[Clip from "So I Married an Axe Murderer"] VICKY: Hello, everyone, I am a Park Ranger and I will be leading you on the tour. All of the Park Rangers here at Alcatraz were at one time guards, myself included. My name is John Johnson, but everyone here calls me Vicky. Will you please follow me? TONY: I love Vicky, he's a great guy. CHARLIE: He's the best. TONY: Oh! [ROCK MUSIC] CHARLIE BENNETT: You are listening to WREK Atlanta. And this is Lost in the Stacks, the Research Library Rock'n'Roll Radio Show. I'm Charlie Bennett, for the second time in the studio with everybody. Each week on Lost in the Stacks, we pick a theme and then use it to create a mix of music and library talk. Whichever you're here for, we hope you dig it. MARLEE GIVENS: Our show today is called Defining Skylines, in honor of our guest's latest effort. This is part six in our series, the Georgia Tech Library Guidebook. CHARLIE BENNETT: On the first Friday of each month, we visit a site in the guidebook and talk about a space or service in the Georgia Tech Library. FRED RASCOE: Our site today is the exhibits gallery on the first floor of the Price Gilbert Library, home of exhibits like 50 Years of Science Fiction at Georgia Tech, Fulton Bag and Cotton Mill, New South Industry, and Design and Making in the Trinidad Carnival. CHARLIE BENNETT: All of which have been featured on Lost in the Stacks. FRED RASCOE: And while the work in the exhibit gallery is the most immediate and visible, we have exhibits and art throughout the library buildings, thanks to our guests today. MARLEE GIVENS: Our exhibits gallery is home to the library's feature exhibit, and our guests today are the ones who help curators bring their ideas to life in the gallery. So for our guidebook, we'll consider their work centralized in one place. ALEX MCGEE: It's true, these folks live in the exhibit gallery. OK, just kidding. They actually have desks elsewhere, but they have been practically living in the gallery the past few weeks. The newest library exhibit is called Defining Skylines-- John Portman and the Architectural Evolution of Downtown Atlanta, which opens next week. FRED RASCOE: And our songs today are about building design, construction of cityscapes, and the feelings evoked by thoughtful architecture. Portman's work can be visited all around the globe. But we like to think that the best things he did were right back here in the city of Atlanta. So let's start with "Back in Atlanta" by The Constellations, right here on Lost in the Stacks. [THE CONSTELLATIONS, "BACK IN ATLANTA"] MARLEE GIVENS: Indeed, that was "Back in Atlanta" by The Constellations, and this is Lost in the Stacks. Our show today is called Defining Skylines, and it's all about the exhibit gallery and the latest exhibition opening next week, also called Defining Skylines-- John Portman and the Architectural Evolution of Downtown Atlanta. This is the sixth in our Georgia Tech Library Guidebook series. ALEX MCGEE: On the first Friday of each month, we visit a site from the guidebook featuring a space or service in the Georgia Tech Library. And our guides today are past and future guests, Kirk Henderson and Connor Lynch. MARLEE GIVENS: And Alex, we're actually giving you guest status on the show, since you're such a big part of the Defining Skylines exhibit. ALEX MCGEE: Let's do it. I can multitask, no problem. CHARLIE BENNETT: Let me make it official. Our guests are all from archives and special collections at the Georgia Tech Library. Kirk Henderson is the Exhibitions Program Manager, Connor Lynch is the Exhibit Specialist, and Alex McGee is the University Archivist and Curator of this latest exhibit. Welcome back to the show, all of you. KIRK HENDERSON: Thank you. ALEX MCGEE: Thanks for having us. CONNOR LYNCH: Thank you. CHARLIE BENNETT: OK, Kirk, let me go after you first. Why are you doing what you're doing? What is the goal of the Library Exhibits Program? KIRK HENDERSON: We like to think of the library as a place of discovery. I think that goes without saying for the function of a library in society. And when we redesigned the buildings a few years back, one of our goals and intentions was to create a space where that kind of discovery could happen with our special collections that wasn't just checking into the reading room and looking at some materials, but to experience those materials, those unique collections that are a part of Georgia Tech's overall collection in an exhibits fashion. And that that serendipity of just encountering the stories that these materials can tell would be a good way to expose students and other folks. Those exhibits that we do in the gallery fall into two overarching categories. One would be things that do feature