The Conspirators

Perhaps Lew Wallace's best-known painting (not that he was famous for art), The Conspirators made the journey from storage to the Study


Movers from Red Ball Moving carry in the custom-made box containing The Conspirators.


Museum staff and volunteers lift the oil painting atop the bookcases in the Study.

Museum Director Larry Paarlberg and Collections Manager Amanda McGuire examine the placement before descending their ladders. The current location not only shows off the painting but also what some of Wallace's artwork would have looked like next to the original colors of the Study interior.

Back Home in Indiana

Lew Wallace's Artifacts are finally back in the Study! Museum staff and volunteers will now spend days unpacking artwork and arranging furniture to reflect Wallace's use of the building.



The furniture, including the grandfather clock, are not in place, but at least they are in the building!

Movers from Red Ball Moving Company, generous supporters of the Museum, prepare to move Il Pensiero (The Thinker) to its pedestal.

Museum Director Larry Paarlberg adjusts the "Girl with Goats" majolica vase in its corner. The colors in the ceramics blend well with the newly restored wall in the southeast corner of the Study!





Associate Director Amanda Wesselmann and Grounds Manager Deb King unveil "The Turkish Princess," a gift to Wallace from Sultan Abdul Hamid II. She is now back in her familiar place above the bookcases.

Uncovering the Past

It's always thrilling to scrape away the covering of years and unveil more of what General Wallace's surroundings looked like when he lived among them.  The past weeks have offered exciting glimpses into both the interior and exterior of the General's study, through the tireless work of some true professionals.

Brian Fick and Mary Yeager of Acanthus Arts in Indianapolis have been hard at work conserving the beautiful decorative paint in places inside the study, and it's been amazing to watch the original colors begin to blossom.  The anteroom just inside the front door is swathed in deep jewel tones, and the dome now has a wide stripe of original paint uncovered down to the bookcases.  Visitors can now see not only the musical motif in the southeast corner of the dome, but the stylish method by which the paint fades from a deep green to a light silvery tone at the dome.

The colors of the plaster frieze just under the dome are being replicated according to the paint analysis done by Matthew Mosca of Washington D.C. in March.  It's easy to see how brilliant General Wallace's dome would've looked when all of the electric lights were on!

Outside, archaeologists from Weintraut & Associates in Zionsville are working with students from the University of Indianapolis to uncover General Wallace's backyard reflecting pool.  Over weeks of painstaking work, they have found the brick perimeter topped by capstones lying just inches below the surface of the lawn.

Keep an eye on this blog for further developments as we continue to work in restoring General Wallace's "pleasure house for his soul" to its original splendor!

Paint Restoration Continues

Exciting work continues here at the Study as our conservators, Brian Fick and Mary Yeager from Acanthus Arts in Indianapolis, uncover and restore more incredible decorative paint inside the historic building's dome.

Brian is spending his day 30 feet in the air, uncovering layer by layer of paint to get to the original design, described by Ella Kostanzer in 1900 as the "implements of war."  So far, he's uncovered a beautiful musical motif in the corner, featuring a drum flanked by  skin-covered mallets, with a fife and sheets of music behind, accented with laurel leaves.  We believe there might be musical scenes in each of the corners, with more military-themed decoration along the sides of the dome.  Here's a progression of the work so far:

We'll continue to update as the restoration progresses.  Many thanks to the Montgomery County Community Foundation for providing the funds for this fascinating project!

Ella Was Right

Ella Kostanzer visited the General's Study around 1900, and described, among other things, a scene on the domed ceiling that contained "implements of war". Because she is the only one to recount this detail, staff and visitors alike have long hoped she was right but didn't want to rely on her testimony too heavily. Today, a pair of paint conservators arrived on the scene to attempt to expose some of that original design.

Sure enough, there appear to be shields and laurel leaves in a design that incorporates not only the shades of green found in the paint analysis, but also rust colors and silvery grays as well. This is part of a 3-foot-wide path the conservators plan to expose from the skylight to the tops of the bookcases. What a wonderful discovery!

Getting There

The end of the Study Restoration Project seems to be in sight! After months of weather delays, workers are installing the last of the copper. To make sure that the roof doesn't leak, all the areas of the roof have to be cut and fastened exactly, from the curved corners to the long skinny battens.

This photo was taken from the tower, looking down on the dome and lawn.

