomas Morgan of Bruce & Morgan once claimed that G.L. Norrman “made friends easily,”2 but it could also be said that he made enemies easily.
Norrman’s rivals were as colorful as he was, but perhaps none were as endearingly antagonistic as Sue Harper Mims, a prominent Atlanta socialite and the leader of the city’s Christian Science congregation.
Between 1898 and 1899, when he designed and oversaw construction of the church’s sanctuary, Norrman — who worshiped Norse gods — made several audaciously disparaging remarks about Christian Science beliefs, drawing rebuke from Mrs. Mims.
It’s hard to determine if Norrman and Mims were truly adversaries or if they just enjoyed taunting each other — perhaps it was a little of both.
Here, Norrman’s friend Wallace Putnam Reed recounted a humorous exchange between Norrman and Mrs. Mims, published in January 1900 for his weekly column in The Augusta Chronicle.
“I see that Architect Godfrey L. Norrman, of Atlanta, has been in Augusta in consultation with the owners of the burned district. Mr. Norrman is not only an accomplished architect, but has a fine sense of humor. He was the architect for the Christian Science Temple in Atlanta, which was erected by Mrs. Livingston Mims. It is a beautiful building of pure white, built after the pattern of the Parthenon, and is made of white plaster over brick walls. When the work was completed and Mrs. Mims was looking at the pretty structure, she exclaimed, “It is beautiful, but I wish it was marble,” whereupon Architect Norrman promptly replied: “Well, Mrs. Mims, you just think it marble, and it will be marble.” It seems that several times during the building of the Temple Mr. Norrman had complained of some indisposition and the Christian Scientist said to him: “Mr. Norrman, just think you are well, and you will be well.” The architect desired her to apply her doctrine to the temple.”3
References
Photo credit: Ariail, Donald L.Images of America: Ansley Park. Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing (2013), p. 88. ↩︎
Continuing an apocalyptic theme established in his previous article about G.L. Norrman, in May 1899, Wallace Putnam Reed of The Atlanta Constitution wrote the following article entitled “A Scientist’s Dream and Its Terrors”.
In the story, Norrman and a friend — undoubtedly Reed himself — discussed the potential cataclysmic effects of an earthquake in the Isthmus of Panama. The conversation was spurred by Norrman’s interest in the 1692 Jamaica earthquake, as he was said to “devote considerable attention to such exceptional freaks of nature”.
Norrman then went to sleep and experienced what he described as “the worst dream I ever had”, picturing his own slow, agonizing death — a curious foreshadowing of his actual death by suicide 10 years later.
The story was published by several other newspapers throughout the United States.
A Scientist’s Dreams and Its Terrors
Some time ago Mr. Godfrey L. Norrman read a thrilling account of the great earthquake which destroyed the old city of Port Royal in the West Indies.
The narrative interested him, and he could not dismiss it from his mind.
His fondness for scientific studies had caused him to devote considerable attention to such exceptional freaks of nature, and the story of the Port Royal disaster led him to speculate upon the possibilities of similar calamities in future.
One evening the matter came up while he was conversing with a friend who took a deep interest in such subjects, and in the course of their talk some startling theories and suggestions were discussed.
“What would be the result if an earthquake should up tear up the Isthmus of Panama?” asked Mr. Norrman’s friend.
“It would be far-reaching in its effects,’ was the reply, ‘and it would doubtless make the region we live in uninhabitable.”
“You are right,” said the other. “I have studied the matter for years, and I have formed some very positive opinions about it. The great earthquakes of the past in the tropics may be repeated. Possibly they will occur in new localities, and on a gigantic scale. the Panama isthmus is only about fifty miles wide. Now, it would be easy for a big earthquake to tear a chasm several miles wide through that narrow strip of land.”
“Just so,” assented Mr. Norrman.
“Very well,” continued the prophet of evil. “It is understood that the Pacific is perhaps fully two inches lower than the Atlantic. You know what would happen.”
“Yes,” answered the interested listener, “the gulf stream would change its course.”
“Change is no name for it,” said the talker. “The gulf stream would rush with fearful velocity through the chasm into the Pacific and where would we be?”
“Buried under mountains of snow and ice,” replied the other.
