Pershing County Courthouse | |
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| Location | 400 Main St., Lovelock, Nevada |
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| Coordinates | 40°8′35″N118°30′9″W / 40.14306°N 118.50250°W Coordinates: 40°8′35″N118°30′9″W / 40.14306°N 118.50250°W |
| Built | 1920 |
| Architect | DeLongchamps, Frederic J.; Williams, Howard S. |
| Architectural style | Classical Revival |
| NRHP reference # | 86001077 |
| Added to NRHP | May 13, 1986 [1] |
The Pershing County Courthouse in Lovelock, Nevada is a Classical Revival building built in 1920-21. The courthouse's plan is hexagonal with a circular dome over the central circular courtroom. The building was designed by Frederic Joseph DeLongchamps, who had previously designed six other Nevada courthouses. [2] DeLongchamps was involved in the design of a new courthouse for Humboldt County, where the old courthouse had burned. As a result of resentment over assessments for the replacement in Winnemucca, the new Pershing County was created from part of Humboldt County and its seat established in Lovelock. DeLongchamps, as Supervising Architect for the State of Nevada, undertook the new Lovelock courthouse. [3]
Lovelock is the county seat of Pershing County, Nevada, United States, in which it is the only incorporated city. It is the namesake of a nearby medium-security men's prison and a Cold War-era gunnery range. Formerly a stop for settlers on their way to California and later a train depot, the town's economy remains based on farming, mining and increasingly on tourism.
Frederic Joseph DeLongchamps was an American architect. He was one of Nevada's most prolific architects, yet is notable for entering the architectural profession with no extensive formal training. He has also been known as Frederick J. DeLongchamps, and was described by the latter name in an extensive review of the historic importance of his works which led to many of them being listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in the 1980s.
Nevada is a state in the Western United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast and Utah to the east. Nevada is the 7th most extensive, the 32nd most populous, but the 9th least densely populated of the U.S. states. Nearly three-quarters of Nevada's people live in Clark County, which contains the Las Vegas–Paradise metropolitan area where three of the state's four largest incorporated cities are located. Nevada's capital, however, is Carson City.
The courthouse features a shallow Ionic portico on a raised basement backed by a plain rectangular mass. Behind this is the hexagonal main body of the courthouse, built with curving walls. A shallow dome, reminiscent of Thomas Jefferson's University of Virginia Library, crowns the central courtroom. [2] The primary building materials are brick with stone trim and terra cotta detailing. [3] Construction cost amounted to $99,138.68. [4]
The Ionic order forms one of the three classical orders of classical architecture, the other two canonic orders being the Doric and the Corinthian. There are two lesser orders: the Tuscan, and the rich variant of Corinthian called the composite order, both added by 16th-century Italian architectural writers, based on Roman practice. Of the three canonic orders, the Ionic order has the narrowest columns.
Thomas Jefferson was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. Previously, he had served as the second vice president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. The principal author of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson was a proponent of democracy, republicanism, and individual rights, motivating American colonists to break from the Kingdom of Great Britain and form a new nation; he produced formative documents and decisions at both the state and national level.
