Category: Architects of Atlanta and the Southeast

The following item was published in The Atlanta Journal on April 25, 1909. G.L. Norrman died 7 months later.

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The Old World

G.L. Norrman, the architect, says that in Europe one asks who designed a house, not who owns it; but here it is, who owns it, not who designed it. In the sleepy old countries of the old world the interest has the artistic and not the money tendency.⁴

References

1. “A Great Building Era Now On In The City”. The Spartanburg Herald (Spartanburg, South Carolina), May 28, 1909, p. 1. ↩︎
2. “Converse To Show Fruits Of Recent Funds Campaign”. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, October 6, 1957, p. A4. ↩︎
3. Conley, Linda. “Restoring the shine to an old jewel”. Herald-Journal (Spartanburg, South Carolina), October 17, 2008, p. D1. ↩︎
4. “The Old World”. The Atlanta Journal, April 25, 1909, p. 2. ↩︎

The Background

As if he hadn’t already gushed enough over G.L. Norrman, in a December 1902 article for The Augusta Chronicle, Wallace Putnam Reed — under the pen name Major Junius — pontificated on why he considered Norrman “the ideal of the best type of southern gentleman”.

These were Reed’s final published remarks about Norrman — he died less than 5 months later, in April 1903.⁵

Article Excerpt:

In Mr. G.L. Norrman, the well-known Atlanta architect, I have found my ideal of the best type of the southern gentleman of the old school. To me this is somewhat remarkable because Mr. Norrman is a foreigner by birth—a member of one of the noble families of Sweden.

He is a sort of “Admirable Crichton,” the master of many arts and accomplishments, a scholar, philosopher, man of society and a recognized leader in his profession.

Sam Small once said that a man could not ride a few hours side by side with Norrman in a car without getting enough ideas from him to fill a bright, strong, original book.

He is an instructive, fascinating talker, and a polished, epigrammatic writer whose contributions are always welcomed by the press. His views of character, conduct and life are those which made our ante-bellum southern gentlemen recognized the world over as the most honorable and chivalric of men. Some of his ideas were so strikingly expressed some time ago in his lecture on “Architecture As Illustrative of Religious Belief, and as a Means of Tracing Civilization,” that I hope he will be induced to deliver it again, in Atlanta and in other cities. It is just the kind of lecture to interest broad-minded, cultured fearless thinkers.⁶

References

1. “Plans Made for Bisbee Building”. The Florida Times-Union and Citizen (Jacksonville, Florida), September 17, 1901, p. 6. ↩︎
2. “Filling in the Blank Spaces”. The Florida Times-Union and Citizen (Jacksonville, Florida), February 24, 1902, p. 5. ↩︎
3. “Dr. Armstrong Back.” The Sunday Times-Union and Citizen (Jacksonville, Florida), May 25, 1902, p. 5. ↩︎
4. “H.C. Seaman.” The Sunday Times-Union and Citizen (Jacksonville, Florida), June 1, 1902, p. 5. ↩︎
5. “Wallace P. Reed Yields to Death”. The Atlanta Constitution, April 18, 1903, p. 1. ↩︎
6. Junius, Major. “Pen Pictures of Well-Known Atlanta Men”. The Augusta Chronicle (Augusta, Georgia), November 23, 1902, p. 11. ↩︎

The Background

Four days after his gushing comments about G.L. Norrman for the Macon press, Wallace Putnam Reed contributed the following report to The Augusta Chronicle about Norrman’s sudden late-career resurgence.

Article Excerpt:

My Augusta readers are lovers of the fine arts, and they will be glad to learn that one of their friends, Mr. G.L. Norrman, the famous Atlanta architect, is winning new honors.

When Norrman planned the splendid Hotel Bienville for Mobile he said nothing about it here. But he could not hide his light under a bushel. The Constitution‘s pictures of his designs for the new dormitory and mess hall at Athens have attracted attention everywhere, and without expecting it this modest man of genius is now overwhelmed with visitors and orders.

The matter interests me, because I have long been convinced that the man who can design and construct a great work in the architectural line is really a greater man than a poet or historian. The arts are different, but the first endures longer than the two others. In recent years we have seen the growth of public interest down south in schools of technology, and this is on the line of my remarks.

To put it more plainly, we of the south are outgrowing the old idea of a plantation aristocracy, whose younger sons must be professional men or nothing. Our young men of the future will be those who can compete with the Carnegies. Like that great Scotchman, they will start at the bottom and work their way up. When they succeed they will have all the social and political prominence they desire.¹

References

1. Reed, Wallace Putnam. “Random Gossip”. The Augusta Chronicle, May 7, 1901, p. 4. ↩︎

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,^{2 3 4} 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

References

1. The Twenty-Ninth Annual Report from the Department of Education to the General Assembly of the State of Georgia. Atlanta: The Franklin Printing and Publishing Company, 1901 ↩︎
2. “In Hotel Lobbies and Elsewhere”. The Age-Herald (Birmingham, Alabama), October 28, 1899, p. 4. ↩︎
3. “In Hotel Lobbies and Elsewhere”. The Age-Herald (Birmingham, Alabama), December 16, 1899, p. 4. ↩︎
4. Morgan, Thos. H. “Letter to Glenn Brown”. 1 January 1900. ↩︎
5. Reed, Wallace Putnam. “Random Atlanta Gossip”. The Macon Telegraph (Macon, Georgia), May 3, 1901, p. 4. ↩︎

The Background

In April and May 1901, Wallace Putnam Reed wrote at least 3 similar articles about G.L. Norrman that 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

1. Reed, Wallace Putnam. “Random Georgia Gossip.” The Savannah Press (Savannah, Georgia), April 27, 1901, p. 4. ↩︎

The Background

Five months after Wallace Putnam Reed’s anecdote 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, and reduced 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

References

1. Swedish Americans – Wikipedia ↩︎
2. “Prominent Architect Here.” The Spartanburg Herald (Spartanburg, South Carolina), September 30, 1909, p. 8. ↩︎
3. “One Woman’s View”. The Washington Post, June 3, 1900, p. 23. ↩︎

The Background

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

1. Photo credit: Ariail, Donald L. Images of America: Ansley Park. Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing (2013), p. 88. ↩︎
2. Morgan, Thomas H. “The Georgia Chapter of The American Institute of Architects”. The Atlanta Historical Bulletin, Volume 7, No. 28 (September 1943): p. 93. ↩︎
3. “By Hook or By Crook”. The Augusta Chronicle, January 7, 1900, p. 4. ↩︎