“Any man who really has faith in himself will be dubbed arrogant by his fellows” - Frank Lloyd Wright in 1957, as told to Mike Wallace

If you’ve ever been to Illinois, you’ll know all about the defining features of its landscape - namely, that it’s pretty much flat. But architect Frank Lloyd Wright did something new when he made buildings that somehow became one with the prairie. Long, low lines, and interiors that brought the light and space of the outside in. With the same approach, he built homes in the woods around waterfalls, on high bluffs that take in the stretch and space of the land below. If you’ve ever visited one of his houses, you’ll know how they manage to make you understand more about exactly where you live.

As part of our special series, The Experimenters, where we’re uncovering interviews with the icons of science, technology, and innovation, we found this 1957 interview with Frank Lloyd Wright. It’s part of a collection at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin celebrating The Mike Wallace Interview, a TV program that ran back in the late ‘50s. Frank Lloyd Wright’s designs and style seem very nice, very clean now, but at the time, he was a controversial personality. And like most famous architects, his work was as much hated as respected. And that’s what Mike Wallace wanted to talk about.

Here’s the tape.

Additional support from PRX and The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation