The front of the building is almost hidden by a group For the walls and roof cypress shingles have been used, 
of sycamores not stained but left to weather 
The Wig w a m 
A MODEST COUNTRY HOUSE AT WAWA, DELAWARE COUNTY, PA., 
THE SUMMER HOME OF MR. EDWIN R. KELLER—A THOROUGHLY 
AMERICAN TYPE THAT SHOWS UNUSUAL FEATURES OF CONSTRUCTION 
by henry L o r s a y , 3rd 
Photographs by Bond Brothers 
A LMOST every house that can lay any claim to pictur¬ 
esqueness, almost every house that the owner confidently 
believes he is going to build for less than it could possibly cost 
him, almost every house that is being put up in the country dis¬ 
tricts to-day, is joyously dubbed “a bungalow.” When we in 
America get hold of a new word that sounds well, and of which 
few people know the exact meaning, we almost invariably work 
it to death. By the time it has been in use for several years its 
mother tongue would not recog¬ 
nize it at all. It would be an 
interesting thing to see a com¬ 
posite photograph of what every¬ 
one who uses the word bungalow 
conceives it to mean. 
Now as the word is used in 
India, its own home, it means a 
house having all of its rooms on 
one floor; and incidentally one 
whose roof is a prominent and 
picturesque feature of the build¬ 
ing. Measured by this standard, 
Mr. Edwin R. Keller’s country 
home at Wawa, Pa., is not a 
bungalow, for it boasts an attic, 
but since the latter is a very 
unobtrusive feature of the exter¬ 
ior -and of the interior too,since 
there is no stairway leading up 
to it — probably ninety persons out 
of a hundred would call it by 
that name and go unchallenged. 
However, since it really isn t a 
bungalow, let me tell you what 
it is. 
The site of the building is 
located on the crest of a hill about 150 feet above the level 
of Chester Creek, which forms the eastern boundary line of the 
property. The country round about is one of the most pictur¬ 
esque parts of that famous land in the immediate vicinity of Phila¬ 
delphia—a type of farm land that is celebrated for its rolling 
character and the abundance of its vegetation. One of Mr. 
Keller’s advantages is the fact that the adjoining property on 
the north is a famous dairy farm, a fact that brings hundreds of 
grazing cattle into the vista from 
any side of‘‘The Wigwam. ” In 
the valley to the south can be 
seen the old town of Lenni, and 
in all directions upon neighboring 
hillsides, one catches glimpses of 
other country estates. 
The site on which ‘‘The Wig¬ 
wam” is built is the highest point 
of land in a 1 5-acre tract, a tract 
that was picked out by a former 
owner of a large farm, some 
twenty years back, as a site for 
his country home. With this 
purpose in view, he planted all 
over it fruit trees, shade trees and 
evergreens, which have now 
reached their full growth. In 
fact the site was so densely wood¬ 
ed that it became necessary to 
cut down several fine old cherry 
trees, in order to get a space 
large enough in which to set the 
house. The first picture at the 
head of this page, showing the 
front of the house, indicates how 
completely sheltered the building 
All the main rooms are on one floor; the attic is reached through 
a trap-door in the linen closet and is used only for storage 
(i34) 