“No doubt about that,” said the man who was predicting future horrors. “The loss of the gulf stream would suddenly change our climate. The gulf would freeze into a solid mass of ice. Florida would be covered with snow-clad glaciers, and Georgia would be bleak and cold as Alaska. The change would kill almost every living thing, but after some years this frozen territory would have a suitable animal and vegetable life. Polar bears would be numerous and perhaps tribes of hardy people like the Eskimos would live here. Other quarters of the globe would send exploring expeditions in this direction, and new Pearys and Andrees would try to discover traces of our buried civilization.”
“Do you really believe all of this?” asked Mr. Norrman.
“Yes, don’t you?”
“Some of it—I hardly know to what extent,” was the response, “but I am inclined to agree with you that such a convulsion as you suggest would suddenly revolutionize our climate and make it impossible for us to live here. The diversion of the gulf stream would probably give us conditions similar to those of the arctic region.”
There was more talk on the same line, and at a late hour Mr. Norrman went to bed with his head full of some very sensational theories, facts and predictions.
Naturally, he had a dream, and it goes without saying that it was a holy terror. He was ripe for it—in the very state of mind for a nightmare.
At first the dreamer found it very pleasant. He was on one of the islands near the Florida peninsula, and the glories of that flowery land and the summer sea dazzled and delighted him.
Suddenly he staggered and came near falling. He felt dizzy and sick. The waves began rolling mountain high, and the island seemed to be rocking.
What was the matter?
A telegraph operator rushed out of his office and shouted to a group of tourists:
“An earthquake has torn the isthmus of Panama wide open from sea to sea!”
The tourists hurried away to carry the news to their families.
Mr. Norrman was left alone on the beach.
He had been watching numerous ships at a distance as they moved slowly over the waters.
All at once their speed increased. They began to move rapidly, and in a short time they darted by in the direction of the Isthmus, so quickly that the spectator wondered how those on board could breathe. The vessels seemed to fly like arrows.
The stiff breeze, growing stronger very moment, was getting colder.
The solitary watcher on the beach felt too weak to walk to in a place of shelter, and he was glad to sit down where a huge rock shielded him from the gale.
He remained there some two or three hours. The ships were no longer visible. Great masses of white fog advanced from every quarter, and a heavy snow began falling.
The white fog began freezing, and big masses of ice could be seen in the gulf, circling around the island, while in the distance icebergs loomed up all in their white and awful splendor.
Unable to move, the man by the rock felt that he was rapidly and surely freezing to death. The ground about him was covered with ice and snow. He was chilled to the very narrow, and shivered like an aspen leaf.
No human being ever suffered more than Mr. Norrman during that frightful ordeal. Certain death apparently was his doom, and he gave up all hope. His tortures were so unbearable that he was anxious to die and end his misery. His ears, nose, feet and hands were frozen, and it was impossible for him to crawl.
Yet his mind was abnormally active. He recalled all that he had ever read and heard about the horrors of arctic life, and he felt the keenest curiosity about the extent of the earthquake and its effects upon the south Atlanta and gulf states.
Even in those moments of excruciating pain his thoughts turned to Georgia, and he laughed deliriously when he pictured to himself the astonishment of the promenaders in their spring costumes on Peachtree street when they lost their climate at one fell swoop, and found the snow drifts piling up around them.
But human endurance has its limit.
A tremendous howl exploding from his own throat awoke Mr. Norrman, and leaping from his bed, with chattering teeth and shaking limbs, he made a rush for the grate, and got as close as he possibly could to the fire.
It was a pleasant spring night, but he was nearly frozen, and it took an hour to restore its circulation.
“That was the worst dream I ever had,” said Mr. Norrman, “and it makes me shiver to think of it.“
Atlanta and the United States were in the throes of the Great Blizzard of 1899 when Wallace Putnam Reed, a friend of G.L. Norrman‘s, wrote the following article as part of his weekly column in TheAtlanta Constitution.
Two days before the article’s publication, Atlanta received 6.5 inches of snow and recorded its all-time low temperature of nearly -9 °F12 in a cataclysmic nationwide cold snap.
