Robert A. Millikan House

The Robert A. Millikan House is a three-story brick residence at 5605 South Woodlawn Avenue in Hyde Park featuring Prairie School design elements. The building displays broad gabled sections and irregularly placed windows that reflect early twentieth-century modern architectural trends.

The residence housed physicist Robert A. Millikan from 1908 to 1921 while he conducted his groundbreaking experiments on electron charge and the photoelectric effect. His work performed within these walls later earned him the Nobel Prize in Physics.

The residence reflects how scientists at the University of Chicago blended their professional work with family life in a single home during the early 1900s. It demonstrates the role of domestic spaces in the development of American physics during this period.

The house stands near the University of Chicago campus and remains privately owned with no public interior access. Visitors can view the exterior from the street and enjoy exploring the surrounding Hyde Park neighborhood on foot.

The residence doubled as Millikan's laboratory where he tested his theories on atomic structure within the home itself. This arrangement was uncommon for the era and reveals how early twentieth-century physicists conducted serious experimental science within domestic settings.

Location: Illinois

Inception: 1907

Architects: Thomas Tallmadge

GPS coordinates: 41.79271,-87.59641

Latest update: December 13, 2025 11:45