MS – 161 Louise Odiorne Papers

Introduction

The papers of Louise Odiorne were accessioned into the Wright State University Department of Archives and Special Collections in October 1982. They were donated by Louise Odiorne’s children, Corrine Odiorne Pelzl, Eve Odiorne Sullivan, and Ken Odiorne.

The materials in this collection range from 1914 to 1976, but are concentrated on the years from 1966 and so on. The collection is contained in seven Hollinger boxes and 80 file folders. It is arranged into three series, as follows:

Series I: Correspondence

Series II: Miscellaneous Papers

Series III: Projects

Subseries I: Rough Drafts of Papers

Subseries II: Diagrams and Photographs

Subseries III: Life-Clime Project

Subseries IV: Yellow Springs

There are no restrictions on the use of this collection.

Biographical Sketch

Louise Odiorne was born in McRae, Georgia, on January 8, 1910. She continued to live in Georgia and even began high school there. She and her family then moved to the Dayton, Ohio area where she finished high school in 1929. The same year, she entered Antioch College in Yellow Springs, which she attended until 1933.

In 1934, she accepted a fellowship to attend the Lowthorpe School to Landscape Architecture, in Groton, Massachusetts. In 1935 she transferred to Ohio State University, where, in 1938, she received a bachelor’s degree in Landscape Architecture, from the College of Engineering. Post graduate studies include the Steve Hamlin plant materials course at the Harvard University Department of Landscape Architecture during the summer of 1938; and also in 1938, she attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Architecture and Planning Department.

With her formal education and training completed, Louise Odiorne took a short break in her professional career and married Richard Odiorne in 1938. She resumed her professional interests in 1940 by entering private practice in Landscape Architecture and Planning. What followed was a varied and dynamic professional career in Landscape Architecture.

In addition to her private practice, one of her interests has been community planning. This interest has landed her in the Ohio Plan Board Office of both Dayton and Yellow Springs. She was also extensively involved in the planning and design of Melbourne Village, Melbourne, Florida.

Louise Odiorne was widely respected professionally and as a quest lecturer, she was able to share her knowledge. She was a guest lecturer at both Ohio State University and Antioch College. In addition, she participated in the Winter Lecture Series at Longwood Gardens, Kennett Square, PA, and was a visiting lecturer at the Cheekwood Gardens and Tennessee Garden Clubs, Nashville, Tennessee. She also served as a consultant to the Notre Dame Graduate School of Environic Studies.

Louise Odiorne is probably best known for her research and development in building technologies and materials for buildings as human life support systems. This culminated in applying for patents for the “Life Clime Platform,” an idea for establishing indoors the symbiotic relationship between living plants and people, called “The Indoor-Eden Effect”. Twenty demonstration structures and installations were built. Closely related to this was her work with rural land owners for regenerative, economically feasible land use and conservation practices.

Finally, busy as she was, Louise also had several other business interests. She established Living Space, Inc., which became a franchise of Alside Structural System in 1965 and in 1969, she established Hunatech Foundation for research in environment. In addition, she was the director of Carr greenhouses, Yellow Springs and directed the conversion from commercial use to Human-Climate productive-ornamental plant selection research.

Scope and Content

The heart of the Louise Odiorne papers is the correspondence in Series I. The first part of the series contains letters to her husband and letters of condolences she received on her husband’s death. It is almost as if her husband’s death was a catalyst for everything that was to happen in the rest of her life. Louise Odiorne was forced to be the sole provider for her family and this was accompanied by an expansion of her professional interests. Almost without exception, all of the Louise Odiorne Papers are dated after the death of her husband.

The rest of Series I contains both general correspondence from friends and background information. Included with the correspondence is letters and postcards from family and friends. The background information contains legal and professional correspondence, political/social activities, and university correspondence.

The second series contains miscellaneous papers of Louise Odiorne. These include articles, handwritten notes, and a thesis authored by her. Profession artivles or books she had acquired during her career are also contained in this series. Finally, this series contains papers from her various business or professional interests, such as Hunatech Tech, Inc.

Series 3 contains a general section and four sub-series containing information on professional projects of Louise Odiorne. The general section contains mainly information about projects on a national level. These include a National Endowment for the Arts grant application, a Hunatech proposal to the Department of Education, General Services Administration Conference information, and information from the Federal Housing Administration.

Sub-series I contains rough drafts of important papers involving some of Louise’s projects. Included in this series is Life-Clime Project correspondence, truly one of the highlights of her professional career. Sub-series II contains diagrams and photographs which provide a pictorial record of some of her projects.

Probably the second most important section of the Louise Odiorne Papers is Sub-series III of Series III, Projects. This sub-series is dedicated to the Life-Clime Project. The Life-Clime Project is the jewel of Louise’s Professional career and will almost certainly be a lasting legacy of this truly remarkable woman.

Sub-series IV contains the last of the papers. This sub-series is dedicated to projects in and around Yellow Springs. Included in this section are several land use projects and the Yellow Springs sewer project. This series also contains a couple of magazine articles written about Louise Odiorne.

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