Content deleted Content added
Hugh Manatee (talk | contribs) mNo edit summary |
Tassedethe (talk | contribs) |
||
| (112 intermediate revisions by 54 users not shown) | |||
Line 1:
{{Short description|American architect (1780–1852)}}
{{Infobox architect
|name=Alexander Parris
|image=Alexander Parris.jpg
|parents=Mercy Thompson<br />Matthew Parris
|nationality= American
|birth_date={{Birth date|mf=yes|1780|11|24}}
|birth_place= [[Halifax, Massachusetts]]
|death_date={{death date and age|mf=yes|1852|6|16|1780|11|24}}
|death_place= [[Pembroke, Massachusetts]]
|significant_buildings=[[Virginia Executive Mansion]]<br/>[[Quincy Market]]
|significant_projects=
|awards=
}}
'''Alexander Parris''' (November 24, 1780 – June 16, 1852) was a prominent [[United States|American]] [[architect]]-[[engineer]]. Beginning as a housewright, he evolved into an architect whose work transitioned from [[Federal style architecture]] to the later [[Greek Revival]]. Parris taught [[Ammi B. Young]], and was among the group of architects influential in founding what would become the [[American Institute of Architects]]. He is also responsible for the designs of many [[lighthouses]] along the coastal [[Northeastern United States]].
==Early life and work==
Parris was born in [[Halifax, Massachusetts]]. At the age of 16, he apprenticed to a housewright in [[Pembroke, Massachusetts|Pembroke]], but talent led him towards [[architecture]]. Married to Silvina Bonney Stetson in 1800, he moved to [[Portland, Maine]], which was then experiencing a building boom. The city had been bombarded during the [[American Revolution|Revolution]] by the [[Royal Navy]], reducing three-quarters to ashes in 1775. But following the war, its trade recovered, almost challenging [[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]] as the busiest port in [[New England]]. Parris received numerous residential and commercial commissions, working in the fashionable style of architect [[Charles Bulfinch]]. Like most housewrights of the era, he often used elements derived directly from [[English people|English]] architectural books, or those published in the United States by [[Asher Benjamin]]. Unfortunately, some of his designs were lost in the [[1866 Great Fire of Portland, Maine|Great Fire of 1866]], but early photographs and Parris' surviving drawings bespeak works of [[Neoclassical architecture|neoclassical]] artistry and taste.
[[Image:The Governor's Mansion, Richmond, VA.jpg|thumb|right|The [[Executive Mansion (Virginia)|Executive Mansion]] at Richmond, Virginia, c. 1905]]
The boom would end, however, with [[Thomas Jefferson|Jefferson's]] [[Embargo Act of 1807|Embargo of 1807]], which lasted 14 months and devastated Portland's mercantile base. Merchants went bankrupt. The Portland Bank, its building designed by Parris, failed. By 1809, construction in the city had come to a halt. Parris left for [[Richmond, Virginia]], where he designed the [[Wickham House]] and the [[Executive Mansion (Virginia)|Executive Mansion]]. But architect [[Benjamin Latrobe]] examined Parris' preliminary plans for the Wickham House, which resembled his previous Federal style works in Portland, and gave it a blistering review. Latrobe's advice left a profound imprint on the future work of Parris, beginning with the building's revised design. Consequently, the Wickham House is considered a watershed design by Parris, marking the shift from his earlier [[Adamesque]] period towards his later, more severe, monumental and [[wikt:architectonic|architectonic]] period. In the [[War of 1812]], he served in [[Plattsburgh (city), New York|Plattsburgh, New York]] as a Captain of the Artificers (engineers), gaining knowledge of military requirements for engineering.
