Toker, Franklin K(arl) B(enedict) S(erchuk) 1944-

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TOKER, Franklin K(arl) B(enedict) S(erchuk) 1944-

PERSONAL: Born April 29, 1944, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada; immigrated to the United States, 1964, naturalized U.S. citizen, 1983; son of Maxwell Harris (a dental surgeon) and Ethel (Serchuk-Herzberg) Toker; married Ellen Judith Burack (a fine arts administrator), September 3, 1972; children: Sarah Augusta, Maxwell Abraham, Jeffrey Burack. Education: McGill University, B.A., 1964; Oberlin College, A.M., 1966; Harvard University, Ph.D., 1972. Politics: "Jeffersonian." Hobbies and other interests: Sailing, travel, painting, writing fiction.

ADDRESSES: Home—1521 Denniston Ave., Squirrel Hill, Pittsburgh, PA 15217. Office—Department of the History of Art and Architecture, Frick Fine Arts Building, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260; fax: 412-648-2792. Agent—William Clark, William Clark Associates, 355 West 22nd St., New York, NY 10011-2650. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Soprintendenza ai Monumenti (historic buildings commission), Florence, Italy, archaeological director of excavation of Florence Cathedral, 1969-74; Carnegie-Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, visiting professor, 1974-76, associate professor of history of architecture, 1976-80; University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, professor of history of art and architecture, 1980—. University of Florence, visiting professor, 1989; University of Rome, visiting professor, 1991. Reggio Calabria, president, 1993-94, visiting professor, 1996. Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ, member, 1985-86.

MEMBER: International Center for Medieval Art, Medieval Academy of America (life member), Archeological Institute of America, College Art Association of America (life member), Society of Architectural Historians (life member; president, 1993-94), National Trust for Historic Preservation.

AWARDS, HONORS: Alice Davis Hitchcock Book Award, Society of Architectural Historians, 1971, forThe Church of Notre-Dame in Montreal; Guggenheim fellowship, 1979; grants, National Endowment for the Humanities, 1979, 1992; Arthur Kingsley Porter Prize, College Art Association of America, 1980, for most distinguished article in Art Bulletin, 1978; resident, Rockefeller Foundation, Bellagio Center, 1994.

WRITINGS:

The Church of Notre-Dame in Montreal, McGill-Queens University Press (Montreal, Quebec, Canada), 1970, revised translation published as L'Eglise Notre-Dame de Montreal, son architecture, son passe, Hurtubise-HMH (Montreal, Quebec, Canada), 1981.

(With Guido Morozzi and J. A. Herrmann) S. Reparata: L'Antica cattedrale fiorentina (title means "St. Reparata: The Ancient Cathedral of Florence"), Bonechi (Florence, Italy), 1974.

Pittsburgh: An Urban Portrait, Pennsylvania State University Press (Pittsburgh, PA), 1985, 2nd edition, 1991.

Fallingwater Rising: Frank Lloyd Wright, E. J. Kaufmann, and America's Most Extraordinary House, Alfred A. Knopf (New York, NY), 2003.

(With Lu Donnelly and David Brumble) Buildings of Pennsylvania: Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 2004.

Contributor to books, including Giuseppe Zocchi's Views of Florence, edited by James Ackerman, Walker (New York, NY), 1967. Contributor to art and architecture journals.

WORK IN PROGRESS: Excavations at the Cathedral of Florence, four volumes, for Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies (Toronto, Ontario, Canada).

SIDELIGHTS: Franklin K. B. S. Toker once told CA: "I write about scholarly material and use scholarly method, but I write as an author, with the aim of provoking and enlivening rather than deadening a scholarly audience. I am contemptuous of technical jargon in other fields and try to keep it out of my works."

Toker later added: "With Fallingwater Rising: Frank Lloyd Wright, E. J. Kaufmann, and America's Most Extraordinary House, I have finally achieved my objective of writing simultaneously as a scholar and as someone addressing a wide audience of nonspecialists."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, November 1, 2003, Keir Graff, review of Fallingwater Rising: Frank Lloyd Wright, E. J. Kaufmann, and America's Most Extraordinary House, p. 472.

Kirkus Reviews, August 15, 2003, review of Fallingwater Rising, p. 1066.

Library Journal, October 1, 2003, Valerie Nye, review of Fallingwater Rising, p. 74.

New York Times, September 29, 2003, Janet Maslin, review of Fallingwater Rising, p. E8.