Described by one forecaster as “probably the most remarkable in the history of the country”,3 the blizzard left hundreds of Atlantans stranded without food and fuel for heat,456 and caused more than $1 million of crop losses in Georgia and $100,000 of pipe damage in Atlanta.78
With the ice and snow still melting, Reed asked a timely question: “Is our climate changing?”, and introduced his readers to Norrman’s belief that Earth’s geographic poles cataclysmically shifted at earlier points in its history, a debunked pseudo-scientific theory that was first hypothesized in the late 19th century.
Here, Reed referred to the infamous “Cold Friday” of 1833, which was previously reputed as the coldest day on record in the Atlanta area,9 although the city didn’t even exist at that point. Reed also mentioned Terminus and Marthasville — both were early names for Atlanta.10
Our Polar Weather And Its Suggestions
Is our climate changing?
Occasionally this question is asked in a humorous way by some old-timer who takes the position that the war ruined everything down this way, including our weather.
But the suggestion has a serious aspect.
A few exceptionally cold winters in the course of a century, or a dozen centuries, would not be conclusive proof of a permanent change of climate.
This globe of ours is very old. According to the scientists, it is at least 100,000 years old, and in that period many remarkable physical revolutions have occurred.
Of course we have had very cold spells in Georgia before the present age. Everyone of my older readers is ready right now to remind me of that memorable and destructive freeze two generations ago, along the thirties, shortly before the big panic.
That was bad enough, but there were fewer people here to suffer in those days, and Atlanta escaped entirely, because there was then no Atlanta—not even Marthasville or Terminus; and I doubt whether Hardy Ivey [sic] had built his solitary cabin on the site of our metropolis.
It was a terrible visitation—that cold Friday. Fruit trees, vegetation and crops were ruined. Thousands of forest trees exploded–bursting wide open.
The people had not recovered when the panic came. then, cotton fell 3 or 4 cents, and many farmers lost everything. Their creditors pushed them to the wall, and sold them out, not sparing even their beds, pots and kettles and cheap tableware.
Some scientific men maintain that in the remote past this was a very cold region. Mr. G.L. Norrman touches upon the subject very entertainingly in his recent pamphlet, entitled “Architecture as Illustrative of Religious Belief.”
Mr. Norrman accounts for the flood by suggesting that sometime during the earth’s existence the accumulation and congealing of the vapors at the poles made them the largest diameter of the globe, and, when this took place, the earth naturally found its equilibrium on a different axis, and turned about 90 degrees.
This is a very startling suggestion, and there is a sufficient basis of fact for it to attract the attention of the thoughtful.
The pamphlet referred to in the foregoing paragraphs says that the poles were perhaps changed from some points near the present equator, taking the place of the former equator at points near the present poles. If such a change in the poles occurred, it would account for many curious phenomena on this sphere.
Such a change would of course change the beds of the oceans.
What are now productive valleys may have been the bottom of the ocean, and the present bed of the ocean may have been tilled valleys, ages and ages ago.
This change of the oceans would have caused a tremendous rush of the waters, destroying everything in their way.
It would account for the phosphate beds, where animals of every kind—lions, tigers, elephants, fish and reptiles—are piled together, as firmly as if a million Niagaras had rammed them in the crevices where they are found.
The coal beds, also, may have had a similar origin, though they may be traced to other causes.
Only some such catastrophe as the changing of poles will satisfactorily account for the remains of tropical plants and animals under the ice and snow in Siberia and Greenland, and the existence of glaciers at the equator.
Remains of tropical animals and plants could hardly have been in the arctic regions, unless that part of the earth had been tropical at some time, and unless a very sudden change in the temperature had taken place.
Whatever power caused the phosphate beds, the coal beds and the existence of tropical plants and animals under the ice and snow of the arctics was necessarily a power sufficiently great to destroy nearly every vestige of life and civilization.
Only on isolated mountain tops could life have been preserved.
People do not like to think of such gigantic convulsions of nature, and contemplate the possibility of their repetition.
Yet, the pendulum always swings backward. Its return may be delayed, but sooner or later it must come.
It is possible, therefore, that sometime in the future another violent shock will cause the present poles and the equator to change places; or again reoccupy their former localities.
The human mind can hardly grasp the full meaning of such a change.
Under such conditions the now frozen regions around the poles would be transformed into productive garden spots, while our south Atlantic and gulf states would be buried under mountains of perpetual snow and ice.