our special collections, so unique and rare materials. But also, we work with campus partners to feature research and scholarship at Georgia Tech that helps to platform what folks in other parts of the campus community are doing. So it's not exclusively history kind of exhibits. But it's those two kinds of categories, like special collections, unique stories from history in our collections, and partnerships with other campus entities. CHARLIE BENNETT: When you say "materials," I feel like that must cover a lot of ground. What are these materials you're talking about from the special collections? KIRK HENDERSON: Well, we are an archive-- so if you think a lot of documents, photographs, those kinds of things. But also, we collect artifacts. One of our more recent exhibits had some sewing machines from a 19th century textile mill. This exhibit, that's about John Portman's work, is going to have some chairs. We couldn't afford to get the buildings inside the building. But he was very focused on designing things that weren't just the exterior and the interior of the building, but also the things that made it work inside. CHARLIE BENNETT: Was he in competition with the Eames about the chairs? KIRK HENDERSON: I think all architects-- and Alex can speak to this, I think-- all architects have a stake in designing chairs. ALEX MCGEE: Totally. CHARLIE BENNETT: Hey, Connor. CONNOR LYNCH: What's up? CHARLIE BENNETT: Tell us about where we can see the work that you and Kirk do throughout the library. CONNOR LYNCH: Yeah, so we have the exhibits gallery that's on the first floor of Price Gilbert. But we also have other locations around the library. There's the Winsett Gallery that's on the third floor of Clough. Right now, there is the OIE, or Office of International Education photo competition, so that's there. We also have exhibit cases on the first floor of Crosland Tower in the Archives Reading Room, in the Si-Fi Lounge there. And then depending on other needs or other exhibits we want to work on, we will locate other areas that are appropriate in the library. So coming up at the end of March, we have another exhibit partnering with Christina Shivers that's going to go on the second floor of Crosland. CHARLIE BENNETT: And how often do you have to switch out? I mean, all the locations you just described to me, it seems like maybe you're constantly changing everything. CONNOR LYNCH: It's a rotating door, yeah. CHARLIE BENNETT: Yeah. CONNOR LYNCH: So the Price Gilbert Exhibit Gallery, that one is maybe only once a year just because of the scale in which it has to be done and the cost. So that's about once a year. But the other locations, we can change them out a little more often. So there's always something going on. We probably change something out every couple months. But there's always other ideas we have. We have a running list of ideas and things we could do, and so there's always something in development. CHARLIE BENNETT: Can you tell us something from that list? CONNOR LYNCH: Oh, gosh. I've been at Tech about two years, so I'm still learning about the lore and different stories. So I've always wanted to do something about drownproofing and Fred Lanoue, and that early class that people had to take, and maybe featuring that in the Archives Reading Room. So that's a maybe. ALEX MCGEE: I'll just go ahead and say, we can make that happen. CONNOR LYNCH: Yeah. MARLEE GIVENS: Yeah. CHARLIE BENNETT: When I came to tech long ago, they were still talking about how you didn't have to do drownproofing anymore. CONNOR LYNCH: Yeah. CHARLIE BENNETT: It was still the, "oh, yeah, and you all." So I would love to do a show on drownproofing. So do that exhibit, and we'll bring you back on. CONNOR LYNCH: I'm trying to think if there's anything else. There's so much in Tech's history, but also in our archives that could be featured. So there's infinite possibilities. CHARLIE BENNETT: So we're coming to the end of the segment. So I'm going to ask you a question that's huge. But I still want you to try and answer it in the last couple of minutes. What do you work on with exhibits? What are the things that excite you? What are the problems that you have to solve in creating exhibits that you enjoy? CONNOR LYNCH: One thing that Kirk and I have talked about, I love problem solving and figuring things out. So that inherently, I think, as exhibits, is trying to figure out how are we going to display things? How are we going to put stuff together, how are we going to put stuff up, what materials do we need, all that kind of thing. But the whole process is much longer than that-- the fancy words of ideation, development, implementation are kind of the big three, I think. KIRK HENDERSON: