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Burley Griffin, the eldest of four children, was born on November
24, 1876 in Maywood, Illinois. His father, George Walter Griffin,
was an insurance adjuster; his mother, Estelle, was active in
social organizations. By the time Griffin was in high school his interest
in landscape gardening had made its appearance. The family had
moved to a new house in the Chicago suburb of Elmhurst and Griffin
was involved in landscaping the backyard. His parents let him
do what he wanted and before long his brother and sisters were
calling it "The Jungle" because he was experimenting
with so many different forms of plants.
y the time he graduated
from high school, Griffin pondered what he should study in college.
His early interest in gardening steered him towards landscape
design. Before making a decision he sought the advice of the
greatly renowned landscape gardener, O. C. Simonds. To Walter's
surprise, Simonds advised him not to study landscape gardening
but instead follow a more lucrative career. So in the fall of
1895, Griffin enrolled in the Department of Architecture at University
of Illinois. Still Griffin never gave up his previous interest.
He was able to supplement his architectural work with classes
in forestry and horticulture.
he University of
Illinois was one of the two land grant universities to give degrees
in architecture; the other being MIT. The architecture program was run under the strict
guidance of Nathan Clifford Ricker who had started the program.
Ricker was schooled in Germany and was very much interested in
the technical aspect of architecture as opposed to simply the
design aspect. This gave Griffin a very strong foundation in
materials as well as in the practical aspects of architecture.
Griffin's senior project was entitled "A Capitol Building."
The actual plan has never been found.
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