Intrepid explorers would probably make their way to Georgia, Florida and Cuba, and return to their tropical Greenland homes with big stories of the polar bears and reindeers seen in this locality.
Fortunately, there is no immediate danger, unless a tremendous earthquake should unexpectedly bring about the change.
For hundreds, and possibly thousands of years to come, this will probably remain the sunny south, with a delightful climate, and a rapidly increasing productive capacity.
The speculations of the scientists will not justify anybody in knocking off work and neglecting the improvement of their real estate.
If Georgia ever becomes an arctic territory again, it will probably be thousands of years hence. By that time our history will have been forgotten. New races may then live here. Perhaps not a vestige of our present civilization will remain.
So we need not concern ourselves bout these matters.
Some years ago there was a very brilliant Atlantian of a scientific turn of mind who was greatly worried over the idea that an earthquake or a canal across the isthmus of Panama might divert the gulf stream from its course, and turn this region into a frozen waste, where no human beings could exist, but his warnings did not alarm many people.
Let us leave the calamities of the future to those who will have to bear them. In the meantime we have our hands full taking care of ourselves and the sufferers at our doors during our occasional blizzards.
G.L. Norrman. New York Herald Building, Cotton States and International Exposition (1895). Atlanta.1
A good idea never dies, as proven by G.L. Norrman‘s design for the New York Herald Building at the 1895 Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta.
More of a booth than a building, the structure’s primary purpose was to distribute copies of the New York Herald to exposition visitors, with the added service of delivering letters and telegrams sent to tourists from their friends and family in the North.2
The structure was built of cheap woodand intended to last for the duration of the exposition: a little over 3 months.3 But Norrman rarely did anything by half, so the booth was designed as a tiny tetrastyle temple — complete with a raised podium, a porch with 4 Ionic columns, and a decorative frieze and pediment. The entire building was also painted white,4 giving it the full classical effect.
G.L. Norrman. Georgia State Building, World’s Columbian Exposition (1892, unbuilt). Illustration drawn by W.L. Stoddart.5
Norrman’s inspiration for the project clearly came from his own 1892 design for the Georgia State Building at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago.
As conceived by Norrman, the Georgia State Building was to be a 50-by-150-foot hexastyle temple made entirely of Georgia materials,6 including “liberal use of parti-colored marbles”,7 marble tile floors, a terra cotta roof,8 and “dressed wood effects” to “remind the traveled beholder of the sublime artistic effects so frequently produced in Venetian and Florentine buildings”.9
The project wasn’t executed, as the state of Georgia couldn’t secure enough space for it at the exposition.1011 Additionally, the estimated $10,000 building12 had to be funded entirely by private donations, which failed to materialize.13
Norrman was obviously pleased with his design, however: Early in the project’s development, he suggested that the Georgia State Building be “lithographed and copyrighted”, with proceeds funding its construction.14
And the building was indeed lithographed — Norrman’s then-assistant, W.L. Stoddart, drew an exquisite pen-and-ink wash of the proposed design (pictured above), which was published in the American Architect and Building News in July 1892.
An illustration of the building was also entered into the Architectural League of New York’s 8th annual exhibition in January 1893, which included designs from the World’s Columbian Exposition. In describing the show, The Architectural and Building Monthly singled out Norrman’s design from 15 other state entries, writing somewhat inaccurately:
. “…the Georgian design by G.L. Norrman, of Atlanta, is the only one which can be considered an exponent of a type. The design is characteristic of the Sunny South, where the public buildings have always been more ornate and graceful than in the more material North. It is of the Grecian temple style, but there is enough originality and boldness in the treatment to defend the architect from any suggestion of a too slavish conservatism. There is a beautiful proportion carried out in the details, and the whole is a harmonious picture.”15
Given its positive reception in New York, it’s fitting that Norrman adapted his world’s fair design for a New York newspaper, no matter how short-lived its use: Following the close of the Cotton States Exposition, the New York Herald Building was demolished in January 1896.1617
View of Cotton States and International Exposition with New York Herald Building under construction (visible between 2nd and 3rd statues).18
References
“Herald’s Booth At Atlanta”. New York Herald, October 20, 1895, p. 10. ↩︎
Humphries & Norrman. Gate City National Bank (1884, demolished May 1929). Atlanta.1
The Background
The following biographical sketch, published in 1884, is one of just a few sources with details about the early life of G.L. Norrman, including an interesting anecdote about a violent outburst in his youth — a forerunner of many to follow.