Yeah. I usually think of it in terms of what story are we going to tell with this stuff that we have? And so it becomes a design problem of what's the information design of what are we going to tell you about the things that we're going to show you? And then it also evolves into a physical and visual design issue of how do we put things that we want to display in a space-- display them, tell you something about them. Create the graphic material around it. Write all the material that goes with that to help the visitor actually appreciate what it is that we're trying to tell them, show them, with materials that we have. MARLEE GIVENS: This is Lost in the Stacks and we will be back with more from Kirk Henderson and Connor Lynch after a music set. File this set in any one of the nine folders dedicated to John Calvin Portman in the Georgia Tech archives. [ROCK MUSIC] ALEX MCGEE: That was "Grave Architecture" by Pavement, and before that, "Tall Buildings" by The Josephine Network-- songs about being inspired by architecture. CHARLIE BENNETT: This is Lost in the Stacks, and today's show is called Defining Skylines. It's another episode in our Georgia Tech Library Guidebook. MARLEE GIVENS: And we are talking with Kirk Henderson, Connor Lynch, and Alex McGee about the newest exhibit opening next week in the library's gallery in Price Gilbert. Connor, what is the new exhibit about? CONNOR LYNCH: So the exhibit is about John Portman, who is a Atlanta architect, but also a Georgia Tech graduate. He graduated in 1950. And the exhibit explores both his education at Tech, his role in Atlanta's growth, and then the influence of his designs thereafter. MARLEE GIVENS: So, Alex, you have some experience with John Portman. Why John Portman now? ALEX MCGEE: So for those that don't know-- if you look me up on LinkedIn, you would find this out-- my first paid archives gig was as an archivist for John Portman. So I actually worked in the Portman archives. And it's funny, we've had stuff in this exhibit where I was like, oh, that's my handwriting on stuff that's on loan from Portman. Why now? He passed away at the end of 2017. And I think Peachtree Center's at a really interesting moment where we're kind of seeing what do we do with these tall office towers in downtown. I think reflecting back on what his intentions were, what he believed should be a downtown area. This concept of the coordinate unit that we go into in the exhibit, he believed that people should be able to work, live, shop, get an education, but do all these functions in what he called a coordinate unit where you shouldn't have to get in a car. He's also a huge proponent of MARTA. He actually was very supportive of getting that vote, where it would eventually pass. But I think just reflecting on his time at Tech, his education, and how that influenced his designs and the investment he had in the city of Atlanta. And truthfully, Kirk pitched me on, hey, maybe one day we can do an exhibit since you worked at Portman. And I think we originally were like, cool down the line. And what do you know, "down the line" ended up being-- KIRK HENDERSON: And we're here now. ALEX MCGEE: --here now, yeah. CHARLIE BENNETT: Yeah. So it is kind of coincidence, though, that you were an archivist at the Portman archives, because this is part of your university archivist mission. This is a famous alum that you're celebrating and exhibiting. ALEX MCGEE: I'm sure it didn't hurt when I interviewed for this job, so yeah. [LAUGHTER] CHARLIE BENNETT: And so is that how exhibits come to be? You have an idea. You think, oh, wouldn't it be cool? And then see if you can make it happen? KIRK HENDERSON: Sometimes these things are based on what collections do we have? In this case, the opportunity emerged because of Alex's connections and the connection of John Portman to Georgia Tech, that it was an idea that we thought made real sense. And I think one of the things is we started to talk about how the storyline could work. Because Portman is a world famous architect and there's a lot of stuff to cover, and we have a gallery that's about 1300 square feet. So the way that we worked the story was that we realized he was a Georgia Tech graduate. We knew that. And then we also realized that some of his last contributions, in terms of being an architect as well as an artist, were things that are here at Georgia Tech. So notably, it's the Coda Building, which opened in 2019, that was one of the last building projects that he would have had a hand in. And then the Cohen sculpture that's on campus was a contribution of his. It was dedicated after his death, but dedicated in 2021. And that was an example of him being an artist, which was very important