Scaffolding Returns

The construction crew has replaced the bucket lift they used in the fall with old-fashioned scaffolding. It looks like these final phases of the exterior Study Restoration Project will resemble when Lew Wallace first built it. I can just imagine him standing on the grounds, overseeing the final days of construction of the "pleasure-house of his soul".

Has It Weathered Well?

The theme for the year is Agents of Deterioration, and believe it or not the Study roof has already begun to deteriorate! Not in the sense of leaking like a sieve the way it used to, but the shiny new copper has already begun to look not quite so new.

In November, the copper on the east side just shone on a bright sunny day.

After a winter of snow, rain, and sleet, this same side doesn't look quite so shiny three months later!

Interestingly,historic photos from Lew Wallace's time (this one is courtesy of the Crawfordsville District Public Library) seem to show the Study roof as bright and reflective. So, if you want to see the Study as Lew Wallace originally intended, you might want to plan a trip here soon! We offer guided tours of the exterior while construction finishes, and the grounds are open and free until 5:00 p.m. every day.

An Industrial Floor for an Industrious Man

If you've visited the Study any time after 1976, you've seen the carpet covering the floor of the main room.

Brightly colored and made to withstand a lot of foot traffic, the carpet made the room warmer and quieter but did not present an authentic appearance.

In historic photos, we can see the concrete floor that Lew Wallace installed in the Study. During colder months, he put down area rugs, and during warmer months he rolled up the rugs and stashed them along the walls. We concluded from this that Wallace did not intend for the floor to be covered completely and so...

...we took out the carpet! As part of the Study Restoration Project, local flooring experts removed the carpet and the sub-floor that it was glued to and revealed Wallace's original concrete floor. Fortunately, that additional flooring made little impact on the concrete, and the Study interior now looks much more like it did when Wallace enjoyed the building. It looks a little "unfinished" or "industrial" to some of us, but it's a step closer to being restored to the appearance Lew Wallace wanted for his Study.

If These Walls Could Talk...

...they would tell us what color they were originally! A grant from the Montgomery County Community Foundation has funded a paint analysis of the Study interior, and specialist Matthew Mosca flew in from Washington, DC, to peel back the layers of paint and tell us what the General's Study looked like when he used the building.


The walls in the inglenook by the fireplace were a dark shade of blue-green - very similar to the current color of the lower parts of the walls.

The walls above the bookcases were a shade of green, as was the plaster frieze molded into the shape of flowers.

The walls in the vestibule were a display of rich jewel tones and gold in a variety of patterns.

The part of the building that may interest the most people, the dome, is proving to be the most difficult. The top layers of paint were not coming off easily, and more analysis needs to be done to ascertain what colors lie underneath. If it's half as interesting as the rest of the building, we are in for a big surprise!

The big question is what do we do with all this information? As the final analysis results show the different shades of different parts of the building, we will see the scope of what it would take to restore the General's Study to its original appearance. Even if it's only one part of the building at a time, we would like for visitors to see the Study as Lew Wallace did!

Cherry on Top

Restoration efforts are coming along nicely here at the Study! The striking copper finial that sits on top of the Study cupola has been chemically cleaned, polished and restored to its place of honor overlooking the Museum grounds. It was unclear at first whether the original finial, which had the same green patina as the original copper roof, would be in salvageable shape, but as one can see from these photos, it's made a beautiful return to what will soon be a beautiful, shiny roof.

Meanwhile, workers have removed the copper roof from the mechanical room on the north side of the building and have begun to repair the damaged wood slats and battens underneath. This roof was in a slightly worse shape than the roof over the main room, so even though it's a smaller job, repair work may take a bit longer in this location. Thankfully, we have been blessed--still--with great weather! Keep your fingers crossed that our luck holds!

Hammer Away

On a windy November day, bundled-up workers hammer the joints where the copper sheets meet the battens on the dome roof. After hammering the copper together, they will solder the joints to make them watertight. It's a very time-consuming process! Meanwhile, more workers are lying down on the job to seal the windows in the cupola in anticipation of the inclement weather we are supposed to get over the next couple of days.

Click on the post title for a video of workers hammering the copper.

Through the Roof

As a regular part of the Study Restoration Project, the architect and some grantors inspect the progress on the construction. This week's inspection includes the resetting of the glass panels in the cupola. The panels on the west side (by the tower) have been removed, cleaned, reset, and resealed to make them waterproof. They expect to be done with the south side (front of the building) today. One worker is knee deep in the dome preparing the steel framework for the glass panels to go back in.

Click on the title of this post to see a video.

