In the early 1990s I had a couple of clients on Northhaven Island, off the
coast of Maine. Except for the location, which is fabulous, they were rather
typical consults with conditions assessments, prioritized recommendations,
investigating serious problems, training the local tradespeople in some
special methods, etc.. I was to be on the island for 12 days. One unusual
thing was that my client thought I shouldn't be away from my family for that
long and that I should bring my wife along. We stayed at the big
shingle-style summer house in a garret room up on fourth storey, with a view
across the harbor of Vinylhaven Island. My wife read books and went on walks
about the island with the other house guests. I got busy with my work on the
house and also solved some moisure problems at their small cape farmstead
out on the north end of the island. One evening there was a dinner party
downstairs. It was quite an elegant affair, in a casual sort of way. The
folks were real interested in my work on old buildings and Phyllis, my wife
(aka The BluesBabe), was a big hit when she sat down at the piano. Later
Phyllis said to me, do you know who these people are? Sure, I said, friends
of my client's, mostly summer folks, probably wealthy, etc. Turns out they
were Rockefellers, Carnegies, Saltenstals, Fords, and on and on. My client
was Henry Cobb, and at dinner I sat next to a friendly Chinese fellow with
whom I got into the best discussion about how building design impacts the
performance and failure of building materials with comparisons of the
traditional buildings I knew and the modern buildings he knew. It turns out
he was Henry's partner, I.M. Pei.


John
by hammer and hand great works do stand
by mind and thought all names forgot

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