to him in terms of creative expression and understanding the world. And that's something we also try to cover in the exhibit. So we saw Georgia Tech as a bookend to his life experience. And then in terms of crafting, well, what can we cover in the exhibit, I think it was Alex who brought to the table the idea of the building cluster downtown that is Peachtree Center, the Merchandise Mart, and all of those buildings which were things that were developed in the 1960s, was an important turning point for Atlanta. I think we have a quote in the exhibit someplace from Mr. Portman's son, Jack, where he says his father continued to develop in downtown Atlanta when everybody else was leaving town and moving to the suburbs and that kind of thing. That Portman was very invested in developing that downtown core-- and is responsible for, in some folks' opinion-- for sort of saving that portion of Atlanta. CHARLIE BENNETT: Did you look at our collection first? Or did you ask for things from Portman archives first when you were trying to collect materials? I'm kind of interested in what's the order of operations when it comes to putting something into the exhibit. ALEX MCGEE: Yeah, so initially when we were like, OK, can we do this exhibit, the first thing I did was I went to Portman and I asked for permission. I asked if they would collaborate with us, basically. Would they let me go in and look at the collections again and loan things to us? CHARLIE BENNETT: Could you have done it without permission? Like, not using their materials, just done it? ALEX MCGEE: It would have been more expensive for us. CHARLIE BENNETT: OK. ALEX MCGEE: I mean, they provided images to us for free. They gave us access to their collections to do research. They're a private archive, so they don't have to give people access. And it is part of their mission, I think, now, that they want to. But they can say no to people. So he had his solo firm, and got frustrated basically that he was not getting big enough commissions. He was doing houses, maybe an elementary school here and there in the city, but he wanted to do something more. And so he actually formed a partnership with H. Griffith Edwards, who was his professor here at Georgia Tech. So we do have H. Griffith Edwards's papers. And we have stuff from their partnership, Edwards and Portman, which does include a lot of materials around the early projects. The Hyatt Regency Atlanta is probably the most significant one in there. But the Dana Fine Arts Center over at Agnes Scott is in there, the Merchandise Mart, the construction of the early Peachtree Center towers, and the very beginning of Embarcadero Center in San Francisco are all in that collection. So we knew we had stuff, it was just going to be a lot easier if we had Portman working with us. CHARLIE BENNETT: And all the stuff you just talked about, that fits the sort of bookend narrative that you were talking about. Is that what made it clear? Like, oh, look, we have stuff from the beginning of the career. Or did you start thinking about Georgia Tech on either side-- oh, good, here it is? ALEX MCGEE: I'll confess, we had not processed H. Griffith Edwards's papers, so that actually happened over the summer. And we were like, oh, great, we have stuff. CHARLIE BENNETT: OK, good. ALEX MCGEE: We had a very high level description where I felt good about it, but found more things once it got processed. CHARLIE BENNETT: So the order of operations was chaos? ALEX MCGEE: No. No, no, no. MARLEE GIVENS: But how long has it taken, start to finish? ALEX MCGEE: I think I had a meeting with the Portman family in December of 2023. MARLEE GIVENS: All right. You are listening to Lost in the Stacks, and we will hear more about the latest exhibit opening in the library on the left side of the hour. [ROCK MUSIC] JAD ABUMRAD: Hey, this is Jad Abumrad from Radiolab, and you are listening to Lost in the Stacks, the one and only research library rock and roll radio show here on WREK in Atlanta. [ROCK MUSIC] CHARLIE BENNETT: Today's show is called Defining Skylines. And I want to read a quote from John Portman's book The Architect as Developer, written in 1976. "We cannot afford to abandon the cities. It is a course of action that makes no sense-- either economically, politically, or socially. And if we do not intend to abandon our cities, we must stop acting as if that is what we are going to do. We must learn to restructure cities, to make them economically healthy and desirable places for people to live and work in. A city is not a fixed object like an individual building. A city is a living entity that is changing all the time. You do not design a city in the way that you design a building. But you can make