Charles Bulfinch | |
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| Architect of the Capitol | |
| In office January 6, 1818 –June 25, 1829 | |
| Profession | Civil Engineer |
Charles Bulfinch (August 8, 1763 – April 15, 1844) was an early American architect, and has been regarded by many as the first American-born professional architect to practice. [1]
Bulfinch split his career between his native Boston, Massachusetts, and Washington, D.C., where he served as Commissioner of Public Building and built the intermediate United States Capitol rotunda and dome. His works are notable for their simplicity, balance, and good taste, and as the origin of a distinctive Federal style of classical domes, columns, and ornament that dominated early 19th-century American architecture.
Bulfinch was born in Boston to Thomas Bulfinch, a prominent physician, and his wife, Susan Apthorp, daughter of Charles Apthorp. At the age of 12, he watched the Battle of Bunker Hill from this home on the Boston side of the Charles River. [2] Charles himself was married to Hannah Apthorp on 20 November 1788 in Boston. [3]
He was educated at Boston Latin School and Harvard University, from which he graduated with an AB in 1781 and master's degree in 1784.
He then made a grand tour of Europe from 1785 to 1788, traveling to London, Paris, and the major cities of Italy. Bulfinch was greatly influenced by Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio. [2] He was also influenced by the classical architecture in Italy and the neoclassical buildings of Sir Christopher Wren, Robert Adam, William Chambers, and others in the United Kingdom. Thomas Jefferson became something of a mentor to him in Europe, as he would later be to Robert Mills. [4]
Upon his return to the United States in 1787, he became a promoter of the ship Columbia Rediviva's voyage around the world under command of Captain Robert Gray (1755–1806). It was the first American ship to circumnavigate the globe. In 1788, he married Hannah Apthorp, his first cousin. Their sons include Thomas Bulfinch (1796–1867), author of Bulfinch's Mythology, and Stephen Greenleaf Bulfinch (1809–1870), Unitarian clergyman and author.
Bulfinch's first building was the Hollis Street Church (1788). Among his other early works are a memorial column on Beacon Hill (1789), the first monument to the American Revolution; the Federal Street theater (1793); the "Tontine Crescent" (built 1793–1794, now demolished), fashioned in part after John Wood's Royal Crescent; the Old State House in Hartford, Connecticut (1796); and the Massachusetts State House (1798). He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1791. [5]
Over the course of ten years, Bulfinch built a remarkable number of private dwellings in the Boston area, including Joseph Barrell's Pleasant Hill (1793), a series of three houses in Boston for Harrison Gray Otis (1796, 1800, 1806), and the John Phillips House (1804). He built several churches in Boston, of which New North (built 1802–1804) is the last standing.
Serving from 1791 to 1795 on Boston's board of selectmen, he resigned due to business pressures but returned in 1799. From 1799 to 1817, he was the chairman of Boston's board of selectmen continuously, and served as a paid police superintendent, improving the city's streets, drains, and lighting. Under his direction, both the infrastructure and civic center of Boston were transformed into a dignified, classical style. Bulfinch was responsible for the design of the Boston Common, the remodeling and enlargement of Faneuil Hall (1805), and the construction of India Wharf. In these Boston years, he also designed the Massachusetts State Prison (1803); Boylston Market (1810); University Hall for Harvard University (1813–1814); First Church of Christ, Unitarian in Lancaster, Massachusetts (1815–1817); and the Bulfinch Building, home of the Ether Dome at Massachusetts General Hospital (1818), its completion overseen by Alexander Parris, who was working in Bulfinch's office at the time the architect was summoned to Washington.
Despite this great activity and civic involvement, Bulfinch was insolvent several times starting in 1796, including at the start of his work on the statehouse, and was jailed for the month of July 1811 for debt (in a prison he had designed himself). There was no payment for his services as selectman, and he received only $1,400 for designing and overseeing the construction of the State House.
In the summer of 1817, Bulfinch's roles as selectman, designer, and public official coincided during a visit by President James Monroe. The two men were almost constantly in each other's company for the week-long visit, and a few months later (1818), Monroe appointed Bulfinch the successor to Benjamin Henry Latrobe (1764–1820) as Architect of the Capitol in Washington, DC (the Capitol Building had been partially burned by the British in 1814.) In this position, he was paid a salary of $2,500 per year plus expenses.
He was also a founding member of The Massachusetts Society for Promoting Agriculture (M.S.P.A.), one of the earliest agricultural societies in the United States. The Society was incorporated by an act of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts on March 7, 1792.
As Commissioner of Public Building, Bulfinch completed the Capitol's wings and central portion, designed the western approach and portico, and constructed the Capitol's original low wooden dome to his own design (replaced by the present cast-iron dome completed in the mid-1860s). In 1829 Bulfinch completed the construction of the Capitol, 36 years after its cornerstone was laid. During his interval in Washington, Bulfinch also drew plans for the State House in Augusta, Maine (1829–1832), a Unitarian Church and prison in Washington, D.C.. In 1827, he was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Honorary member. He returned to Boston in 1830, where he died on April 15, 1844, aged 80, and was buried in King's Chapel Burial Ground in Boston. His tomb was later moved to Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1943, a United States Liberty ship named the SS Charles Bulfinch was launched. The ship was scrapped in 1971.
Designs marked with an asterisk (*) have been attributed to Bulfinch, though are not confirmed to have been designed by the architect
Beacon Hill is a historic neighborhood in Boston, Massachusetts, and the hill upon which the Massachusetts State House resides. The term "Beacon Hill" is used locally as a metonym to refer to the state government or the legislature itself, much like Washington, D.C.'s Capitol Hill does at the federal level.
