THE TOWNSGAPE 93 



It is always a lot of fun to get together where everybody agrees 

 and talks to each other, but in all of our city we have a hard core, 

 probably 90 percent of the citizens who are either apathetic or against 

 what we call beauty. 



We think beauty is almost a respectable word yet it still isn't in 

 a good many areas of our city, and I am talking of the private enter- 

 prise level. 



My recommendation for the record is that such a conference as this 

 with similar panels be directed toward the financial community of 

 the United States. If you think about it a minute, the great financial 

 organizations such as the insurance companies literally decide the fate 

 of most of the private building that is done in the United States of 

 America. They are the ones that should be talked to and they are 

 the ones that have got to be convinced that beauty is a financially 

 sound investment. 



I would like to recommend to the President that GSA be given the 

 power to select single architectural firms of high quality in each city 

 where they do any building so that their building can be a catalytic 

 agent for the beauty and growth of the entire community. 



I would like to recommend that landscaping be given the same 

 dignity as architecture in the evaluation of all work in all cities. 



EDWARD STONE. Mrs. Johnson this morning said the search for a 

 more beautiful environment must originate with the individual. 

 This prompts me to say the following. 



Obviously, the greatest common denominator in our environment 

 is the individual dwelling. 



I am afraid that, in this country, we have an Anglo-Saxon heri- 

 tage. Our forefathers, Washington, Jefferson, were in effect emu- 

 lating the English country squire on his large acreage. Granted 

 that Mount Vernon and Monticello are very poetic episodes but 

 now, the spectacle of Mount Vernons and Monticellos are observed 

 on 50-by 100-foot lots. If our ancestors had come from the Con- 

 tinent, from France, Italy, or Spain we would have quite a dif- 

 ferent set of standards. 



Anyone who has motored through France has seen that villages 

 are built compactly and permanently, wall to wall, with privacy 

 obtained in cloistered gardens at the rear. They have seen the hill- 

 top towns of Italy built in the same way. In Spain you see houses 

 built around cloistered patios which has its origin back as far as 

 Pompeii where there were the traditional atrium and courtyard. 