==Boston and federal patronage==
In 1815, he moved to Boston, where he found a position in the office of Charles Bulfinch. Like his famous employer, Parris produced refined residences, churches and commercial buildings. When in 1817 Bulfinch was called to [[Washington, D.C.|Washington]] to work on the [[U.S. Capitol Building]], Parris helped complete the Bulfinch Building home of the [[Ether Dome]] at [[Massachusetts General Hospital]]. With Bulfinch's departure, Parris soon became the city's leading architect, and a proponent of what would be called "Boston [[Granite]] Style", with austere, monolithic stonework. Around 1818-1823 he kept an office on [[Court Street (Boston, Massachusetts)|Court Street]].<ref>Boston Directory. 1818, 1823</ref> He belonged to the [[Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association]].<ref>Joseph Jenkins. An address delivered before the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanick Association, December 17, 1818, being the anniversary of the choice of officers, and fourth triennial celebration of their public festival. (Boston: Munroe & Francis, 1819)</ref>
[[File:Quincy Market When Built.jpg|thumb|right|[[Quincy Market]] in 1830, Boston, Massachusetts]]
In 1824, however, he began a twenty-year association working for the [[Boston Navy Yard]] in [[Charlestown, Massachusetts|Charlestown]]. He would end his career as chief engineer at the [[Portsmouth Naval Shipyard]] in [[Kittery, Maine]]. With the federal government as patron, Parris produced plans for numerous utilitarian structures, from storehouses to ropewalks, and was superintendent of construction at one of the nation's first [[drydock]]s, located at the Charlestown base. Today, he is fondly remembered for his stalwart stone lighthouses, commissioned by the [[U.S. Treasury Department]]. They are often of a tapered form termed "windswept."
Parris balanced the delicacy of his "superb draftsmanship", as it was called, with the coarseness of his building material of choice: granite. His most famous building, [[Quincy Market]], is made of it. Parris died in Pembroke, where he is interred in the Briggs Burying Ground.
==Designs==
[[Image:United First Parish Church (exterior), Quincy, Massachusetts.JPG|thumb|right|[[United First Parish Church]], 1828, Quincy, Massachusetts -- exterior]]
[[Image:United First Parish Church (interior), Quincy, Massachusetts.JPG|thumb|right|-- and interior]]
* 1801 - [[Joseph Holt Ingraham House]], Portland, Maine
* 1803-1804 - Maine Fire & Marine Insurance Company Building, Portland, Maine
* 1804 - James Deering House, Portland, Maine
* 1805 - Commodore Edward Preble House, Portland, Maine
* 1805 - Hunnewell-Shepley House, Portland, Maine
* 1806-1807 - Portland Bank, Portland, Maine
* 1807 - [[St. John's Church (Portsmouth, New Hampshire)|St. John's Church]], [[Portsmouth, New Hampshire]]
* 1809-1810 - Moses Payson House, [[Bath, New Hampshire]]
* 1812 - [[Wickham House]], Richmond, Virginia
* 1813 - [[Executive Mansion (Virginia)|Executive Mansion]], Richmond, Virginia
* 1816 - [[Watertown Arsenal]], [[Watertown, Massachusetts]]
* 1818 - 39 and 40 Beacon Street, Boston, Massachusetts
* 1819 - [[Cathedral Church of St. Paul, Boston|Cathedral Church of St. Paul]], Boston, Massachusetts
* 1819 - [[David Sears (America)|David Sears]] House (now the [[Somerset Club]]), Boston, Massachusetts
* 1819 - [[Appleton-Parker House]], or [[Nathan Appleton Residence]], Boston, Massachusetts
* 1822 - St. Paul's Episcopal Church, [[Windsor, Vermont]]
* 1824 - [[Pilgrim Hall Museum|Pilgrim Hall]], [[Plymouth, Massachusetts]]
* 1824-1826 - [[Quincy Market]], Boston, Massachusetts