a city a humane environment, not just in isolated places, but continuously throughout its whole fabric." File this set under NA737.P63B37. [ROCK MUSIC] [PRIESTS, "DESIGN WITHIN REACH"] PRIEST: (SINGING) Into it, out of it, into it, into it, into it CHARLIE BENNETT: That was "Design Within Reach" by Priests. And before that, "Blueprint" by Fugazi. Songs about the design and planning of big things. ALEX MCGEE: This is Lost in the Stacks, and our show today is part of the Georgia Tech Library guidebook. Today's episode is all about the Exhibit Gallery, where the newest exhibit in the library, Defining Skylines, opens next week. CHARLIE BENNETT: We're speaking with Kirk Henderson, Connor Lynch, and Lost in the Stacks producer Alex McGee. They are all part of the Georgia Tech Library's archives and special collections. And they are essential personnel for Defining Skylines. So off-air we were chatting about what you hope people take away from the exhibit. And I was delighted when that just devolved into enjoying all these little pieces of the exhibit. There's Easter eggs almost throughout the whole exhibit, things that you really enjoy. So I want to give you all a chance to talk about what's your favorite little thing in the exhibit that you kind of hope people will stumble across? CONNOR LYNCH: Yeah. So as you said, we have a lot of really fun, unique artifacts, I think, in the exhibit. And one of my favorite things is a little paintbrush that has a note attached to it. And the story behind it is that someone was visiting John Portman, or one of his studios, and took this paintbrush as kind of a sneaky souvenir. CHARLIE BENNETT: They stole the paintbrush. CONNOR LYNCH: They borrowed it, long-term loan. So they took it, and then years later, I think probably a decade or more, they sent it back because they felt so guilty. And there's a note attached to it apologizing for taking the paintbrush. And so that will be in one of the cases that you can find in the exhibit. CHARLIE BENNETT: Nice. Kirk? KIRK HENDERSON: Yeah, I was thinking that one of the things that I'm most fond of is the fact that he wrote down what he was thinking about in a book. It's called Architect as Developer. And when you're working on an exhibit and you're trying to put together all the pieces and parts, and the things you have to write, and things you have to find the photograph for, and the things you have to figure out how to explain what this person was thinking, and he did it for us. So we just had to do a little editing and harvest. And when you visit the exhibit, it'll be fun to just go through and find out what he's thinking about what he was doing, and just let him explain himself. CHARLIE BENNETT: So having to write all that stuff is not your favorite part of the job? KIRK HENDERSON: Well, I don't mind writing things. I mean, I think that's one of the interesting things about doing an exhibit is figuring out how to compact the story. An old colleague that I used to work with said an exhibit's not a book on a wall. And so some people would bring a lot of expertise into a particular exhibit, topic matter, subject matter, and they want to tell you too much. CHARLIE BENNETT: Yeah. KIRK HENDERSON: And an exhibit, kind of like a radio show, it's like we have to distill this down to we have a certain amount of space, a certain amount of time to cover this, and you need to think about what those things are that you want to say. And so I enjoy that process. But it's also very helpful when the historical figure you're talking with, or doing the exhibit about, does some of the work for you. CHARLIE BENNETT: Nice. Alex, we're going to get to you, but I want to jump over to Marlee real quick. What was the thing that came up for you, Marlee, when we were talking about parts of the exhibit? MARLEE GIVENS: The life-size cutout. CHARLIE BENNETT: The life-size cutout? MARLEE GIVENS: Mm-hmm. CHARLIE BENNETT: Explain yourself. MARLEE GIVENS: It's apparently a life-size cardboard cutout of John Portman that visitors can take a selfie with. ALEX MCGEE: #PosingWithPortman, that is what we are asking people to do. MARLEE GIVENS: Is it gator board, foam board? ALEX MCGEE: It's not cardboard. It's a little stronger than that. MARLEE GIVENS: Oh, I'm sorry. CONNOR LYNCH: It's OK. Yeah, so exhibit's come in-- CHARLIE BENNETT: It's called a chip board. MARLEE GIVENS: Yeah, yeah. CONNOR LYNCH: The materials we print on come in many shapes and forms. But gator board, it's like a really stiff foam board. So he's pretty sturdy. ALEX MCGEE: It's like a photo of a very young him. I can't remember, is it '50s or '60s? CONNOR LYNCH: I would have to back and look. ALEX MCGEE: Leaning against a lamppost on Peachtree