No Longer Slippery When Wet

The front and back porches are getting a new traffic coating to help them shed water - preventing it from leaking into the basement of the Study - and seal and unify all the small cracks in the stone.

The gray sticky stuff was the first layer to go down, and then workers mixed in sand which gives it a pebbly appearance. There is another top layer that should make it look more like the Indiana limestone that make up the porches.

Grab Your Shades

The first panel of new copper is on the roof! Workers are braving the wind to install the new roof on the east side of the building. As predicted, it's bright and shiny, so if you can make it out to see the progress, make sure you bring your sunglasses!

To see a video of the workers placing the copper, click the title to this post!

Southern Exposure

Workers removed the copper from the south side of the Study earlier this week. That leaves two sides without copper and two sides still covered. You can see the wooden decking and battens, just like what they found on the east side, before they installed the weatherproof barrier. From their investigation inside the dome, the workers report additional interior steel supports for the wood and copper that make up the roof.

They covered the wooden structure with the rain and snow shield until they get the new copper on (ETA for new copper: next week!). Today they worked near the cupola to remove sealant and other material from around the windows and the joints between the cupola and roof. Even though they're complying with safety regulations, I am glad they still steady themselves on stable parts of the building while they're up there!

Click on the post title for a video of the final stages of removing the south side copper.

Closing the Gap

The front steps of the Study got reset today after their "vacation" on the lawn. Construction workers relaid support underneath the steps - instead of the piles of loose bricks - and then moved the steps back in place. Years ago, a previous crew apparently patched a sizable gap between the brick building and the steps, so this time, in an effort to make the work more stable and less prone to water damage, the crew poured cement to make a better fit.

Workers also repaired the crack in the bottom step and poured new cement in front of the steps. They still have to seal smaller gaps between the steps themselves as well as the attachments to the building, but they look sturdier already!

Like a New Penny

Earlier this week, the construction workers put up a sample piece of the new copper that will become the dome. They wanted to make sure they had the measurements correct and that the copper would fit properly over the curvature and battens before they cut enough for the whole building (or even a whole side). It's not the green patina like the weathered gutters below - this is a glimpse of what the roof looked like when General Wallace first built the Study, and what it will look like when the Study Restoration Project is finished in the spring!

Because this was only a sample, they took the copper back to the shop and re-covered the wooden dome structure with the black weatherproof sheeting.

Paint Analysis: Expect the Unexpected

Ratio Architects from Indianapolis began the paint analysis by revealing what is underneath the current paint layer. This prelminary test uncovered small pieces of the walls in different places in the Study: the entryway, under the benches by the fireplace, along the flowered frieze, and more.

Surprise! In the entryway of the Study, there's a geometric pattern, like blocks of color. Looking carefully at the photo, going right from the wooden door frame, the test revealed a teal rectangle outlined with black, surrounded by a taupe brown, and finally a thin red line forming another rectangle. The red and black lines seem to continue toward the corner through the splotches of bare plaster.

We thought there might be some decorative painting in the Study, but the last place we expected to find it was the entryway. As Museum Director Larry Paarlberg says, "It's very Victorian. A lot of people at that time were blocking colors on walls, although this is an unusual pattern." Even though it fit with the times, why put such attention in such a small part of the building?

To add to the mystery, the architect did not get all the way up to the dome to see if any decorative painting - such as a military scene or a gradient of color - is there. The current scaffold is not high enough, so he will have to return when a higher scaffold is in place.

In the meantime, we're left to wonder: what kind of pattern did Lew have in the entryway, and how can we best interpret it when we can take tours inside the Study again? And if he painted the entryway decoratively, what may he have done to the more dramatic dome or flowered frieze?

Good News and Bad News

The bad news about the Study Restoration Project is that two days after they removed an entire side of the roof, it poured rain for hours! We haven't had rain in weeks - maybe the best way to make sure it's wet out is to start major construction.

The good news is that the plastic seal they put over the exposed area is holding water, so though it is raining outside, it's not raining INSIDE as it has been for years. No buckets out today, hooray!

Workers have also removed the damaged plaster from an area of the domed ceiling that has absorbed moisture over the years. With the loose plaster gone, now we can see that there is more than one color of paint there. What color was the ceiling? Was it different colors at different times, a gradient of color, or - as one historic account suggests - a scene celebrating the military that Lew Wallace loved so much? Next week Ratio Architects will take over 70 samples as part of a paint analysis project that dovetails with the Study Restoration, and we hope to get some answers!