William G. Preston

William Gibbons Preston
FAIA
Born(1842-09-29)September 29, 1842
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
DiedApril 26, 1910(1910-04-26) (aged 67) [1]
Brookline, Massachusetts, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Alma mater
OccupationArchitect
Image of "Study for House at Brookline" which appeared in the March 21, 1885 edition of American Architect and Building News. The house was built at 137 Gardner Road in 1884 for Amasa Clarke, a prominent woolens manufacturer.[2] It is no longer standing.
"Bungalow at Monument Beach, Massachusetts" (1879) from the March 27, 1880 edition of American Architect and Building News[3]

William Gibbons Preston (September 29, 1842 – March 26, 1910) was an American architect who practiced during the last third of the nineteenth century and in the first decade of the twentieth. Educated at Harvard University and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris,[4] he was active in Boston, New York, Rhode Island, Ohio, New Brunswick and Savannah, Georgia, where he was brought by George Johnson Baldwin to design the Chatham County courthouse. Preston stayed in Savannah for several years during which time designed the original Desoto Hotel (1890, demolished 1965[5]), the Savannah Volunteer Guards Armory and 20 other distinguished public buildings and private homes.[6] He began his professional career working for his father, the builder and architect Jonathan Preston (1801–1888), upon his return to the United States from the École in 1861, and was the sole practitioner in the office from the time his father retired c. 1875[7] until he took John Kahlmeyer as a partner in about 1885.[8]

The drawings of the Preston firm, now owned by the Boston Public Library, make up "...one of the most complete sets of architectural graphics preserved from the nineteenth century."[9] Many of his buildings were pictured as prints in American Architect and Building News. He is credited with the introduction of the bungalow to the United States through a house loosely of the type that he designed in Monument Beach, Massachusetts in 1879.[10] Preston was an early historic preservationist. He was influential in the successful 1896 effort to prevent the Massachusetts state legislature from demolishing Boston's historic State House,[11] which had been designed by the noted architect Charles Bulfinch and built in 1798. Bulfinch was also an architect of the Capitol building in Washington, D.C.[12]

Preston ran his practice for many years from a commercial and office building located at 186 Devonshire Street.[13] He designed Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Rogers Building in 1864, located on Boylston Street near Boston's Copley Square, which housed the school's architecture department. Floor plans for the building show a large, centrally located space devoted to an architectural library and museum. Drawings from the Study Collection were hung on the studio walls and numerous casts and other artifacts also lined the walls and picture rails.[14]

Preston married Estelle M. Evans (1847–1920),[15] whose father was the wealthy real estate developer Brice S. Evans,[16] on December 6, 1866, and the couple had one son, Evans (1867–1900). William was an active member and fellow of the American Institute of Architects[17] and served that organization in the office of first vice-president at the end of the 1890s.[18] He was for many years a member of the Boston Society of Architects, and for thirty years served as its treasurer.[19] He died at his home at 1063 Beacon Street[20] in Brookline in 1910.[21]

  1. ^ "Obituaries - William Gibbons Preston". American Institute of Architects Quarterly Bulletin. XI (1): 35. April 1910.
  2. ^ Hardwicke, Greer and Roger Reed (1998). Brookline. Charleston: Arcadia Publishing. pp. 73. ISBN 978-0-7385-4974-3.
  3. ^ "The Illustrations – Bungalow at Monument Beach, Mass., Mr. W.G. Preston, Architect, Boston". American Architect and Building News. VII (222): 129. March 27, 1880.
  4. ^ "Mechanic's Hall Designer Dies". Boston Journal: 9. April 8, 1910.
  5. ^ Triplett, Whip Morrison (2006). Postcard History Series – Savannah. Charleston: Arcadia Publishing. pp. 10–14. ISBN 0-7385-4209-1.
  6. ^ Caldwell, Wilber W. (2001). The Courthouse and the Depot: The Architecture of Hope in an Age of Despair – A Narrative Guide to Railroad Expansion and its Impact on Public Architecture in Georgia – 1833–1910. Macon: Mercer University Press. p. 64. ISBN 0-86554-748-3.
  7. ^ O'Gorman, James F. (1989). On the Boards: Drawings by Nineteenth-Century Boston Architects. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. pp. 376–377. ISBN 0812212878.
  8. ^ "Obituary – William Gibbons Preston". The Western Architect. XVI (1): 76. July 1910.
  9. ^ O'Gorman, James F. (1989). On the Boards: Drawings by Nineteenth-Century Boston Architects. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. p. 39. ISBN 0812212878.
  10. ^ Barbara Mayer – The Associated Press (June 20, 1997). "The Bungalow Makes a Comeback". The Salina Journal: A5.
  11. ^ "THREE-CENT FARE – Representative Mellen Says West End Can Afford Them. – COMPANY SAYS IT IS NOT SO – Last Free Transfer Hearing Will Be Given Thursday. – MORE BOSTON LEGISLATION". Boston Post: 8. April 7, 1896.
  12. ^ Risjord, Norman K. (2001). Representative Americans: The Revolutionary Generation. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. pp. 161, 167–69. ISBN 1461641985.
  13. ^ The Boston Directory – Containing the City Record, A Directory of the Citizens, and Business Directory – No. LXXVII – Commencing July 1, 1882. Boston: Sampson, Davenport and Company. 1882. p. 1131.
  14. ^ Architecture at MIT, accessed August 12, 2010, includes photos
  15. ^ "Deaths". The Boston Globe. XCVII (117): 13. April 26, 1920.
  16. ^ Herndon, Richard and Edwin M. Bacon (1896). Men of Progress: One Thousand Biographical Sketches and Portraits of Leaders in Business and Professional Life in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Boston: New England Magazine. pp. 960–61.
  17. ^ "A Group of American Architects". American Architect and Building News. XV (425): 75. February 16, 1884.
  18. ^ "MEN WHO MAKE PLANS – AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF ARCHITECTS HERE – PROTRACTED PRELIMINARY SESSIONS YESTERDAY AND TO-DAY – Contentions to be Adjudicated before Convention Can Meet". Detroit Free Press. 63 (4): 7. September 28, 1897.
  19. ^ "Chapter Notes - Boston Chapter". American Institute of Architects Quarterly Bulletin. XI (1): 10. April 1910.
  20. ^ Rich Adams (June 1915). "MCMA History". Charitably Speaking: 2–3.
  21. ^ American Art Annual, Volume 8. MacMillan Company. 1911. p. 400.