The sketch appeared as part of an article in The Atlanta Constitution heralding the completion of the first “modern” office building in the city, which was designed by Norrman and owned and anchored by the Gate City National Bank.
Located at the southeast corner of Alabama and Pryor Streets, the 5-story structure was one of Norrman’s most important early works, designed in the “metropolitan style”, with Stone Mountain granite for the foundation, Tennessee limestone on the lower floors, and pressed brick on the upper floors.
Location of Gate City National Bank
The building’s entrance porticoes were made of Ohio freestone and carved by a mysterious Mr. Ruckle, who was said to be a graduate of the “national school of fine arts at Munich”.2 Inside, the building included an elevator,3 among the earliest in Georgia (the first one debuted at Atlanta’s J.F. & M.C. Kiser department store in 18774).
The project took nearly 2 years to complete5 and was officially credited toHumphries & Norrman.6 However, George P. Humphries left the firm shortly before its completion,7 and it appears Norrman was the primary designer, assisted by his first known draughtsman, Aug Petersen.
L. J. Hill, president of the Gate City National Bank, praised Norrman’s design for the building, saying: “…no finer architect need be wanted by anyone than Mr. Norrman.”
Although the article calls it the “Hill building”, the structure was typically referred to as the Gate City National Bank until the institution abruptly closed its doors and was sold in 1893,89 after an employee embezzled over $100,000 from its coffers.1011
“Temple Court”, Gate City National Bank, after 1895 expansion.12
Seizing the opportunity for prime real estate, the Venable Brothers of Atlanta purchased the building,13 and in 1895, added 3 floors14 with a roof garden,15 installed “two swift modern elevators”,16 renovated the interior,17 and renamed the structure Temple Court (pictured above).18
Billed as “Taller than the Equitable“,19 the 8-story Temple Court gave the structure a new lease on life, as it was already becoming outmoded by Atlanta’s first “skyscrapers” of the 1890s, which topped out at a whopping 10 floors by the end of the decade.
The Temple Court addition was reportedly designed by another architectural firm,20 but while work was underway on the project,21 Norrman was also hired by the Venables to design the 10-story Hotel Venable (unbuilt).2223242526 Whoever was responsible for the Temple Court addition (I suspect Bruce & Morgan27), it appears to have seamlessly matched Norrman’s original design.
Temple Court was demolished in May 1929 for a 3-story hotel,2829 shortly after its ground floor and basement were stripped of their ornamentation and sealed beneath the Alabama Street viaduct, then under construction.30 The new structure was simply built on top of the old building’s ground floor, vestiges of which can still be seen in whatever remains of Underground Atlanta.
Vestiges of rusticated limestone facade from Gate City National Bank, Underground Atlanta.
This need for fact-checking is strong in this biographical sketch, which appears to have been hastily written: it’s chock-full of run-on sentences, overlong paragraphs, and numerous mangled names. It also makes several claims that merit further attention. Among them:
I haven’t been able to confirm that Norrman served 3 years in the “royal navy”, but in the mid-19th century, all Swedish males between the ages of 20 and 25 were required to serve in the military for 4 weeks every 2 years.31 At Norrman’s death, a photograph was also found of him “in full dress suit of a marine”.32
The “government engineer corps” mentioned in the article could be the Pontonjärbataljonen, a battalion stationed in Stockholm that primarily built bridges.