Street where Peachtree Center is. CONNOR LYNCH: So yeah, we cut him out. Went into Illustrator and cut a line out, but left the telephone pole to make it look like he was still leaning on something. And that's what greets you when you first come into the exhibit gallery. So he's there. ALEX MCGEE: It was inspired-- there's a cutout of LBJ, Lyndon Baines Johnson, at the LBJ Presidential Library that I have photos from me in 2019. He was known for leaning over people. And so they had this life-size cutout of him where you could be like ahh, he's standing over me! And I think my husband Tyler was posing and was like, peace sign. And so I came to Kirk and Connor with that idea of, what if we do a life-size cutout? CONNOR LYNCH: I will say, we got a lot of our graphics last week, and we've been putting them up. And I forget he's in there sometimes. And I'll be working, and then I'm like, what was that? It's John Portman. MARLEE GIVENS: Oh, this happened on a previous guidebook episode where Nic Fann was talking about the buzz-- CHARLIE BENNETT: Yeah. MARLEE GIVENS: --that was in the LRC. ALEX MCGEE: Oh. CHARLIE BENNETT: And if you walk back far enough, there's a standing shape waiting for you. MARLEE GIVENS: Yeah, catch it out of the corner of your eye. CHARLIE BENNETT: So, Alex, what is your favorite little bit of the exhibit? ALEX MCGEE: Well, there are many. But I would probably say the thing that I really like getting to showcase that we weren't talking about earlier is probably our bonus exhibit outside, which we haven't even mentioned. We actually have content outside of the gallery with this exhibit, and it is a chapter that I had come up with called Unbuilt Atlanta. It's featuring renderings. They have this amazing collection at Portman of watercolor renderings. CHARLIE BENNETT: Wait, you said a chapter you came up with? ALEX MCGEE: For the exhibit. CONNOR LYNCH: Oh, yeah. ALEX MCGEE: Chapters in the exhibit. CHARLIE BENNETT: Is that what you call it? ALEX MCGEE: That's how I-- yeah. CONNOR LYNCH: Kirk, maybe you will explain it better. But it's when we come up with a narrative, we think of it in sections and we call them chapters a lot of times. CHARLIE BENNETT: Oh, that's great. ALEX MCGEE: Yeah. CONNOR LYNCH: Because we've said, if somebody only read the headlines of things, would they still get the concept of what the exhibit is about? And so chapters are a way to place that. MARLEE GIVENS: Yeah. ALEX MCGEE: And so Unbuilt Atlanta is basically featuring some model photographs, some watercolor renderings of projects that he had done design concepts for in Atlanta that did not get realized. There are some really-- we'll go with "trippy" ones. There was an outdoor Peachtree-- CHARLIE BENNETT: No, we say conceptual. ALEX MCGEE: Conceptual. There was an outdoor entertainment arts complex that he pitched that was in a huge city block in Peachtree Center. There was a Georgia Center for the Arts that would have been downtown. He had a design for, RIP, Georgia World Congress Center. So it's this look at an Atlanta that could have been, is what I pitched it as. CHARLIE BENNETT: It sounds very cool. Connor or Kirk, do one of you have notes on the opening times and dates for the exhibit and all that? CONNOR LYNCH: Yeah. We have our official opening reception, RSVP only, on Tuesday, March 11. But then it will be open to the public on Wednesday, March 12. Our hours are 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM every day of the week. MARLEE GIVENS: This is Lost in the Stacks, and today we visited the exhibition gallery located in Price Gilbert Library for the Georgia Tech Library Guidebook. ALEX MCGEE: Our guests today are Kirk Henderson, the Exhibitions Program Manager, and Connor Lynch, the Exhibit Specialist Exhibits Associate, who knows, both-- CHARLIE BENNETT: The Exhibits Person. ALEX MCGEE: Yeah, both applicable. Both with the Georgia Tech libraries Archives and Special Collections. Thanks so much for being on the show. CHARLIE BENNETT: Nice job with the dual role there, Alex. ALEX MCGEE: Thank you. MARLEE GIVENS: File this set under F294.A84S53. [ROCK MUSIC] You just heard "Constructs" by Plume, before that, "Construction" by Tomato Flower. And we started our set with "Build" by The Minders. Songs about the processes of building and construction. CHARLIE BENNETT: Today's Lost in the Stacks was called Defining Skylines, as part of the GT Library Guidebook, and we visited the Exhibit Gallery at the Georgia Tech Library. OK, for fun, let's do a quick survey of everybody. What's your favorite piece of architecture you've seen, either in the media or in person? My favorite is David Lynch's house from Lost Highway. Which I did go to visit, and