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Image: Engraving of The Athenaeum from Gleason's Pictorial Drawing Room
Companion, 8/15/1854. Hand colored at a later date.
New Books for October
Michael
Capuzzo Lecture and Book Signing
 Michael
Capuzzo, The Murder Room
Best selling author, Michael Capuzzo, here illuminates the story of the Vidocq
Society of Philadelphia, which was the brainchild of three wildly different men
brought together by their desire to speak for the dead: freewheeling ex-boxer
turned forensic sculptor Frank Bender; FBI and U.S. Customs agent William
Fleisher; and pre-eminent forensic psychologist and profiler Richard Walter.
What began as an informal meeting of colleagues in 1990 evolved into an
expansive international think tank of sorts modeled and named after France's
famed criminal-turned-sleuth Eugene Vidocq, a model for Sherlock Holmes.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010, 5:30 PM
Free to members. RSVP to Susan Gallo at 215-925-2688 or sgallo@philaathenaeum.org
Non-members
click here to register
Children's
Programs
 Saturday, November 6, 2010
Come for stories with Michele Belluomini of Blue Deer
Storytelling and then stay for a book arts workshop with Maria Pisano. Our
theme is travel: holiday travel, travel abroad, and for the workshop even travel
to another planet.
1:00-2:00pm STORYTELLING WITH BLUE DEER STORYTELLING
Free for members, RSVP to Susan Gallo at 215-925-2688 or sgallo@PhilaAthenaeum.org
$5 for Non-Members, Click here to register
2:00-4:00pm BOOK ARTS WORKSHOP WITH MARIA PISANO:
EXPLORING THE EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL
$15 for
Members
$25 for
Non-Members, Click here to register
H.
Mather
Lippincott (1921-2010)
 Architect
Horace Mather Lippincott passed away suddenly on September 20th. He was a
shareholder of the Athenaeum since 1967. Born in 1921 in the Chestnut Hill
section of Philadelphia, he attended Haverford College and later, the University
of Pennsylvania where he graduated with a degree in Architecture. In
1958, Robert Venturi, Paul Cope and Mather Lippincott formed the
architectural firm of Venturi, Cope and Lippincott. One of the
notable buildings that resulted from this professional collaboration was the
Guild House, built in 1963 and located at 7th and Spring Garden Streets.
The Guild House was placed on the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places
in 2004. His architectural partnership with Paul Cope would continue until
Cope's death in 2006.
He designed the home where he and his wife Peg
would live for 45 years, located in the Coleshill Subdivision of Rose Valley,
PA. Peg selected the home's interior finishes and much of the work constructing
the house was completed using their own labor. The house was featured
in the Delaware County Times as the "Home of the Week" in 1957, for
its unique modern design which had floor to ceiling windows looking out onto a
wooded acre. Peg and Mather were the parents of four sons.
He joined the Union League in 1968. In
1969, he was an inaugural member of the newly formed Union
League Glee Club, of which he was a member for over 40 years, singing
in the tenor section. He and Peg were featured in the 2010 season of
the Glee Club performing a Gilbert and Sullivan duet from the operetta "The
Mikado," which met with rave reviews. He was also a founding member
of the Union League's Pepper Patrons and was a founding member and
Trustee Emeritus of the Abraham Lincoln Foundation.
Mather was proud of his Quaker heritage and was a
descendant of Richard Lippincott who settled in Dorchester, Massachusetts, in
1635. Richard Lippincott's many descendents include former presidents Richard
Nixon, George W. Bush and publisher James Ballinger Lippincott.
In 2007, Mather was interviewed by Bruce Laverty
and Hyman Myers, FAIA. To view highlights from this interview click
here.
Above:
H. Mather Lippincott. Photo from the 1969 AIA Philadelphia Yearbook when
Mather was its President. Obituary courtesy of Janet Grace.
Member
Critics
 Terry
Teachout. Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong. Boston and New York:
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009.
An
excellent biography with newly available material, but nothing really new until
this on page 362:
...unknown
in his lifetime save to his friends...colorful boxes, like the pages of
clippings posted into his scrapbooks and the giant-sized collages that covered
the walls and ceiling of his den, have a freely associated quality that recalls
the "visionary art" of untrained painters...
Louis was
an artist in the broad sense of the term (as well as in the narrow sense).
Essentially his life was a work of art. It, like his performances, was not
meticulously planned as some would (and do) say it was at its best when he
threw away the script. The key word was "balance," and an
essential aspect of his genius was his ability to turn it loose and quickly
recover.
Submitted
by Dr. Harold Rashkis.
Do
you have a book that you loved (or hated), and would you be willing to share
that opinion on the Athenaeum e-newsletter? If so, please send your short
essay to sltatman@philaathenaeum.org.
Save
the Date:
October
2: First Saturday, Athenaeum open
October
12: Socrates Cafe, 11:00am
October
13: Michael Capuzzo, The Murder Room. Lecture and book signing, 5:30pm
October
30: Book Workshop: Pockets, Inserts
and Hidden Places- A Travel Journal
See
the Event
Calendar for details and additional
events.
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