The Plymouth Church wasn’t actually the last place I visited for Doors Open, it was the last place I planned to visit. But the event still had an hour to run when I walked out of that church on Saturday, so I checked the map and discovered I was within walking distance of the American Geographic Society Library on the UW-Milwaukee campus, which is usually open only Monday to Friday.
Home to 2 million or so items: maps, atlases, photographs, monographs, serials, digital geospatial data and of course globes. Many, many globes.
A divers collection.
Maps on display.
This wasn’t my first visit, though it had been about five years, and I hope not my last. Maps are useful, but also their own reward.
Tucked away on a side street northeast of downtown Milwaukee, and not far from Lake Michigan to the east and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee to the west, is Plymouth Church. I arrived there on Saturday afternoon as the last place on my Doors Open visit.
It is United Church of Christ, one of whose confessional predecessors were New England Congregationalists. Puritans and Separatists, if you go back far enough.
“Alexander Eschweiler, who designed many prominent houses and buildings throughout Milwaukee, served as the architect of the original building,” notes Historic Milwaukee. “His design harkened back to an older pastoral age, replicating the image of an old English church. The beautiful sanctuary is notable for its nine Tiffany windows.”
Maybe eight. A volunteer at the church entrance – a little old church lady (really) – told me that one of the windows was unsigned. It sure enough looks like a Tiffany, but without the lettering, you can only be 99.44% or some other high percentage sure of its pedigree.
I spent a good while looking at the windows, dedicated more than a century ago to a number of early congregants.
Long looks are highly recommended.
Toward the front entrance. At that moment, the afternoon sun obscured the church’s rose window, which rises over the choir balcony.
Obscured unless you got up close. Then it is a thing of wonder.
The window was installed in 1917. Let Bobby Tanzilo, writing in OnMilwaukee, take it from here: “ ‘The window, a large Tiffany art glass, was presented to the church by Mrs. C. W. Noyes in honor of her mother, Marcia Wells, wife of Daniel Wells, who built the Wells Building and for whom Wells Street was named,’ wrote the Sentinel in June 1917.
“The window represents an angel figure bestowing the benediction of peace. This is the seventh memorial window in Plymouth Church.”
1917. How many of the congregation prayed ardently for Peace that upheaval year? For the American men headed for war? For Victory? All in a single breath?
Tanzilo also discusses the artist who did the rose window, and quite possibly the other windows, while working for Tiffany: Clara Burd (d. 1933). That despite the fact that Tiffany didn’t name the artists that worked on its projects.
“Clara Burd was – along with others including Agnes Northrop who designed the 1917 Hartwell Memorial Window that’s at Art Institute of Chicago, Clara Driscoll and others – one of the so-called ‘Tiffany Girls,’ talented women responsible for designing stunning works of art in glass (not only windows, but also lamps and other objects),” Tanzilo wrote.
She did a lot else besides. Such as book illustrations. “The Returning Prodigal” (1911).
Head west on Bluemound Road in Milwaukee – once an Indian trace, later an early paved road – and before long you arrive at Calvary Cemetery. The entrance is easy to spot, though my shot is from inside.
It’s Milwaukee’s oldest Catholic cemetery, counting as a rural cemetery, as it was outside the young city in the 1850s. About 80,000 people repose there these days, including the first mayor of Milwaukee, Solomon Juneau.
I didn’t see his grave. But there were a lot of others, varying in style, age, condition and carved sentiment. The ground has contour and the trees are mature. Everything you need for a picturesque cemetery.
Including some sizable art and a handful of mausoleums.
That’s the stone of the Jung family, early Milwaukee brewers. What was it Jung said about beer being the royal road to the unconscious? No, that was that other Milwaukee brewer, Ziggy Freud. I believe they were rivals.
A good number of priests are buried at Calvary, including some fairly recent internments, such as this long row of Jesuits.
More Jesuits. A wall of Jesuits, with room for a few more.
The cemetery was unusually busy for a cemetery, because it was on the Doors Open Milwaukee list. Not for the grounds or stones, but for the chapel atop the fittingly named Chapel Hill.
“This cream brick Romanesque style chapel was designed by architect Erhard Brielmaier and built in 1899,” says Historic Milwaukee. “A noted designer of Catholic churches around the country, Brielmaier also designed the famous St. Josaphat on the city’s south side, under construction at the same time. The chapel is located on one of the highest elevations in the city with impressive views of Story Hill, Miller Park and the downtown skyline.”
