The Balloon Frame: The House Building System of the Common Man

Colbert Elias and Chamberlin Everett Chicago and the Great Conflagration. Chicago : J.S. Goodman and Company, 1871, pp. 35–36.

Letter from Caroline Clark to Mary Walker, November 1, 1835, Chicago Historical Society from Walker Field “A Reexamination into the Invention of the Balloon Frame. Journal of the American Society of Architectural Historians, Vol. 2, No. 4, October 1942, pp. 3–29.

Op. cit., Colbert and Chamberlin , pp. 35–36, 91.

Ibid., p. 91.

Op. cit., Field, pp. 3–29.

Giedion Siegfried in Space, Time and Architecture, (Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1941), credited George Washington Snow as the inventor of the balloon frame. Giedion's work inspired Field's research.

Andreas Alfred T. , History of Cook County, Illinois Chicago : A.T. Andreas, publisher, 1884, pp. 131, 132, 136.

Encyclopedia Americana, Vol. 17, Americana Corporation, New York, New York, 1973, pp. 844–45.

Greeley Horace , et al. Great Industries of the United States, Hartford, Conn., 1872, p. 1072. Op. cit. Field, pp. 3–29.

Lakeside Monthly, Vol. 3, November 1872, pp. 188–191.

Nelson Lee H. Nail Chronology as an Aid to Dating Old Buildings,” Technical Leaflet No. 48, American Association for State and Local History, Nashville, Tennessee, November, 1968, based on research of Dr. Henry Chapman Mercer, a 1923 paper presented to Bucks County Historical Society, New Hope, Pa., now available from this society in a booklet entitled “The Dating of Old Houses.”.

Farmer Prairie , Vol. V., No. 11, November 1845, p. 275 and Vol. VII, No. 2, February 1847, p. 48.

American Agriculturist, Vol. V., No. 2, February 1846, pp. 57–58 reprinted in the Albany Cultivator, Vol. 2, March 15, 1846, pp. 41–42.

For details of Solon Robinson't life see Herbert Anthony Kellar's writing in the Indiana Historical Collection, Vol. XXI, No. 1, and Vol. XXII, No. II, Indiana Historical Bureau, Indianapolis, 1936 and Dictionary of American Biography Vol. 16 New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1935, pp. 50–52.

Robinson settled at Crown Point, Lake County, Indiana in 1835 and built a large double log cabin. As early as 1837, he began contributing articles on various farm and immigration topics to the Cultivator and other farm papers. In 1838, he proposed the formation of a national agricultural society and went to Washington in 1841 to preside over an organizational meeting. While a national society did not come about, Robinson's activities and those of others paved the way for the United States Agricultural Society in 1852, which in turn was an influential role for the establishment of the United States Department of Agriculture ten years later, Robinson reported his observation of agriculture and pioneer life in the Cultivator, Prairie Farmer and American Agriculturist. In 1852, he began the publication of The Plow and in 1853 became the agricultural editor of the New York Tribune. In connection with the latter, he traveled extensively throughout the United States, becoming a prominent spokesman for agriculture until 1868, when illness forced his retirement to Jacksonville, Florida. Robinson continued contributing to the New York Tribune for a number of years and published a Florida newspaper. He also wrote novels and short stories about pioneer life until his death in 1880.

Downing Jackson Alexander Cottage Residences New York : Wiley and Putnam, 1842. Downing's book was the first of many house–pattern books. These differ from the earlier carpenter–guide books, in that the authors of the latter were not concerned with a new building method, since the braced frame method was accepted in toto. Carpenter–guide books advised the master carpenter on the proper style interpretation and treatment. Downing, a horticulturist, was more concerned with a picturesque setting for a recent romantic sytle, the Gothic Revival. Downing assumed the contemporary customary wood building method could be adapted for a new style. Downing started one element usually featured in house–pattern books, that of showing a perspective drawing of the exterior house design and its floor plan.

Ibid., American Agriculturist.

Union Agriculturist, May 5, 1841, p. 44.

American Agriculturist, Vol. 1, No. 7, July 1847, pp. 217–18.

Prairie Farmer, Vol. VIII, No. 8, August 1847, p. 248.

Prairie Farmer, Vol. 15, January 1855, p. 46.

Country Gentleman, Vol. XIV, November 17, 1859 through Vol. XVII, June 6, 1861, p. 370, reprinted in the Cultivator January 1860 through July 1861. Country Gentleman, Woodward's eighth article, Vol. XVI, No. 18, November 1, 1860, p. 290.

Woodward George E. Country Homes, New York, George E. and F.W. Woodward, 1865;

Cottage and Farm Homes New York, George E. and F.W. Woodward, 1867;

Architecture … and Rural Art, New York, George E. and F.W. Woodward, 1867;

Suburban and Country Homes, New York ; Orange Judd and Company, 1873.

Cultivator and Country Gentleman, Vol. XXI, No. 781, January 2, 1868, p. 22.

Jacques Daniel H. , The House, A Manual of Rural Architecture, New York : Fowler and Wells, 1859.

