In the parlor game of classifying art as elitist or populist, Frank Lloyd Wright qualifies as a geniune populist. A son of the Midwestern heartland who was brought up by farmers and preachers. Wright conquered twentieth-century architecture in the name of a particularly American kind of genius. His were the virtues of frontier individualism: stamina, practical ingenuity, a cranky independence of mind, a boundless belief in his own destiny. In an architectural career that extended from 1893 to 1959, Wright produced a thousand designs (half of them were built) for every region of the country. Although he attempted every type of building, including the skyscraper, Wright earned his fame as a designer of houses. He claimed that "the small house" was the architect's greatest challenge, and he applied a dazzling inventiveness not only to homes for the wealthy, but custom houses for school teachers and newspaper reporters, prototype homes for women's magazines, prefabricated houses and suburban plans that integrated his residences into a total community. Read More