A nonprofit, the Friends of Calvary Cemetery, is overseeing the long and expensive restoration of the chapel. Some decades ago, the Archdiocese had planned to tear it down, but fortunately preservationists prevailed. Members of the Friends showed visitors around the inside on Saturday. We had to sign a waver in case a piece of it fell on us.
The crypt was dark and crypt-like.
“Originally built intended for services, prayers, private contemplation, and as a mausoleum for clergy, only one clergy member was ever buried at the site,” Historic Milwaukee continues. “The structure has two levels: the upper level features the chapel, with its raised sanctuary and high altar, side altars recessed in twin apses, lofty vaulted ceilings, soaring arches and central dome; the lower level is the bi-level mausoleum containing 45 crypts. Reposing directly beneath the main altar is the body of Reverend Idziego Tarasiewicza, interred in 1903.”
Why just him? The authoritative answer seems to be, dunno. Go figure.
I went on Saturday to see a church, Hope Lutheran, west of downtown Milwaukee, but I also got a good look at its attached building, the Carpenter Mansion. It’s an unusual Siamese twin-like pairing of structures.
The Carpenter House came first, built in the 1890s as a home for the founder of a thriving commercial bakery and his large family. These days, it’s a little long in the tooth, though a nonprofit is overseeing its restoration, a slow process. Still, handsome cream city brick, artfully put together.
“The gorgeous cream city brick Queen Anne house is a stunner outside even now, with its broad arches squaring off the entry porch – which also has some striking, stumpy and bulbous Romanesque columns – the elegant chimney, the decorative carved panels – including one under another arch, this one a second-story window – and the remains of a turret on the southeast corner of the home, which is perched atop a small hill,” writes Bobby Tanzilo in On Milwaukee.
The newer Hope Lutheran has its charms, too, such as a well-kept exterior.
The church ceiling evokes the ribs of an upside-down boat, like an impromptu meeting place for members of the early church. In that, and its elegant and simple lines, Hope Lutheran reminded me of St. Paul’s Episcopal in San Antonio, though the structure is even more pronounced in the Texas church.
Also like St. Paul’s, a fine array of stained glass windows.
How often is the Serpent seen in this medium? Not sure how often. Note the nick in the fruit of the tree of knowledge.
The church and the house are connected via a small room. The church bought the house long ago, and most of the first floor is church offices. The upper floors are closed for the ongoing restoration.
A summerish weekend as the fall equinox came and went. That made Saturday a good day for Doors Open Milwaukee.
The main event on Sunday was planting the enormous number of tulip bulbs that Yuriko acquired at a yard sale recently for a small price. If half or a quarter or even a tenth produce blooms next spring, there will be a nice display.
How would one start, and profit from, a virtual tulip bubble? Just wondering. Sillier things have happened in our time.
This was the sixth Doors Open for me. Yuriko didn’t feel like it this year, so it was a solo shot up to Milwaukee and back for me. When I was reading about possible sights at Historic Milwaukee’s web site, I came across one for Carma Laboratories, maker of lip balm Carmex.
“The 40,000 square foot building was built by Carma Laboratories approximately thirteen years ago specifically to function as a warehouse and distribution center,” Historic Milwaukee said. “The style of the building is a generic contemporary warehouse made of concrete.”
Well, fine. Why should I go there? Next paragraph:
“Carma Laboratories, the manufacturer of Carmex Lip Balm, is home to the world’s largest theater pipe organ, [which is] housed in its distribution center. The organ contains 6,000 pipes, a concert grand Steinway Piano, numerous percussion instruments and a set of handbells all playable from the organ console.”
Really? Rarely has such a bland opening paragraph been followed by such a wowzer. I knew I had to see that. It was my first stop Saturday morning.
Ordinary exterior indeed.
It’s one building in a district of suburban offices and distribution centers in Franklin, Wisconsin, which is south of Milwaukee proper.
Inside.
The organ is the vast enthusiasm – hobby is hardly the word – of the president of the company, Paul Woelbing, who was on hand to tell visitors about the organ, which has been under construction by the Century Organ Co. for years and isn’t quite finished even now. But enough to belt out a rousing version of the main theme from Star Wars (1977), which was playing when I walked in the door.
