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Show OMB No. 1024·0018 NPS Form 10-000-a (8-Il6) Utah WordPerfecl Format United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Section number ~ Page __5__ Dallin House, Springville, Utah County. UT house in 1938 to J. Lewis Bird, a Springville businessman. 18 Shortly after the Bird family acquired the house, the rear kitc~en-bathroom addition was constructed and the house's original cellar was enlarged. 9 After the death of J. Lewis Bird in 1975, the house was neglected and deteriorated. In 1992, the house was purchased by J. Douglas and Naomi Bird, son and daughter-in-law of J. Lewis Bird and a systematic restoration begun. Besides his mother, Dallin's frequent attention to his native Utah was motivated by his interest in Springville and the surrounding Wasatch Mountains. Dallin had, as his biographer wrote, "an almost occult fascination for2the Utah County mountains whose 'living force' influenced both his life and art". Dallin's western retreat, to his mother and to his childhood locale was centered around this house and the little log cabin that was once located beside it. After his mother's death in 1919, the house continued to be where Dallin stayed or visited when in Springville. Although Dallin's Arlington Heights house is listed in the National Register of Historic Places (his adjacent studio was destroyed by a fire), this building is the only surviving, and most closely identified, structure associated with Dallin's life in the western United States. While Dallin twice lived and worked temporarily in Salt Lake City, first in mid 1880s and later in the early 1890s. These two known sites where Dallin apparently had studio space, the Gardo House (built as a reception home for Mormon leader Brigham Young) on the corner of State and South Temple Streets and ~ business block on the corner of West Temple and 300 South, are no longer standing. 1 Dallin was one of two major artists that inaugurated Springville's now nationally recognized art collection and art movement. During a visit to Springville in 1903, Dallin donated a plaster statuette of his Paul Revere to Springville's schools. -X- See continuation sheet 18Francis, Rell G., interview conducted by P. Bradford Westwood, January 4, 1994: Francis, CyrUS E. Dallin, 162: obituary, Jane Hamer Dallin, Deseret News, March 24, 1919, 7 and Abstracts and Deed Books, Property no.:06:016:0006:002, Utah County Recorder's Office, Utah County Offices, Provo, Utah. 19 Interview by the writer with the present owner J. Douglas Bird, who is a son of J. Lewis Bird, 23/07/93. See also the title search form attached, the Pre-development Evaluation which was conducted by the writer, and the Intensive Survey (1984) findings, SHPO Office, Utah State Historical Society, Salt Lake City. 2Iloallin made frequent statements to this end, i.e., "When asked from what source came the greatest inspiration for his work, Dallin pOinted to the massive form of Mt. Flaunet (more commonly known as Sierra Bonita) that towered above the Springville landscape. 'I always heard the voice of the mountain calling to me to be lofty and to achieve lofty ends. '" Also, "I was born in the West in the mountains," he said, "but never in my life have I been able to return to them without breaking down and weeping." Also, "To those who are born and reared amid these circling hills I have little need to tell what a potent spell they have, and as whatever little I have done has been directly traceable to their influence, you can well understand how they are intimately connected with the most sacred part of my being." Francis, CyrUS E. Dallin, 149, 152-53, 160 and 163 and Francis, "Paul Revere," 5-36. See also this earlier reference, National Cyclopedia of American Biography. 21Francis, CyrUS E. Dallin, 17, 67 and 157. |
