Prairie-style homes were made famous by the architect Frank Lloyd Wright. These homes celebrate and complement the natural beauty of the Midwestern landscape with low and long shapes in the floor plan and building elements.
Prairie-style houses showcase:
- Long and low-to-the-ground builds
- Flat or shallow roofs with overhanging eaves
- Thin bricks or stucco exteriors to match the house shape
- Minimalist yet stylized ornamentation
Prairie houses inspired the flat planes and natural elements popular in Mid-century houses.
The Royal Exchange in London was founded in the 16th century by the merchant Sir Thomas Gresham on the suggestion of his factor Richard Clough to act as a centre of commerce for the City of London.[1] The site was provided by the City of London Corporation and the Worshipful Company of Mercers, who still jointly own the freehold. It is trapezoidal in shape and is flanked by Cornhill and Threadneedle Street, which converge at Bank junction in the heart of the city. It lies in the ward of Cornhill.
It has twice been destroyed by fire and subsequently rebuilt. The present building was designed by Sir William Tite in the 1840s. The site was notably occupied by the Lloyd's insurance market for nearly 150 years. Today the Royal Exchange contains Fortnum & Mason The Bar & Restaurant, luxury shops, and offices.
Traditionally, the steps of the Royal Exchange are the place where certain royal proclamations (such as the dissolution of parliament) are read out by either a herald or a crier. Following the death or abdication of a monarch and the confirmation of the next monarch's accession to the throne by the Accession Council, the Royal Exchange Building is one of the locations where a herald proclaims the new monarch's reign to the public.
American popular music has had a profound effect on music across the world. The country has seen the rise of popular styles that have had a significant influence on global culture, including ragtime, blues, jazz, swing, rock, bluegrass, country, R&B, doo wop, gospel, soul, funk, punk, disco, house, techno, salsa, grunge and hip hop. In addition, the American music industry is quite diverse, supporting a number of regional styles such as zydeco, klezmer and slack-key.
Distinctive styles of American popular music emerged early in the 19th century, and in the 20th century the American music industry developed a series of new forms of music, using elements of blues and other genres of American folk music. These popular styles included country, R&B, jazz and rock. The 1960s and 1970s saw a number of important changes in American popular music, including the development of a number of new styles, such as heavy metal, punk, soul, and hip hop. Though these styles were not in the sense of mainstream, they were commercially recorded and are thus examples of popular music as opposed to folk or classical music.
Georgian-style homes were one of the most common styles in the 18th century and showcased formal and classical details that previous homes didn’t. Georgian houses are similar to Federal houses, though they can be distinguished by:
- A crown and pilasters framing the front door
- Decorative quoins or bricks at the corners
- Smooth decorative blocks as moulding
You can also find regional variations with hooded front doors and pent roofs between levels.
Victorian homes were built between 1837 and 1901 while Queen Victoria reigned in Britain. “Victorian” actually refers to multiple styles that vary in influence, but each features ornate detailing and asymmetrical floor plans.
The key features of a Victorian-era home include:
- Elaborate woodwork and trim
- Towers, turrets, and dormer windows
- Steep gabled roofs
- Partial or full-width porches
Victorian homes are all about ornamentation — industrialization allowed these homes to be produced en masse and across a variety of architectural styles.
The American Farmhouse is a simple and timeless style. Farmhouses are designed to be practical first and foremost. They’re common across the US and often showcase regional variations, like wrap-around porches in the South.
Farmhouses have evolved with time and location, but often feature these elements:
- Rectangular floor plan
- Large front porches
- Natural wood and stone materials
- Few and small windows
- Formal front rooms separated from family rooms
Of course, the easiest way to identify a farmhouse is that they’ll often be situated on a large plot of farmland.
There was a renewed interest in handcrafted art and design following the industrial revolution. This became the “Arts and Crafts” era and paved the way for the Craftsman home, or “arts and crafts” home.
Craftsman homes focus on simplicity to counter the ornate stylings of Victorian homes. They’re also designed to highlight the craftsmanship of its builders and include:
- A low-pitched roof with overhanging eaves
- A covered porch
- Woodwork including exposed beams and built-in features like shelving
- Natural tones to complement the warmth from woodworking
Craftsman homes are favored for their character and are another versatile style that may borrow common elements from other home styles.
Cape Cod homes are similar to the British or American Colonial homes, though they originated further north in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. These are often seen as the classic American family home since the style’s revival in the 20th Century.
Cape Cod homes are identified by their:
- Shingle exteriors
- Modest size and ornamentation compared to British Colonial homes
- Originally single-story homes
- Large central fireplaces
- Attic lofts (20th-century revival)
- Dormer windows (20th-century revival)
Cape Cod homes are built of local wood and stone to withstand the north-eastern weather. This exterior weathering provides an iconic weathered-blue color to these homes.
The U.S. health system is a mix of public and private, for-profit and nonprofit insurers and health care providers. The federal government provides funding for the national Medicare program for adults age 65 and older and some people with disabilities as well as for various programs for veterans and low-income people, including Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program. States manage and pay for aspects of local coverage and the safety net. Private insurance, the dominant form of coverage, is provided primarily by employers. The uninsured rate, 8.5 percent of the population, is down from 16 percent in 2010, the year that the landmark Affordable Care Act became law. Public and private insurers set their own benefit packages and cost-sharing structures, within federal and state regulations.
The Pueblo Revival was inspired by the indigenous Pueblo people’s architecture in the Southwestern US. Pueblo homes were made of adobe or stucco and designed to handle the extreme temperatures of the desert.
Architects in California began to explore the Pueblo style in the late 19th century and the Pueblo Revival style spread across New Mexico, Arizona, and Colorado.
