Patrick MacLeamy - Designing a World-Class Architecture Firm

Hellmuth loved to travel in pursuit of work around the world and loved to tell stories about his adventures. St. Louis was a TWA hub, and he always flew first class on TWA. He was one of their biggest customers and got to know all the flight attendants, then called stewardesses. One day Hellmuth went to TWA and said, “I fly with you all the time, and I want to set it up so that whenever I make a reservation, I always get seat 5B.” The TWA representative said it would wreck their reservation system, but finally agreed that on flights originating in St. Louis, he could reserve seat 5B. As he was leaving, Hellmuth quipped, “And one more thing: make sure it's always on the shady side of the plane.” He was kidding, of course, but was totally serious about hopping on an airplane at a moment's notice to pursue work for HOK.

One Saturday morning in 1968, several of us were working in the St. Louis office when the building began to shake. Most people don't think about the fact that St. Louis is near the New Madrid fault zone, which has produced three of the largest earthquakes in U.S. history. Suddenly, the whole room was in motion and everyone stopped what they were doing—except Chi Chen Jen, an HOK designer who was originally from Taiwan. He knew about earthquakes and was through the door, down the stairs, and outside the building before the rest of us realized it was an earthquake. By the time I looked out the window to see what was going on, he was down on the street, no doubt wondering where we all were. King Graf had been in a bathroom stall when the earthquake hit, and the lights went out. He came out of that bathroom like a shot—trying to pull his pants up!

George Hellmuth and King Graf were not the only storytellers. Paul Watson, the first HOK attorney, liked to tell a story about his first day at HOK. George Kassabaum hired Paul, and, while showing him around, introduced him to Obata, saying, “Gyo, meet Paul Watson, our new in-house lawyer.” Obata looked at Paul, then said, “Lawyer? We don't need a lawyer.” Kassabaum was surprised, and said, “I told you we were going to hire a lawyer and you agreed.” Obata replied, “I'm not sure I'm going to like him, so let's make him temporary.” Paul turned to Obata and said, “Good, I'm not sure I'm going to like you either!” Obata and Watson became good friends after that exchange and worked together for years.

These stories and many others reflect HOK Culture, who we are as people. Lots of them poke a bit of fun in a mild-mannered way. Hearing—and telling—stories like this when we were working late, or on the road, or at the annual barbecue was one more thing that made me feel like part of the family. Even the firm's name became the stuff of stories.

The founders' last names were difficult to spell, so the firm became best known by the initials H-O-K. Years later, we shortened the name to just the initials for simplicity. But for now, people around the firm loved to poke gentle fun at the challenge of the founders' names.

Here's a Kassabaum story that took place in an era when HOK had established several offices, but receptionists still wrote phone messages by hand. The receptionists were all trained to answer the phone by saying, “Good morning, Hellmuth, Obata, and Kassabaum. How may I direct your call?” George Kassabaum called the Dallas office and asked to speak with King Graf. The receptionist replied, “I'm sorry, Mr. Graf is out of the office. Would you like to leave a message?” Kassabaum said, “Please have him call George Kassabaum when he returns.” The receptionist said, “How do you spell Kassabaum?” Kassabaum replied, “Young lady, look on your paycheck!”

King could tell and retell funny stories about Kassabaum—and Hellmuth and Obata— because he held a unique position of trust with all three founders. He never boasted about his special role. Instead, he made yet another joke about the firm name, saying “If Kassabaum retired and I became his replacement, the firm would be called Hellmuth, Obata & Graf, or HOG—and that would never do!”

Much later, in the 1980s, we all enjoyed another good laugh about the HOK name. Vernon Geisel, one of our architects, had previously worked in Moscow for the U.S. Embassy and wrote and spoke fluent Russian. Vernon subscribed to some Soviet magazines and brought one to the office. It contained an article about HOK, including our logo and pictures of some of our buildings. The article was titled “HOK: A Hawk in the Skies of Architecture.” The author claimed it was no mistake that the HOK initials sounded, phonetically, like “hawk,” because we were a big capitalist company intent on gobbling up our smaller competitors! It was still the Cold War era, and Soviet apparatchiks regularly instructed state journalists to slant stories against the United States and Western companies. We were oddly flattered, figuring we had really made it, if HOK was the subject of Soviet propaganda.

The HOK name was misconstrued—and misspelled. Over the years Chip Reay, the graphic designer in St. Louis, collected misspellings from mail that came into the HOK mailroom. When the office relocated to new space in downtown St. Louis, Chip created a humorous announcement containing the many misspellings of the firm name. Everyone had a good laugh over it, including the founders. My personal favorite is the last name on the list.

HOK culture played a part in serious times, too. A fire swept through the St. Louis office on Friday evening, November 8, 1974. HOK occupied several floors in the Syndicate Trust Building, a downtown landmark that had formerly been a department store. It took 110 firefighters to bring the fire under control. Finally, at about midnight, officials allowed tenants into the building for a first look at the damage. After wading through the water and burned debris, George Kassabaum told the St. Louis Post Dispatch that he expected most—possibly all—work on current projects would be completely lost.

How would HOK survive? How would HOK respond? Employees heard about the fire from news reports and spontaneously began to call each other. They agreed to meet the next morning at a nearby restaurant and make a plan of attack. Everyone went to the unburned portion of the office on the tenth floor and began to organize. One team went to visit a nearby building, where two floors were empty, and found enough space was available to reestablish an office. By midmorning, the phone company was installing telephones as the team blocked out areas for each department to occupy.

FIGURE 4.1Humorous announcement listing misspellings of HOK founders' names. c. 1970.

Source: Image courtesy of HOK.

A second team surveyed the staff to find out who had drafting tables and specialized tools at home to replace the ones destroyed by the fire. Other architecture firms pitched in as well, and HOK sent a trucking service around to collect everything. Someone noticed that the old, unused department store cafeteria was still full of oak captain's chairs, and these became temporary desk chairs.

As employees began picking through the charred mess, a minor miracle: someone opened a large, specialized filing cabinet, called a “flat file” used for storing architectural drawings. Their find? The drawings inside were charred at the edges, but salvageable. Only the drawings on the drafting boards were a complete loss. That meant the very latest versions of various projects were gone forever, but HOK would survive. A hum of relief, excitement, and renewed activity surged through the group.