“When Woelbing and his late father, Donald, were inspecting a vacant warehouse for the expansion of Carma Labs, the acoustics of the cavernous building gave him some inspiration,” says the American Theatre Organ Society. “Woebling, a collector of paintings, old Harleys, and self-playing musical instruments, naturally thought of a pipe organ for the space.”
Woelbing at the console, programing the instrument ready for another piece, but I forget what.
Not Toccata and Fugue in D minor, though I’m sure that played at some point during the day. Still, the piece that did play was equally rousing, seeming to fill the space from top to bottom. Theater organs aren’t an enthusiasm of mine particularly, but I know a powerful instrument when I hear one.
This recorded concert from this summer gives some idea of its power and range, but not quite like being there.
The sound is one thing, but I’d say the icing on the cake is the location. We’ve all heard organs of various sorts in various places — including a few theaters — but in an obscure warehouse in an obscure corner of the Midwest? Sweet icing indeed.
The organ’s many parts occupy only part of the warehouse. The rest is exactly that – warehouse space, which was roped off to us casual visitors on Saturday.
“The nucleus of the instrument is the 3/15 Wurlitzer organ that was originally installed in Chicago’s Nortown Theatre,” says ATOS. “Denver organ enthusiast Dr. Bruce Belshaw purchased the organ in the 1950s and installed it in his home, before it made the current move to the Franklin, Wisconsin warehouse.
“With many additions, the now 90-rank instrument has extensive tonal colors. The organ has been used for annual company holiday parties, and Woebling’s desire is to share the instrument and music with the community.”
Time for an autumnal break. Back to posting around October 16, when the tree colors will be bold and the winds (probably) brisk, at least around here. Expect photos.
Out last stop in Milwaukee on Sunday afternoon, as a light rain fell, was Chubby’s Donuts, spotted by chance and visited on a whim.
The place has a mascot atop. Hard to tell just how chubby he is.
The doughnuts, which are really round dough-rings each about the size of an onion ring, come in bags, and are dusted liberally with cinnamon and sugar. Pretty good, but I’m not running up to Milwaukee just for them.
On Monday evening, we went to west suburban Westmont to visit my old friend Kevin, and participate in a trivia contest at a local restaurant. That was a first for me, unless you count the contest at one of my former companies, at a company event ca. 1999, that netted me some movie tickets.
I don’t remember all the various categories now, but as usual, some were easier than others, and our team (Kevin, Jay and I) came in second, partly on the strength of us knowing all eight of the comic strips in the visual part of the contest. Everyone got a piece of paper with eight single panels illustrating each comic, but without any captions, and you had to name the strip for each.
They were The Far Side, Calvin & Hobbes, Nancy, Garfield, The Family Circus, Bloom County, The Adventures of Tintin and Beetle Bailey.
I thought they were easy. Maybe it’s a generational question: who among the younger set is going to know that many of them, much less all?
Then again, I remember a high school English teacher of mine expressing wonder that any adult — including a highly educated friend of his — would spend time reading the funnies, so perhaps he wouldn’t have done very well at naming them either, despite being of the generation who grew up with Terry and the Pirates (for example).
Another category was songs with the word “love” in their titles, which of course includes a lot of possibilities. Name the artist, given the song title. We didn’t do that well — flummoxed mostly on the newer songs — but God help me, I knew that the Captain & Tennille had a big hit with “Muskrat Love” (1976).
What I didn’t know, until I happened to hear about it on the radio a few years ago, was that the Captain & Tennille’s version of “Muskrat Love” was a cover, and that the band America had done an earlier one. It was written and first recorded by Willis Alan Ramsey, of all people. In any case, it’s one of those songs not that you’ll always remember, but which you’ll never forget.
What do we think of when we think of Milwaukee, the result of years of history but also modern lore, only a part of which involves anything as consciously planned as advertising? Beer.
Found on a wall at a food court at the former Pabst Brewery complex.
What do I think of? Beer, yes, but also the astonishing number of large churches for such a mid-sized city. Every time I go there now, I see at least one I hadn’t seen before, inside and out.
Such as St. John’s Lutheran Church, which has been a congregation since 1848. A year of mass movement of Germans out of Germany, for sure, though I imagine most of the original congregants were Germans already in Milwaukee. It was the last place in town that we saw as part of this year’s Doors Open event, arriving in the mid-afternoon on Sunday.
The current church building dates from 1890, a design by Herman Schnetzky and Eugene Liebert, two German architects who came to Milwaukee in the late 19th century.