The Pueblo Revival hit its peak in the 1930s in Santa Fe, and these Pueblo-style elements are still popular in the Southwest:
- Rounded corners and irregular shapes
- Earth tones that reflect the desert colors
- Stepped effects with higher floors becoming smaller
- Flat roofs with parapet trim
- Exposed roof beams extending past the walls
The Pueblo Revival style is also commonly called Adobe or Santa Fe style architecture.
A college endowment refers to all the money that an institution receives in donations. However, endowment funds are not ‘no-questions-asked’ cash boosts for the college. Instead, endowments are tightly controlled investments that are supposed to be grown so that the interest can be used to upgrade facilities, hire new staff, provide scholarships or aid the college or its students in some way.
Over the past three decades, the total market value of the 20 largest college endowments has grown nearly tenfold — from $30.6 billion to $302.1 billion. As the size of college endowments has increased, so too has the debate over their purpose, management and ethical obligations.
To get a better idea of how college endowments have changed over the last 30 years, DegreeQuery looked at the market value of the 20 largest U.S. college endowments from 1990 to 2020.
30 Years of U.S. college endowments
Based on the most recent NACUBO survey of 810 universities, the total market value of endowments in 2018 was $624.3 billion. 48.3% of that is held by just 20 colleges. But why the huge growth in market value over the past 30 years? It might be something to do with how much of the endowment the university chooses to spend on operations or the return rates of the endowment’s investment portfolio. Due to their often wealthy donor base and long-term investment horizons, the largest university endowments can invest in a diverse array of asset classes, and often grow faster than the economy as a whole.
From 1990 to 2020, the market value of the 20 largest college endowments grew at an average annual rate of 8.5% — faster than the 6.6% average annual growth rate for the Fortune 500 over the same period. The universities with the fastest growth over the past 30 years include the University of Michigan, Duke University and the University of Notre Dame. Meanwhile, the endowments with the slowest growth include Emory University, Rice University and Washington University in St. Louis.
1. U.S. college endowments in the 1990s
From 1990 to 1999, the market value of the 20 largest U.S. college endowments grew at an average annual rate of 12.5% — the fastest of the last three decades. As you can see from our graph, over this period, the University of Michigan endowment rose from the 20th largest to the 17th largest, and the University of Pennsylvania rose from the 16th largest to the 12th largest. Meanwhile, the Columbia University endowment fell from the sixth-largest to the 11th largest. Although the University of Texas System endowment had the slowest growth of the 20 largest endowments over this period, it remained the second-largest endowment overall.
2. U.S. college endowments in the 2000s
Endowment growth is closely connected with the overall health of the economy. As of 2018, just 4% of endowment assets were held as cash, the rest invested in equities, fixed income instruments and alternative investment vehicles. In the lead up to the 2008 financial crisis — university endowments had increasingly invested in high-risk, illiquid investments like private equity, real estate and hedge funds. As a result, endowments lost tens of billions of dollars in value, with some schools losing more than 25% of their total endowment value. From 2008 to 2009, the total value of the 20 largest endowments fell 3.4%. Yale posted the largest percentage decline, losing 28.6% of its market value. Other university endowments that posted big losses from the recession include Harvard, Duke and Stanford.
3. U.S. college endowments in the 2010s
Endowment growth rates rebounded in the wake of the Great Recession, although growth was still slow compared to the 1990s. From 2010 to 2018, the market value of the 20 largest endowments grew at an average annual rate of 7.6%. This is more than the 3.5% average annual growth rate for 2000 to 2009, yet less than the 12.5% rate for 1990 to 1999. During this period, the biggest winners were the University of Pennsylvania, rising from 11th to 7th largest, and the Texas A&M University System, which rose from 10th to 8th largest. Lackluster performance at some of the wealthiest schools has prompted some universities to make major changes to their endowment management. In 2017, for example, Harvard announced it would lay off roughly half of its 230-person staff in the wake of poor investment performance.
As you can see, university endowments were big business over the past 30 years. Nowadays, students, policymakers and the general public are increasingly involved in the conversation surrounding their management, mission and societal impact. For example, the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which imposed a 1.4% tax on the net investment income of the wealthiest endowments, recently sparked a wave of criticism from university administrators. Elsewhere on campus, protesting students demanded their universities divest from fossil fuel companies.
As the debate rages on and endowments continue to grow, these visualizations help us see how we got to this point.
Methodology
To get a better idea of how college endowments have changed over the last 30 years, DegreeQuery looked at the market value of the 20 largest U.S. college endowments from 1990 to 2018. Data on endowment asset value by university came from the National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO) and is unadjusted for inflation. In years when certain universities did not participate in the NACUBO survey, we estimated the endowment value based on the compound annual growth rate for all available years. Estimated figures include the market value of the endowment assets for the Texas A&M University System for 1990, as well as the market value of the endowment assets for the University of California system for the years 1990 through 1992.
SOURCES
Fortune 500. (n.d.) Fortune 500 2018. fortune.com
NACUBO. (2019). Detailed Asset Allocations for U.S. College and University Endowments and Affiliated Foundations, FY18. nacubo.org
Miller, C. & Fabrikant, G. (2008). Universities retrench as endowments suffer from financial crisis. nytimes.com
Humphreys, J. et al. (2010). Educational Endowments and the Financial Crisis: Social Costs and Systemic Risks in the Shadow Banking System. tellus.org
Plender, J. (2014). There is a history lesson to be learnt from Yale endowment. ft.com
Fabrikant, G. (2017). Harvard Makes Changes in Managing a Lagging Endowment. nytimes.com
Tax Policy Center. (n.d.). What is the tax treatment of college and university endowments? taxpolicycenter.org