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Our membership is speaking, and it is clear that the perennially popular architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright and modern art-especially in unique exhibition venues-are the hot tour tickets this year. The "Two Usonian Houses" tour on the afternoon of Thursday, March 21 (Tour 4) and both tours of the Pulitzer Foundation (Tours 14 and 15) have filled! As we mentioned in the preliminary program, the Frank Lloyd Wright homes on the "Two Usonian Houses" tour are not normally open to the public. Likewise, the Pulitzer is a private foundation open during limited hours by appointment only, and they have provided the only hours available during our conference to our group. We are of course thrilled that we have offered you tours that are of great interest to our membership, but sorry that we will not be able to add additional tours of the Frank Lloyd Wright Usonian Homes and the Pulitzer Foundation. However, many offerings unique to our St. Louis venue are still available, and these will give you the opportunity to experience many of the finest aspects of our city and the surrounding area. We want your experience of the St. Louis conference to be rich and pleasurable. By using our many tours to get to know St. Louis we think you will walk away feeling as your local arrangements co-chairs already do-that St. Louis is a city with world-class attractions in a tidy, accessible package.

For those of you interested in the architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright and his contemporaries, don't despair! We have planned a very exciting tour on Friday, March 22 to visit Wright's Dana-Thomas House in Springfield, Illinois (Tour 6). One of the best examples of Wright's Prairie style, the Dana House is not only remarkable for its original furnishings, art glass, and decorative woodwork, but also for the unique personality of its owner Susan Dana, whose many marriages and interest in mysticism make her perhaps the most interesting of Wright's patrons. After lunch at Maldaner's, a restaurant that has been in operation since almost the time of Lincoln (we promise that the food isn't this old!), we will complete our visit to Springfield at the home owned and occupied by Abraham Lincoln immediately before his presidency. Interested in Wright's contemporaries? We are happy to offer a tour of Principia College (Tour 12), a private Christian Scientist campus designed by Arts and Crafts architect Bernard Maybeck. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to see some of Maybeck's best work at a Mississippi river bluff venue that is entirely closed to visitors. Really interested in Wright's later work? "Two Usonian Houses" is also available on the morning of Thursday, March 21, but act soon, for this tour is also filling fast!

We are happy to report that the Pulitzer Foundation is not the only place in town to see exceptional examples of modern and contemporary art. The Cass Gilbert designed St. Louis Art Museum, one of the only remaining structures from the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair, houses an extraordinary collection of twentieth century art, including monumental work by Anslem Kiefer and a broad range of work by Max Beckmann on permanent display. The Saint Louis Art Museum tour (Tour 3) also includes tickets to the special exhibition "John Singer Sargent : Beyond the Portrait Studio," allowing you to view seldom seen work by John Singer Sargent. No Madame X or other monumental society portraits here. Instead the show offers a special glimpse into the artist's private world, seen through the lens of gorgeous watercolors and drawings that span his long career.