Harrison Gray Otis, was a businessman, lawyer, and politician, becoming one of the most important leaders of the United States' first political party, the Federalists. He was a member of the Otis family.
Alexander Parris was a prominent 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.
Asher Benjamin was an American architect and author whose work transitioned between Federal architecture and the later Greek Revival architecture. His seven handbooks on design deeply influenced the look of cities and towns throughout New England until the Civil War. Builders also copied his plans in the Midwest and in the South.
The Old West Church is a historic United Methodist Church at 131 Cambridge Street in the West End of Boston, Massachusetts. It was built in 1806 to designs by architect Asher Benjamin, and is considered one of his finest works. It is a monumentally-scaled example of ecclesiastical Federal architecture, whose design was widely copied throughout New England.
There are three houses named the Harrison Gray Otis House in Boston, Massachusetts. All were built by noted American architect Charles Bulfinch for the same man, Federalist lawyer and politician Harrison Gray Otis.
St. Stephen's Church is a historic church in the North End of Boston, Massachusetts. It was built in 1802–1804 as the New North Church or New North Meeting House and was designed by the noted architect Charles Bulfinch. It is the only one of the five churches he designed in Boston to remain extant. The church replaced one which had been built on the site in 1714 and enlarged in 1730. The Congregationalist church became Unitarian in 1813, and the church was sold to the Roman Catholic Diocese in 1862, and renamed St. Stephen's. It was restored and renovated in 1964-65 by Chester F. Wright, and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.
Mount Vernon Proprietors was a real estate development syndicate operating in Boston, Massachusetts. Founded at the end of the 18th century, it developed land on the south slope of Beacon Hill into a desirable residential neighborhood.
The Church of the Holy Cross (1803-ca.1862) was located on Franklin Street in Boston, Massachusetts. In 1808 the church became the Cathedral of the Holy Cross. It was designed by Charles Bulfinch and was the first church built for the city's Roman Catholics.
Franklin Place, designed by Charles Bulfinch and built in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1793–95, included a row of sixteen three-story brick townhouses that extended in a 480-foot curve, a small garden, and four double houses. Constructed early in Bulfinch's career, Franklin Place came after he had seen the possibilities of modern architecture in Europe and had determined to reshape his native city. It was the first important urban housing scheme undertaken in the United States, and the city's first row-house complex. However, years of decline and the push of industry into the area forced its demolition in 1858.
The First Harrison Gray Otis House is a historic house museum and National Historic Landmark at 141 Cambridge Street in the West End of Boston, Massachusetts. The house, built in 1795–96, was the first of three houses designed by Charles Bulfinch and built for Massachusetts politician Harrison Gray Otis. It is notable as one of the earliest three-story brick houses that came to represent the Federal style of architecture, and its interiors show the influence of Robert Adam. The house is now the headquarters of Historic New England, a regional preservation organization, and is open year-round for tours.
The Quincy family was a prominent political family in Massachusetts from the mid-17th century through to the early 20th century. It is connected to the Adams political family through Abigail Adams.
Hepzibah Swan née Clarke was an American socialite of Boston, Massachusetts. She was a wealthy and well connected heiress who was among the most cosmopolitan, intelligent, and erudite of ladies in Federal Boston. Madame Swan was said to be charismatic, not least because of her wealth but also in good measure because of her effusive personal charm. Lifelong friends included revolutionary war heroes Henry Knox, Henry Jackson, Charles Bulfinch, Sarah Wentworth Apthorp Morton, and Harrison Otis.
Perez Morton was a lawyer and revolutionary patriot in Boston, Massachusetts.
Caleb Davis was an American merchant, revolutionary patriot, and public servant in Boston, Massachusetts. He held several positions of public trust, including state legislator (1776–1788), Speaker of the Massachusetts General Court (1780–1782) and Elector for Massachusetts' Suffolk County in the first U.S. presidential election in 1789.
The Federal Street Church was a congregational Unitarian church in Boston, Massachusetts. Organized in 1727, the originally Presbyterian congregation changed in 1786 to "Congregationalism", then adopted the liberal theology of its fifth Senior Minister, William Ellery Channing, (1780–1842). For most of the 18th century the church was known as the Long Lane Meeting-House. In 1788, state leaders met in the relatively spacious building to determine Massachusetts' ratification of the United States Constitution. Thereafter the church renamed itself the Federal Street Church in honor of the event. In 1803, it called William Ellery Channing, (1780–1842), as its minister who defined "Unitarian Christianity" and launched the Unitarian movement, making the Federal Street Church one of the first to define itself as Unitarian.
The Amory–Ticknor House is a historic house at 9–10 Park Street and 22–22A Beacon Street in Boston, Massachusetts. It was built in 1804 by businessman Thomas Coffin Amory, and later owned by scholar George Ticknor. It sits atop Beacon Hill, across from the Massachusetts State House on Beacon Street and the Boston Common on Park Street. Numerous tenants have occupied various parts of the house through the years, including Samuel Dexter, Christopher Gore, John Jeffries, Harrison Gray Otis, Anna Ticknor's Society to Encourage Studies at Home, and temporarily in 1824, the Marquis de Lafayette.
Stephen Greenleaf Bulfinch was an American Unitarian clergyman, author and hymn writer.
John Trecothick Apthorp was a banker, Lieutenant Colonel of the First Corps of Cadets (Massachusetts) and grandson of Charles Apthorp.
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