Norrman and his first partner in Atlanta, M.B. Weed, can only be partially credited with the design of the main building at the International Cotton Exposition. The original plan wasdesigned byW.H.H. Whiting of Boston,3738 and it appears Norrman & Weed designed multiple expansions of the building during its construction.3940 The firm also designed 5 accessory buildings at the exhibition, with Fay & Eichberg of Atlanta designing two.4142
In addition to the exposition buildings, 19 of Norrman’s other works are mentioned in the sketch, although many are given incorrect names or locations. Only one of those, the Edward C. Peters House, remains standing — Atlanta does love the wrecking ball. The correct names, dates, and locations for each project are:
St. Luke’s Cathedral, built 1883 and demolished 1906 – NE corner of North Pryor and Houston Streets, Atlanta – later site of Georgia-Pacific Center, Downtown [Map]
Unitarian Church of Our Father, built 1883 and demolished 1900 for construction of Carnegie Library – SW corner of Church and Forsyth Streets, Atlanta [Map]
Edward C. Peters Residence, “Ivy Hall”, completed 1883 – 179 Ponce de Leon Avenue NE; Midtown, Atlanta [Map]
William H. Venable Residence, built 1883 – 19 Forrest Avenue, Atlanta [Map]
William S. Everett Residence, built 1884 – 278 Peachtree Street, Atlanta – later site of Atlanta Expressway (I-75/85) [Map]
William D. Ellis Residence, built 1882 and demolished for construction of Atlanta Expressway (I-75/85) – 193 Washington Street, Atlanta [Map]
John Milledge Residence, built 1883 – 120 East Peters Street, NE corner of East Peters Street and Capitol Place, Atlanta – later site of 2 Capitol Square SW, Downtown [Map]
Horace Bumstead Residence, “Bumstead Cottage”, built 1883 and demolished by 1929 – 169 Vine Street, NE corner of Vine Street and University Place, Atlanta [Map]
Thomas H. Blacknall Residence, built 1883 and likely demolished for construction of East-West Expressway (I-20) – 56 Park Avenue, SE corner of Park and Lee Streets, West End, Atlanta [Map]
West End Academy, built 1883-4 and demolished circa 1911 – Lee Street, West End, Atlanta [Map]
Ponce De Leon Springs pavilion, built 1883 and demolished circa 1914 – later site of Sears, Roebuck & Company Building, Atlanta. [Map]
Robert A. Hemphill Residence, built 1884 – 231 Peachtree Street, Atlanta – later site of SunTrust Plaza, Downtown [Map]
Daniel N. Speer Residence, built 1882 – 486 Peachtree Street, SW corner of Peachtree and Linden Streets, Atlanta – later site of Emory University Hospital Midtown [Map]
Dr. Spalding Residence, built 1883 – 484 Peachtree Street, NE corner of Peachtree and Howard Streets, Atlanta – later site of Emory University Hospital Midtown [Map]
Nathaniel P.T. Finch Residence, built 1881 – 388 Peachtree Street, Atlanta [Map]
R. H. Richards Residence, built 1885 and demolished 1925 for construction of Davison-Paxon-Stokes Company building – 190 Peachtree Street, Atlanta [Map]
Homer G. Barber Residence, built 1884 – 147 Forrest Avenue, Atlanta – later site of Georgia Power Company, Old Fourth Ward [Map]
William A. Osborn Residence, built 1884 – 194 Jackson Street, Atlanta [Map]
Grant Park pavilion, built 1884 – Grant Park, Atlanta [Map]
G.L. Norrman, Architect.
Probably no man in Atlanta is more widely or favorably known than Mr. G.L. Norrman. He has only been here about three years, but in that time has furnished designs for fully $2,000,000 worth of buildings of every character, including of course, the time when he had Mr.Humphries associated with him as partner.
Mr. Norrman now occupies rooms 58 and 59 on the fourth floor, and is nicely equipped with all the appurtenances of a first class architect. He is a Swede by birth, and held a position for three years in the royal navy. He has ever been a man of great nerve and pluck an amusing incident which occurred while he was in the navy going to prove this fact. A superior officer having given him some very insolent words, had the pleasure of being straightened out on deck by a blow from Mr. Norrman’s fist. He soon after resigned from the marine service, and took a position in the government engineer’s corps where he distinguished himself for his ability. Mr. Norrman was educated in architecture at the Academy of Design in Stockholm. His first work after reaching Atlanta was to draw up plans for the great cotton exposition buildings in 1881, which were accepted and will be remembered by everyone, of course. He also designed the St. Luke’s cathedral and the Unitarian church, which are universally admired. The great characters [sic] which Mr. Norrman’s work always shows, has made it popular among those who appreciated individuality, and the fact that within three years he has done $2,000,000 in houses, is sufficient evidence of his merit as an architect. He designed Colonel Richard Peter‘s fine house on Peachtree [sic] , Mr. W.H. Venabla‘s [sic], Mr. Everett‘s, Mr. Ellis‘, on Washington; Captain Milledge‘s, Professor Bumbstead‘s [sic], Major Blacknall’s at West End; the West End academy buildings, the Ponce de Leon pavilion, Mr. R.A. Hemphill‘s, Colonel Dan Speer‘s, Mr. Spaulding‘s [sic], Mr. Finchs‘s [sic] and many others not necessary to mention. Mr. Norman now has a number of homes in hand, among them Mr. Richard‘s [sic] fine residence on Peachtree, which is to cost $40,000; Mr. Barber‘s, Mr. Osborne‘s [sic] on Jackson street, and many others. He has also the designs for a very neat pavilionto be placed inGrant’s park.