* 1828 - [[United First Parish Church]], [[Quincy, Massachusetts]]
*1831 - [[Barnstable County Courthouse]], [[Barnstable, Massachusetts]]
* 1834 - [[St. Joseph Catholic Church (Boston, Massachusetts)|St. Joseph's Church]], Boston, Massachusetts
* 1834 - Ropewalk, Boston Navy Yard, Charlestown, Massachusetts
* 1836 - [[Chelsea Naval Hospital]], [[Chelsea, Massachusetts]]
* 1837 - [[Chelsea Naval Magazine]], Chelsea, Massachusetts
* 1839 - [[Saddleback Ledge Light]]house, between the islands of [[Vinalhaven, Maine|Vinalhaven]] and [[Isle au Haut, Maine]]
* 1847 - [[Mount Desert Light|Mount Desert Rock Lighthouse]], south of [[Mount Desert, Maine|Mount Desert Island, Maine]]
* 1848 - [[Libby Island Light]]house, [[Machiasport, Maine]], at the entrance to Machias Bay
* 1848 - [[Matinicus Rock Lighthouse]], 6 miles south of Matinicus Island, Maine
* 1848 - [[Whitehead Island Light]]house, Whitehead Island, Maine—southern entrance to [[Penobscot Bay]]
* 1849 - [[Execution Rocks Lighthouse]], [[Long Island Sound]], New York
* 1850 - [[Monhegan Island Light]]house, [[Monhegan, Maine|Monhegan Island, Maine]]
<gallery>
Image:The Wickham House, Richmond, VA.jpg|[[Wickham House]], 1812, Richmond, Virginia
Image:Somerset Club, Boston, MA - front facade.JPG|[[Somerset Club]], 1819, Boston, Massachusetts
Image:Pilgrim Hall Museum.JPG|[[Pilgrim Hall Museum|Pilgrim Hall]], 1824, Plymouth, Massachusetts
Image:Executionrocks.jpg|[[Execution Rocks Lighthouse|Execution Rocks Light]], 1849, Long Island Sound
Image:Bulfinch Building.jpg|The Bulfinch Building: State of the Art from the Start.
</gallery>
==References==
{{reflist}}
* Richard M. Candee, "Maine Towns, Maine People -- Architecture and the Community, 1783-1820", a chapter in ''Maine in the Early Republic''; Maine Historical Society & [[Maine Humanities Council]]; University Press of New England, Hanover & London 1988
* Arthur Gerrier, "Alexander Parris' Portland Years, 1801-1809", ''Landmarks Observer'' (Greater Portland Landmarks, Inc.), VIII, November–December 1981, pp. 10–11
* Edward F. Zimmer, Pamela J. Scott, "Alexander Parris, B. Henry Latrobe and the John Wickham House in Richmond, Virginia", ''The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians'', Vol. 41, No. 3 (October, 1982), pp. 202–211
*''[http://giving.massgeneral.org/bulfinch-building-state-of-the-art-from-the-start/ The Bulfinch Building: State of the Art from the Start]'', R. Tomsho, Massachusetts General Hospital Magazine, 2011
==External links==
{{commons category|Alexander Parris}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20050825133150/http://www.parrisproject.org/Default.htm Alexander Parris Digital Project]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20080821103115/http://www.mosespaysonmansion.org/ Moses Payson House (1809-1810)]
* [http://www.iboston.org/mcp.php?pid=quincyMarket Quincy Market (1824-1826), Boston, Massachusetts]
* [http://www.vintagedesigns.com/architecture/fed/wv/ Wickham House (1812), Richmond Virginia]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20070711215509/http://www.richmondhistorycenter.com/wickham.asp Wickham House -- The Valentine Richmond History Center]
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Parris, Alexander}}
[[Category:1780 births]]
[[Category:1852 deaths]]
[[Category:American civil engineers]]
[[Category:Architects from Boston]]
[[Category:People from Halifax, Massachusetts]]
[[Category:Federalist architects]]
[[Category:19th century in Boston]]
[[Category:Architects from Portland, Maine]]
[[Category:Engineers from Maine]]
[[Category:Engineers from Massachusetts]]
[[Category:19th-century American architects]]
[[Category:19th-century American engineers]]
| |||