Eric Gugler

Eric Gugler (March 13, 1889 – May 17, 1974) was an American Neoclassical architect, interior designer, sculptor and muralist. He was selected by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to design the Oval Office.

Early life Gugler was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the son of printer and engraver Julius Gugler and his wife Bertha Bremer. and was awarded the 1911 McKim Fellowship in Architecture. He returned to the United States, and worked in the offices of McKim, Mead & White.

During World War I, he served in the American Camouflage Corps (Company A, 40th Engineers, U.S. Army).

Career He opened his own architectural office in 1919.

Gugler altered a rowhouse at 319 East 72nd Street, Manhattan into Manship's residence and studio in 1925. Gugler later bought a 5-foot (1.52 m) diameter glass sphere etched with the constellations. He lent this to Manship, who created multiple sculptures inspired by it. For what became the Aero Memorial (plaster 1933), Manship modeled Zodiac figures in clay directly atop the glass sphere, then cast them in plaster and bronze. In projects together and separately, Gugler and Manship repeatedly returned to the idea of spheres, heavenly bodies and signs of the Zodiac.

Gugler and architect Roger Bailey won a 1929 design competition for the World War I memorial for the City of Chicago. Because of the Great Depression, the $3,000,000-to-$5,000,000 project was never built. Gugler designed a massive obelisk as a World War I memorial for Battery Park, at the southern tip of Manhattan. It also was never built.

Gugler and muralist Ricard Brooks created large Art Deco murals for the 1,883-seat Forum Auditorium of the Pennsylvania State Library and Education Building (1931) in Harrisburg. The walls of the semi-circular hall feature mural maps of ancient empires. The vast celestial ceiling mural depicts constellations and signs of the Zodiac, and incorporates lighting and ventilation fixtures. The building, by architects William Gehron and Sidney Ross, also features architectural sculpture by Lee Lawrie, Carl Paul Jennewein and Harry Kreis. The auditorium is home to the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra.

In New York City's Central Park, overlooking Conservatory Water, is the Waldo Hutchins Memorial Bench, a curved Concord white granite exedra designed by Gugler. The bench is almost tall, wide, and weighs several tons. It was executed in 1932 by the Piccirilli Brothers studio, the firm that carved the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. The sundial features a small Art Deco bronze gnomon sculpture of a female dancer trailed by a wind-blown gown and flowing scarves at its center.

Gugler served as consulting architect to the White House, 1934–48.

For the State Dining Room mantel, in 1945 Gugler designed the inscription of John Adams's 1800 benediction for the White House:

I pray Heaven to bestow the best of Blessings on this House and all that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none but honest and wise Men ever rule under this roof.

Later works Gugler was a preservationist architect, and headed the 1939 restoration of Federal Hall National Memorial, on Wall Street in Manhattan. He was prominent in the 1940s public campaign opposing the demolition of Fort Clinton, Manhattan.

In the 1940s and 1950s, Gugler expanded the campus of Wabash College in Crawfordsville, Indiana, designing Waugh Hall, Campus Center (now Sparks Center), Wolcott and Morris Dormitories, Lilly Library, and Baxter Hall. He collaborated with sculptors James Earle Fraser and Donald De Lue on the Harvey S. Firestone Memorial (1950), in Akron, Ohio. He designed the setting for Fraser's Mayo Memorial (1952), in Rochester, Minnesota.

With sculptor Paul Manship and landscape architect Ralph E. Griswold, Gugler designed the Sicily–Rome American Cemetery and Memorial (1956), in Nettuno, Lazio, Italy, where more than 7,800 U.S. soldiers from World War II are buried. Gugler's chapel ceiling mural depicts the positions of the stars and planets on January 22, 1944, at the hour when the Battle of Anzio commenced. Manship and Gugler were awarded the National Sculpture Society's Henry Hering Medal, for noteworthy collaboration between sculptor and architect. World War II put the idea on hold, but it was revived post-war as a shrine to the late president. Former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt supported and helped to publicize the Georgia project. A corporation was organized to shepherd it through to completion, but the estimated $25,000,000 cost and obscure location made fund-raising difficult, and the corporation was dissolved in 1954.

The project was resurrected in 1957, proposed for one of the most prominent locations in the United States: Arlington Ridge Park, on the west side of the Potomac River, between Arlington National Cemetery and the Marine Corps War Memorial. This was the visual terminus of the National Mall, on axis with the U.S. Capitol, the Washington Monument, and the Lincoln Memorial. and collaborated on projects with architects such as Roger Bailey, Walker O. Cain, Ferdinand Eiseman, Henry G. Emery, Henry Powell Hopkins, and Henry J. Toombs.

Honors Gugler served as a trustee of the American Academy in Rome, 1918–1945. He was elected a member of the National Academy of Design in 1941, and an academician in 1946. He was a member of the National Sculpture Society, a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters, and a trustee of the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society.

Personal life and death Gugler married Broadway actress and dancer Anne Tonetti in 1932.

Gugler donated his White House papers to its Office of the Curator. His widow donated additional papers to the Archives of American Art at the Smithsonian Institution.

Paul Manship's relief portrait of Anne and Eric Gugler (1932) is at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Selected works American Academy in Rome War Memorial (1923–24), Villa Aurelia, Rome, Italy, with sculptor Paul Manship and muralist Francis Barrett Faulkner. Murals for Forum Auditorium (1931), Pennsylvania State Library and Education Building, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, with muralist Richard Brooks. Waldo Hutchins Memorial Bench (1932), Central Park, New York City, with sculptors Albert Stewart and Paul Manship. The White House: Rebuilding of the West Wing (1933–34) Oval Office (1933–34) Cabinet Room (1933–34) Steinway Grand Piano (1938), with sculptor Albert Stewart and muralist Dunbar Beck. Inscription for State Dining Room mantel (1945) Business Systems and Insurance Building (1939), 1939 New York World's Fair, Queens, New York City, with architects John B. Slee and Robert H. Bryson. Master plan and alterations to Forman School (1939–40), Litchfield, Connecticut. Harvey S. Firestone Memorial (1944–50), Akron, Ohio, with sculptors James Earle Fraser and Donald De Lue. Dr. William and Dr. Charles Mayo Memorial (1943–52), Mayo Park, Rochester, Minnesota, with sculptor James Earle Fraser. Sicily–Rome American Cemetery and Memorial (1950–56), Nettuno, Lazio, Italy, with sculptor Paul Manship and landscape architect Ralph E. Griswold. Armillary Sphere (1964), Flushing Meadows, Queens, New York City, with sculptor Paul Manship. Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial Block (1965), outside National Archives Building, Washington, D.C., with sculptor Paul Manship. Eleanor Roosevelt Memorial Bench (1966), United Nations Garden, New York City. Theodore Roosevelt Memorial (1963–67), Roosevelt Island, Washington, D.C., with sculptor Paul Manship.