Perhaps the great monument to Mr. Norrman’s architectural skill and ability is the Hill building, the subject of this sketch. The cut herewith presented does not give an adequate idea of the perfection of the building, but it serves to show in a measure its graceful, massive proportions. Mr. Hill expresses himself more than satisfied. Said he, “I consider my building one of the best constructed in the country, and I take pleasure in saying that no finer architect need be wanted by anyone than Mr. Norrman. His work here far exceeded may expectations.” Mr. Aug Peterson, also from Sweden, is associated as assistant with Mr. Norrman. He studied architecture at the institute of technology in Norkpoking [sic]. It gives The Constitution pleasure to add its own praise to Mr. Norrman’s value to the architectural worth of Atlanta.43
References
Photo credit: The Atlanta Historical Society. Atlanta in 1890: “The Gate City”. Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press (1986).↩︎
“The Hill Building.” The Atlanta Constitution, March 16, 1884, p. 4. ↩︎
Burnham & Root. Equitable Building (1892, demolished 1971). Atlanta.1Photograph from an undated postcard published by E.C. Kropp of Milwaukee.
The Background
The 8-story Equitable Building was Atlanta’s first “skyscraper” when it opened in 1892. Built by Joel Hurt’s East Atlanta Land Company — a major client of G.L. Norrman‘s at the time — the Equitable wasn’t designed by Norrman but by John Wellborn Root of Burnham & Root2 in Chicago, one of the leading American architects of the era and a Georgia native.
Riding high on his own commercial and creative success of the early 1890s, Norrman was one of the Equitable Building’s original tenants3 and had perhaps the best view in Atlanta with a top-floor studio that spanned multiple suites,4 described as “brilliantly lighted, opening eastward”.5
On December 17, 1892, Norrman was profiled as part of an Atlanta Journal article about the building’s occupants, appropriately titled “The Equitable”.
Theprofile, published below, provides a few previously undisclosed details about Norrman’s early life, primarily regarding his education in Sweden and his international travels. It also indicates that Norrman emigrated to the United States in 1874, which he confirmed in the 1900 census,6 although in his 1897 passport application, he claimed to have entered the country in the fall of 1872.7
Norrman’s reluctance to reveal his age is also pointedly mentioned, and it seems he was self-conscious about the subject — in both the 1880 and 1900 censuses, Norrman reported himself as 2 years younger than his actual age.89 Given the fudging on his passport application, perhaps he just liked being mischievous with dates.
The article’s emphasis on his training is also notable, as Norrman was the only Atlanta architect at the time who had any formal education. The city’s other architects were all either self-taught or trained under other designers, and the difference is apparent when you compare their often crude vernacular creations to Norrman’s more sophisticated designs.
The profile has several minor errors, including misspelling Norrman’s name (3 times), erroneously stating that he came to Atlanta in 1882 (it was 188110), and referring to his first partnership as “Weed & Normann”, although it was Norrman & Weed.
The sketch also mentions the “Charlotte Hotel, Charlotte, N.C.”, although I’m not aware of any hotel designed by Norrman in that city. The name likely refers to Norrman’s design for the Hotel Carrolina (1891) in Durham, North Carolina, or it could also refer to the City Hall (1893) in Charlotte, then under construction.
“An Educated Architect”
Some men are born great, some achieve greatness, others have bachelorhood thrust upon them.
Now, the gentleman who occupies 829 on the eighth floor of the Equitable building is not only the architect of his own fortunes but the fortunes of a vast many others.