Inside, a curious feature: lights running along the ceiling arches, added in the early 20th century. Over 800 bulbs, I read. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that in a church. Adds more than a touch of luminosity to the place.
The altar, hand-carved in Germany long ago.
Four prophets from the Old Testament: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel.
Those were the west transept windows. The east windows featured Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
An organist was practicing on the church’s sizable organ, a 2,500-pipe instrument. He had a nice touch.
The pastor was also around — a young man, maybe no more than 30, and not long out of seminary. Had a nice chat with him about the church and a bit about the various Lutheran groups, which I can never quite keep track of. A synod here and a synod there. He seemed like a personable fellow, which you really ought to be if you go into that line of work.
Our visit to Milwaukee on Sunday took us, in the mid-afternoon, to what it now is known as the Brewery District. Once upon a time — for a long time — Pabst was brewed there.
The sign hangs between some handsome buildings. On one side, the cream city brick Malt House, originally developed in 1882 and former one of the world’s largest brewery-owned malt houses, according to the district’s web site (who else would own a malt house?). Now it’s apartments.
On the other side, the Brewhouse Inn & Suites, a hotel that was once the brew house for the Pabst operations.
“The Pabst Brewery closed in 1996 leaving a seven-block area of downtown Milwaukee vacant,” the site says. “For over a decade, historic structures deteriorated until real estate developer and philanthropist Joseph J. Zilber purchased the site in August 2006.
“The results include seven apartment developments, three office buildings, two hotel properties, two breweries, restaurants, banquet halls and two public parks. In addition, the Brewery District is home to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Joseph J. Zilber School of Public Health and No Studios, an incubator for the growing film industry in Milwaukee.”
Not that much of the district was open on Sunday. The spot participating in the Doors Open event was Best Place at the Historic Pabst Brewery, a retail complex formed from some of the old brewery buildings.
“Great care has been taken to ensure that Blue Ribbon Hall, The Great Hall, Captain’s Corner, Captain’s Courtyard, Guest Center, King’s Courtyard, and the original Gift Shop have all been restored to their original glory,” the separate Best Place web site says.
Enter one courtyard and there’s good old King Gambrinus.
Not actually that old, since it’s a 1967 reproduction, in aluminum, of an older wooden statue that had fallen apart.
My brother Jay is in town for a visit, and part of the visit included heading up to Milwaukee on Sunday for the Doors Open event.
Except for rain late in the afternoon, it was a fine cool day for gallivanting around, looking at buildings. First we went to the Basilica of St. Josaphat and then the Tripoli Shrine Temple, owned by the Shriners.
I decided to take a few detail shots at the temple, such as the top of a door handle, wall décor and a hanging bit of masonic symbolism.
Plus something to remember the guide by.
From there we sought lunch, which we found — takeout, so we had it in the car — from a place on Wisconsin Ave., east of Marquette U. Breakfast food for lunch.
Also on Wisconsin Ave., the main Milwaukee Public Library branch was part of the event, but unfortunately not on Sunday, so we didn’t get in. The sign shouldn’t have been left up.
Later in the afternoon, we spent time looking around the site of the former Pabst Brewery complex, now handsomely redeveloped, and capped things off with a visit to St. John’s Lutheran Church. The last two of those were new even to me. Though not that big, Milwaukee is dense with sights.
On the way home, we couldn’t very well pass up a short visit to Mars Cheese Castle.
The rain was done by then, leaving a rainbow over the Interstate.
During the 2019 event, we happened across another public art event, one not confined to a particular weekend, but rather a particular year: Sculpture Milwaukee.
“Sculpture Milwaukee is a non-profit organization transforming downtown Milwaukee’s cultural landscape every year with an outdoor exhibition of world-renowned sculpture that serves as a catalyst for community engagement, economic development, and creative placemaking,” is how the organization’s web site puts it.
I don’t know about “community engagement” or “creative placemaking.” I would just say the org puts up different interesting sculptures to look at every year, but maybe that’s my editorial instinct for jettisoning publicist puffery coming into play.
Anyway, that year we saw works on E. Wisconsin Ave., including “Seraphine-cherubin” from “Teaching Staff for a School of Murderers” by Max Ernst (1967).
I’ve forgotten most of whatever I once knew about Dada, and had to look him up to make sure he wasn’t the one who peed on a pile of books in public. I don’t think he was. Who was that? I know I heard that story in college. I don’t think I want to feed verbiage along those lines into Google, however.
