For a brief moment in time, Colorado enjoyed an architectural flowering in a style approaching that of the Catalonian master, Gaudí. Working in the same era, William A. Lang and his partner Marshall R. Pugh bestowed upon Denver and other Colorado towns hundreds of houses and business structures representing an apex of architectural exploration and innovation.

Lang, a self taught architect, began designing buildings in Denver in 1885, and rode the dizzying silver boom to its bitter end in 1893. Newly wealthy miners wanted houses and offices that reflected their individuality, style, and sometimes flamboyance. In the materials of the day, carved stone and wood, Lang's ideas leapt beyond traditional forms and ventured into florid conglomerates of Queen Anne, Romanesque, and Gothic styles. His buildings provided perfect venues for the interiors of the day, in the "horreur vacua" style - the densely cluttered melange that abhorred a vacuum.

Lang was joined in 1889 by Marshall Pugh, a University of Pennsylvania graduate, whose contribution probably was in the realm of engineering, his field of study. It was during this period of collaboration that the Library's "Lang & Pugh Presentation Album" was compiled as a professional portfolio.

The Silver Crash of 1893 ended the building craze, along with the careers of Denver's star architects. Marshall Pugh went on to fight in World War One, building supply railroads on the French / German border. He died in Germantown, Pennsylvania, in 1930. William Lang did not fare so well. Broken by the ruin of his career, he idled until 1897 when he left his brother's home, and "not knowing where he was going, he wandered as far as Morris, Illinois, where he was arrested as a tramp and a vagrant."* Soon after, he was hit and killed by a train in Marseilles, Illinois, and buried there in a humble grave.

Denver's Baker Historic District is home to many of the remaining Lang and Pugh houses. Others include the Molly Brown House at 1340 Pennsylvania, and the Ghost Building at 18th and Stout.

The "Lang and Pugh Presentation Album" was acquired by the Western History Department in the 1930's, and includes photographs and floorplans on 49 pages. At some point before the acquisition, the album suffered water damage, and underwent restoration. Now searchable online, the album's fragile pages are in a temperature/humidity controlled vault at The Denver Public Library.

To search the database for any Lang and Pugh house, use "Lang Pugh" in a keyword search. To see images from the presentation album, add the word "album" to your search.

*For more information about Lang & Pugh, see Charles O. Brantigan's biographies at the Western History / Genealogy Department at The Denver Public Library.

For more about Building History Research, visit our Tutorial.