Steffens House

From HistoryWiki

Steffens House was located at 7631 Sheridan Road.

The Steffens House is a smaller version of Wright's Prairie-styled homes and has been compared in design to the earlier Isabel Roberts House(1908) in River Forest, Illinois. Although the home was built on a ridge about a block from Lake Michigan in the Birchwood neighborhood, Wright faced the home looking West, away from the lake, leaving few windows on the first floor faced the lake. The bedrooms on the second floor were the only rooms that enjoyed a view of the lake.

Very little information can be found concerning the Steffens or their Frank Lloyd Wright home. According to Cook County records, the property was purchased by Katherine B. Steffens in August 1908. There is no indication why her husband, Oscar M. Steffens was not included on the deed. He was a wealthy business man, and might have left the responsibilities of all aspects of the home in the hands of his capable wife. If she was the one that was responsible for purchasing the property, she may have also been responsible for contacting Wright, or possibly contacting Wright on her husbands behalf.

According to the October 30, 1907 issue of the business journal Clay Record, it was reported that "The Illinois Granite Brick Company has been incorporated... for the purpose of manufacturing brick. Capital $250,000. Incorporators Oscar M. Steffens, Joseph A. Grober, and Arnold D. McMahon." That is the equivalent investment of nearly six million dollars today.

The January 30, 1908 issue of the Clay Record, reported that "The Illinois Granite Brick Company has purchased 40 acres of sand in Michigan City, Indiana and will build a sand lime brick plant. Paul Fuchs is president, Oscar M. Steffens treasurer and Leo H. Pleins secretary. All are Chicago men." By April, 1908 train track were installed for hauling brick to Chicago. By September, 1908, construction began for the Illinois Granite Brick Co. brick plant to be built in Michigan City, Ind. Little else can be found concerning the lives of Oscar M. and Katherine B. Steffens.

Wright was most likely contacted just after the purchase of the property or in early 1909. The home was completed by the end of 1909. Many classic Prairie styled features were part of the Steffens' home. Broad overhangs, shallow hipped roof, central fireplace and rows of second story clerestory windows cement stereotypical prairie features. Like the Walter Davidson (1908), Isabel Roberts and Frank Baker (1909) Houses, the Steffens also included a one and a half story Living Room. But unlike the first three homes where the living room windows extended to the roofline, the Steffens living room windows stopped short and fell in line with the base of the upper clerestory windows.

One questions that begs to be asked. Why was the home not constructed of brick? There are no records to indicate why the Steffens would move from their home after just three years. The home was purchased by Otto Carl Bach in August 1912. The family moved out in the 1920s.

Otto Carl Bach was the first of two Bach brothers to own a Wright home. After seeing Otto's house, Emil Bach hired Wright to design a home in 1915.

Otto Carl Bach was born in Germany on January 18, 1872 to William and Katharina Bach. The Bach family immigrated to Chicago in 1881 when he was nine years old. He attended Bryant & Stratton Business Collage. On January 17, 1907 he married Louise Cora Gatter of Evanston, who was born in 1887. She was twenty years old, fifteen years younger than her husband. They had two sons, Otto Carl, Jr., born in June 1909, and Robert W., born in 1912.

Otto's father, William started one of the first brick manufacturing plants in Chicago, having brought the skill with him from Germany. Otto began working for his father's company, the William Bach & Sons Co. in 1886. He became a stockholder in 1900. When his father William Bach, Sr. retired in 1905, Otto and his five brothers changed the name to the Bach Brick Company.

As a result of the many visits to his brother's Wright designed home, Emil Bach had to have one of his own. He purchased a lot just two blocks north of his brother's home on Sheridan Road. In 1915, during the middle of World War I, Wright designed the Emil Bach House.

Otto C. Bach passed away on October 7, 1932, at 60 years of age, after living in his Wright designed home for twenty years. Birchwood District, which had once been a scarcely populated neighborhood was now crowded and bustling. The City of Chicago exploded North with Sheridan Road becoming a major thoroughfare. For reasons unrecorded, Louise moved out of home after her husband’s death, but retained ownership. Possibly because the house was more than a single mother could manage or afford. She rented the home, and for the next thirty years the King's Arms Restaurant abused what was once was a beautifully designed Frank Lloyd Wright home. When Louise Bach passed away, the home went to Otto Carl Bach, Jr. in December 1960. He continued to rent the property to the restaurant, but when approached by a developer, and with no real ties to the home, he sold it to O.W. Howell Enterprises in January 1963. Three months later, and only a skeleton remaining of the home, it was laid to rest.

All that survived were a few of the windows. As legend has it, on April 6, 1963, Richard Nickel, the Chicago-born photographer was arrested for "saving" some Frank Lloyd Wright windows from the Oscar Steffens House, which was under demolition. The charges were dropped. According to Thomas Heinz others ended up installed in the Arkansas vacation home of a Chicago architect.

Over a hundred years later, the Husser House a nondescript apartment complex is now located where once the Steffens House stood.