Maurice H. Webster
It was a wood frame house with a great room and a large screened-in porch overlooking a pool and pastureland beyond.
Some years later, his nephew, the noted artist Stokely Webster, described the Bee Tree as a “magical place” that shaped his style of painting.
[2] Maurice Webster went on to have a long career designing a public buildings and private homes in a variety of architectural styles.
Among his projects, Webster would build an airport, a castle, a stadium and field house, and Chicago’s Chess Pavilion.
In 1929 they designed the Club House at Sky Harbor Airport in Northbrook Illinois, a suburb north of Chicago.
The Chicago Tribune described it as the “latest thing in modernistic architecture and also reminiscent of ancient Aztec buildings.”[7] It had a large square base with each succeeding floor stepping back to form a central tower.
[5] At about the same time that Sky Harbor was on the drawing boards, Webster was hired to design a home for Walter A.
He had purchased 360 acres of wooded property north of Oregon, Illinois that included a limestone bluff overlooking the Rock River.
His wife, Josephine, was Maurice Webster’s older sister, so Strong had been a frequent guest at Bee Tree Farm.
The original concept was to build a simple barn and silo structure, but it quickly grew into something resembling a castle, with 16 bedrooms, 9 baths, and 8 fireplaces.
[9] The castle was done in a Tudor Revival architectural style that was influenced by Strong’s travels to Europe and his English ancestry.
In 1946, Beloit College began planning a field house that could serve as a gymnasium and provide space for large events, such as concerts and commencement ceremonies.
"[12] Ever since the 1930s, North Avenue Beach had been a popular summer spot for Chicagoans to gather and play chess.
[14] The Pavilion, a modern open-air structure made of Indiana limestone and sweeping concrete forms, is both "architectural and a sculptural work of art".
Blair Kamin, architecture critic for the Chicago Tribune, wrote the Pavilion is "at once a sculptural object, an orienting device and a lively people place".
