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Books on Nazi agent and architect Philip Johnson (1906-2005), including Rachel Maddow’s recent Prequel (2023) certainly warned us. Our recent spotlight on Philip Johnson and Hitler’s Aristocrats (2023) detailed more, raising serious questions about the status of Johnson's branded designs in Meriden, Madison, and— effectively his memorial site in New Canaan, CT— the Glass House site on 49 tax-free acres.    

Why are US / CT taxpayers funding this, via non-profit tax status and any government grants received along the way, especially now with such high government debt? Is it because he was part of 1945+ left elite culture?

Today's Johnson supporters tell us that he “reformed himself” after WWII— and this, with the architecture, is the excuse for the special attention. But this raises difficult questions: what exactly would an architect have to have done to effectively cancel out any architectural achievement, the attention, and special designations and perks related to tax, etc.?

What is the line of acceptability in this elitist sphere? Is there a line? What range of crimes are acceptable, and not acceptable, in the architectural world sub-culture?

The Cleveland Press boys knew a lot about Philip Johnson

As a reminder of what Clevelanders in-the-know were hearing and witnessing, here is a reprint of an article from Philip Johnson’s hometown newspaper, The Cleveland Press, on October 3, 1940, after the European War battle began. Johnson had been living in Cleveland and New York through the 1930s. The U. S. federal government had finally started clamping down on bad actors, not so different than we see today, and this included Philip Johnson.

Cleveland Press reprint: Socialite called Nazi apologist; Magazine says Clevelander is a pro-fascist author

Fortune Magazine in the October issue asserts that Philip Johnson, socialite son of Homer H. Johnson, prominent Cleveland attorney is a “pro-Fascist” author of articles in a publication which the magazine asserts is used as an apologist for Nazism.

In an article titled “The war of nerves: U. S. front”, Fortune discusses individuals and organizations connected with Nazi propaganda, naming The American Fellowship Forum, for whose official organ Philip Johnson has written.  

The Forum, organized last year as a patriotic American group, actually wants to present the Nazi viewpoint and to keep the United States neutral, the article states. It has branches here and in four other cities, the article continues.

Founders of the Forum were Dr. Friedrich E. Auhagen, a naturalized German, and George Sylvester Vierick, well known German propagandist. Dr. Auhagen was arrested yesterday in Los Angeles for questioning by Dies Committee investigators seeking information about Nazi organization in this country.

Reached in Cambridge, Mass., today, Mr. Johnson said he had not yet seen the Fortune’s article, but categorically denied being active in the American Fellowship Forum or a friend of Dr. Auhagen. (On p. 15, with profile photo of Philip Johnson. This article was also typed in and included in Philip Johnson’s FBI report.)

Note that in late January 1940 two Springfield, Mass., newspapers ran announcements that Philip Johnson was to speak, preceded by Auhagen, at the Springfield branch of the, you guessed it, American Fellowship Forum.

Also in the FBI report, see Ben Williamson’s "Among friends" column in the The Cleveland Press also on October 3, 1940, p. 12. He spilled the beans on Johnson further:

And today’s Connecticut Centinal readers, we just thought you also would like to know.

Since December 1934, The Cleveland Press had been reporting now and again, with a watchful eye, on the curious case of Philip Johnson. Over his long career, only one noted design ended up in Cleveland. That was bulldozed in recent years, without much of a second thought.

There were more allegations against Philip Johnson. In this case, Friedrich Auhagen was convicted as an unregistered foreign agent on July 11, 1941. George Sylvester Vierick was convicted for concealing part of his activities as a registered German agent on March 6, 1942. Other Philip Johnson associates were also in federal grand jury investigations, including Viola Bodenschatz, sister-in-law of a Lt. Gen. under Goering, and his longtime friend, on April 17, 1942.

After WWII at his Nuremberg Trial, Goering was convicted of Nazi war crimes — and sentenced to death by hanging.

Oh wait, but think of the architecture...

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Today out of the pro-Johnson camp, for the most part, we get just smoke, mirrors, and convenient condemnation of Johnson’s pre-WWII, pro-Nazi activity, but the underlying message is: “Just deal with it, bitches. Glass House stays as is, more or less.”

We can always trust left power-elites to do the right thing amongst themselves, can’t we? Their track record is not so impressive in recent years.

It is widely thought that Johnson escaped justice due to lobbying by his elite family and friends. In the post-WWII “forgive and forget” era, Johnson returned to his architecture work in New York and built the Glass House in 1949. Johnson achieved a position of power in the architecture world sub-culture, and it's thought his power muzzled questions about his Nazi past among the complicit.

In 1994, a critical biography noting an FBI report on Johnson was released. This book contained Nazi-era information smashing through the complicit barriers to the public. In the later 1990s, it's understood that the Glass House site received a protective historical designation.

This was before a fuller set of facts were unearthed about Johnson's 1930s, and that research is woefully incomplete compared to standard deep dives on other Nazi history figures. Would Johnson's architectural-memorial site have received historical designation if applied for today, with non-profit status and tax perks? Or would it be considered like a Modern version of a Confederate-era monument of a questionable figure?

Thankfully, the discourse is partly and quickly moving out of the celebratory and incestuous architectural world, and that sub-cultural sphere, to the critical, international Nazi history area for historic information breakthroughs. Watch this space.

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> See more articles on Philip Johnson at the CT Centinal.

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