He is a lover of the beautiful, but has never been able to satisfy himself as to which style of architecture he would prefer in a wife.
In Southern Sweden his honest eyes first saw the light. He elected to be a designer and architect.
He finished his regular educational course in the finest school of Stockholm.
Then he made a tour of southern Europe and spent a time in Great Britain, studying all the different styles of architecture and the technique of different designers, from the age of sixteen until he proved himself one of the best draftsmen and one of the most ardent lovers of artistic architecture. He then spent a time in South America.
He has been at work for twenty-five years—eighteen in America—but he refuses, or rather, declines to make his age known because of the fact that he is still a bachelor of marriageable age and still hopes to meet with a companion of the opposite sex who would be willing to share his lot in a cottage of his own.
After coming to this country eighteen years ago this gentleman served as a draughtsman under various architects. He came to Atlanta in 1882 [sic], and was with his partner, Mr. Weed, under the firm name of Weed & Normann [sic], one of the architects of the Cotton Exposition buildings.
Of course you know who he is now—Mr. G.L. Normann [sic], whose splendid work as a finished architect is of national repute.
G.L. Norrman. Telephone Exchange Building (1893, demolished 1952). Atlanta.11 Illustration by W.L. Stoddart.12
Among his finest tasks are some of the buildings that are monuments in Atlanta as well as other southern cities. He designed the Gate City bank building, the Piedmont exposition buildings, the beautiful Hebrew Orphan’s home, the elegant Hirsch building, the Edgewood school building, many of the handsome business houses and dwellings on Peachtree street and Edgewood avenue, and is now engaged on the new Bell Telephonebuilding which will be one of the handsomest in the city.
Then he has designed many elegant buildings otherwheres, including the Armstrong hotel, Rome, Ga.; the Printup house and many beautiful homes in Gadsden, Ala. The aristocratic Windsor hotel, Americus, Ga.; the court house at Waycross, Ga.; the Charlotte hotel, Charlotte, N.C. [sic]; the Sweetwater Park hotel at Lithia Springs and many others.
Mr. Norrman is not only thoroughly conversant with all that pertains to his profession, but he looks on his work with the eye of an artist.
“I prefer the classic,” he said to a reporter, “for libraries, school houses, courthouses and all buildings of an educational character, as most proper. For depots and hotels any style will do, but I prefer the Romanesque for depots and the renaissance for hotels and homes as being more homelike and less business like in appearance. Churches I like Romanesque because the growth of the church and that style of architecture are so closely identified.
The so-called ‘colonial style’ of the old southern mansions is rennaissance [sic] so far as the builders were able to carry that style in those olden days, and it has recently come again into popular favor because of the sentiment that clings about those honored halls.”
Mr. Normann [sic] is a most interesting talker, thoroughly conversant with and in love with his art, and one can fail to be interested in talking with him if he is a bachelor of uncertain age.”13
References
Sparks, Andrew. “Turmoil Among the Turrets”. The Atlanta Journal and Constitution Magazine, March 7, 1971, p. 26. ↩︎
“A Big Building.” The Atlanta Constitution, January 9, 1891, p. 6. ↩︎
“G.L. Norrman. Architect.” (advertisement). The Atlanta Constitution, June 26, 1892, p. 5. ↩︎
Norrman & Falkner.E.W. McCerren Apartments, “The Chester” (1907). Atlanta. 12
The Background
The September 1907 edition of The Inland Architect and News Record published the following remarks from G.L. Norrman expressing his dissatisfaction with the compensation structure for architects at the time.
Norrman’s was one of multiple letters from architects across the United States calling for changes to the “Institute Schedule of Charges”, which was established by the American Institute of Architects and set a standard 5 percent fee for architects regardless of project cost or size.
Norrman’s remarks:
Atlanta, Ga. June 29th, 1907.
“The past year we have been as busy as we could be. We could not have done any more if we had attempted it, and yet we have made comparatively very little. This, I think, goes to show that the present schedule of charges is too small for work which cost from $10,000 to $50,000, which is the average cost of houses in small towns. I think that for large buildings running up into the millions, the present rate would be fair renumeration; but for work done in small towns it seems that it is entirely inadequate to the training an architect must have, to the attention he must give his work and to the responsibility involved.”