Todd Sereno E. Todd's Country Homes and How to Save Money to Buy A Home, New York, J.D. Denison, 1868.

Atwood Daniel T. Atwood's Country and Suburban Houses New York, Orange Judd and Company, 1871.

Dwyer Charles P. The Immigrant Builder or Practical Hints to Handymen Philadelphia, Claxton, Remsen and Haffelfinger, 1872.

Reed Samuel B. House Plans for Everybody New York, Orange Judd Co., 1878;

Cottage Houses for Village and Country Homes New York, Orange Judd Co., 1883,

and Dwellings for Village and Country … New York, Orange Judd Co., 1885.

Examples include: Ekblaw Karl J.R. , Farm Structures New York, Macmillan, 1917;

Holtman Dudley F. , Wood Construction New York, McGraw–Hill, 1929;

Newcomb Rexford Home Architecture Wiley, 1932;

Mix Floyd M. and Cirou Ernest H. Practical Carpentry Chicago, Goodheart–Wilcox Company, 1960 and.

Neubauer Loren N. and Walker Harry B. Farm Building Design Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, Prentice Hall, 1961.

Prairie Farmer Vol. X, No. 9, September, 1850, p. 298;

Prairie Farmer Vol. XV, No. 3, March 1855, p. 101;

Prairie Farmer Vol. XV, No. 6, June, 1854, p. 206.

New York Weekly Tribune, 1855 and the American Institute Transactions, 1855.

Prairie Farmer, Vol. XV, Vol. 1, January, 1855, p. 46.

The western or platform framing variation had been accepted throughout the United States by the first decade of the twentieth century.

Prairie Farmer, Vol. XV, No. 4, April, 1855, p. 107.

Calhoun County Patriot and Democratic Expounder, Marshall, Michigan, April 18, 1951.

Skjelver, Mabel Cooper Nineteenth Century Homes of Marshall, Michigan Marshall Historical Society, 1971, p. 74.

Cultivator and Country Gentleman, Vol. XXXI, No. 781, January 2, 1868, p. 22.

Rural New Yorker, Vol. XV, No. 12, March 24 1855, p. 93;

Rural New Yorker Vol. XI, No. 1, January 7, 1861, p. 5.

Cultivator and Country Gentleman, Vol. XVII, No. 9, February 28, 1861. p. 146.

Woodward's eleventh and twelfth articles in the Cultivator, Vol. IX, February, 1861, p. 54; Vol. IX, March, 1861, pp. 86–87, and.

Country Gentleman, Vol. XVII, No. 2, January 10, 1861, p. 35;

Country Gentleman Vol. XVII, No. 6, February 7, 1861, p. 99.

Country Gentleman, Vol. XV, No. 25, June 21, 1860, P. 402.

A Dictionary of Americanisms on Historical Principles Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 1944 and 1951 cited these literary examples.

Bond , James Wesley Minnesota and Its Resources New York, Redfield, 1851, p. 122.

Boynton Charles B. and Mason T.B. , Journey Through Kansas with Sketches of Nebraska Cincinnati, Moore, Wilstoch and Keys and Company, 1855, pp. xi, 68.

American Institute Transactions of the Farmers Club, 1855, pp. 394, 399, 405, 407.

Eggleston, Edward The Mystery of Metropolisville New York, Orange Judd Company, 1873, pp. xxxv, 302.

Report of Indian Affairs Bureau of Indian Affairs, 1883, p. 150.

Moore Francis C. How to Build a Home New York, Doubleday and McClure Company, 1897, pp. ii, 13.

Burroughs John In the Catskills New York : Orange Judd and Company, 1910, p. 58.

Prairie Farmer, Vol. 7, No. 14, April 4, 1861;

Prairie Farmer Vol. 23. No. 23, June 6, 1861.

Skjelver, Mabel Cooper Webster County (Nebraska): Visions of the Past Webster County Historical Museum, Red Cloud, Nebraska, 1980.

Ibid.

Ibid.

Butler James D. Nebraska, Its Characteristics and Prospects, Lincoln, Nebraska. 1873.

Beadle Erastus F. To Nebraska in 1957, a Diary of Erastus F. Beadle Courtesy of Dr. Frank P. O'Brien, New York, The New York Public Library Bulletin, July 1923, pp. 7, 30. 33, 38, 40, 45, 61–65, and 79.

Andreas Alfred T. History of Cook County, Hlinois Chicago, A. T. Andreas, publisher, 1884. pp. 274–275, 279 and 298.

Statistical and Historical Review of Chicago Chicago, City Directory Publishing House, 1869, unpaged.

Pierce Bessie L. History of Chicago, 1848–71 Chicago, Alfred Knopf 1940, p. 105.

Iowa Choice Farm Lands, Des Moines, Mills and Company printers, 1870, pp. 70–71.

Op. cit., Skjelver M. C. , Webster County, Visions of the Past.

Giedion , Siegfried Space, Time and Architecture Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1941, p. 271.