In 1937, Paul and Jean Hanna were visiting the hilltop site of their future campus home when a neighbor, geologist Bailey Willis, stopped by. Willis warned the Hannas that a minor earthquake fault ran right through the property. Alarmed, Paul Hanna, an education professor, telegraphed their architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, with the information. Wright was cavalier, reminding Hanna that his Imperial Hotel withstood the 1923 Tokyo earthquake.
Hanna House, as it came to be known, was not as fortunate. The 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake cracked its walls, displaced its concrete floor slabs and partially destroyed its retaining walls. The building was in danger of collapse in an aftershock. It turned out that Wright had designed a home in which the foundation and chimneys were essentially unreinforced. The house was closed for nearly 10 years; after a $2 million restoration campaign, it has finally reopened for public tours and as a site for seminars and receptions.
The experimental Hanna House was Wright's first residential foray in Northern California. To architects, the building is significant because of its hexagonal layout, much like a honeycomb. Many interior details, from the flooring to the fireplace, echo the motif. This breach of convention opened the way for future Wright works, including the spiraling Guggenheim Museum in New York. And many of the features -- the carport, the L-shaped living/dining room, the open kitchen -- became standard in suburban homes two decades later. Paul Turner, a professor of architectural history and chairman of the Hanna House board of governors, says the house is "the most important architectural work in the Bay Area, perhaps all of California."
The Hannas stayed there 37 years and, in 1975, gave the house to the University. Four successive provosts lived there until the 1989 quake. Restoration efforts focused on maintaining Wright's original vision while adding just enough seismic reinforcement to make the building safe. Says Laura Jones, MA '85, PhD '91, campus archeologist: "This house is not going to fall down -- ever."