I did stand on the stoop, and I'm pretty sure I heard a table saw running while that was happening. Fred, how about you? FRED RASCOE: Yeah, not as creepy. When I was in high school, I was fortunate enough to go on a two-week exchange with about 14 of my classmates to Brescia, which is a town in Northern Italy. And on the first day there-- I grew up in Charlotte, North Carolina. This was just people from suburban Charlotte, North Carolina. The first day there, we saw a temple. In English, it's "The Temple of Brescia," but it has an Italian name, as well. And it was constructed in like 79 AD or CE. CHARLIE BENNETT: [LAUGHS] Not 1979. FRED RASCOE: The oldest thing that I pretty much had ever seen was a strip mall. And so seeing this-- I was, of course, aware of things that were thousands of years old. But seeing it in person just had a really profound effect on me. Like, that's the thing there, and people were there. They touched it and existed in it. CHARLIE BENNETT: I think that's just as creepy. [LAUGHTER] Marlee? MARLEE GIVENS: I like Frank Lloyd Wright, so The Guggenheim. Cody? CODY: I think of, I guess it's a church on top of a mountain in Spain that I went to. I had a similar reaction to you, Fred, where I was like, man, this so old and so beautiful. And I can think about how many people have been through here. ALEX MCGEE: Well, let me just add to the list of European churches, I guess. I would say La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona. I have been lucky to go twice. I went in 2017, and then I went back again last summer. And they had actually completed another tower while I was there, so that was really cool. But I think the stained glass being in there is just-- I mean, I could be in there for hours. And I took many Instagram-worthy photos. MARLEE GIVENS: Connor? CONNOR LYNCH: Oh, me? OK, so I had to think about it. It's also a church. We all love churches. I have not been there. But in Iceland, there's a church in Reykjavik. And I cannot remember the name, but it's a big Lutheran Church. And I think when we think of churches, we think of big, ancient structures that have been around a long time. This is a newer church. But it has these big, sweeping, walls come from very low up to very, very high at the center of it. It has just a really cool facade. I don't want to butcher the name, but I think it's just the Church of Iceland, or Lutheran Church in Iceland. KIRK HENDERSON: For me, I think it's going to be Frank Lloyd Wright's home and studio in Oak Park, Illinois. The home he built for himself and the studio when he went out on his own as an architect. It was really very impressive. And I thought, I could live here. CHARLIE BENNETT: So churches, Frank Lloyd Wright and David Lynch-- is that where we're at? MARLEE GIVENS: Mm-hmm. CHARLIE BENNETT: Cool. Roll the credits. [MUSIC PLAYING] Lost in the Stacks is a collaboration between WREK Atlanta and the Georgia Tech Library. Written and produced by Alex McGee, Charlie Bennett, Fred Raskin and Marlee Givens. MARLEE GIVENS: Legal counsel and a life-size cutout of Philip Burris himself were provided by the Burrus Intellectual Property Law Group in Atlanta, Georgia. CHARLIE BENNETT: We're all going to take a selfie. ALEX MCGEE: Special thanks to Kirk and Connor for being on the show today, and to Paige Adair, Katie Toomey, and Becca Brown at the Poorman Archives for all they brought to the exhibit. And lastly, to Jana Portman for saying yes over a year ago when I pitched this little idea. And thanks, as always, to each and every one of you for listening. Our web page is library.gatech.edu/lostinthestacks, where you'll find our most recent episode, a link to our podcast feed, and a web form if you want to get in touch with us. MARLEE GIVENS: Next week, we're doing some retro tech archaeology on a gaming system from the '80s. FRED RASCOE: It's time for our last song today. The great thing about the Portman exhibit-- well, there's a lot of great things about the Portman Exhibit. But one great thing about the Portman Exhibit at the Georgia Tech Library is that anyone who visits the exhibition in the library gallery can then subsequently take a short walk off campus and see some of the actual buildings he designed, and that stroll through downtown Atlanta will naturally take you down Peachtree Street. So let's close with "Peachtree Street" by Frank Sinatra and Rosemary Clooney right here on Lost in the Stacks. [SINATRA & CLOONEY, "PEACHTREE STREET"] ROSEMARY CLOONEY: Say, Frank, you want to take a walk? FRANK SINATRA: Why, sure, sweetie. Just pick a street. ROSEMARY CLOONEY: Piccadilly circus. FRANK SINATRA: Oh, I'd rather not. ROSEMARY CLOONEY: Champs Elysees? FRANK SINATRA: Mais, non.