User:JPRiley/Pratt

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William Fenno Pratt (1814-1900) was an American architect from Northampton, Massachusetts.

Life and career[edit]

William Fenno Pratt was born January 15, 1814 in Northampton, Massachusetts to Thomas Pratt Eunice (Parsons) Pratt. His father was a carpenter who came to Northampton in 1807. He attended the public schools until becoming a teeneger. He began to work with his father on a number of major projects, including houses for Henry Bowers (1826, demolished), designed by Ithiel Town and Samuel Whitmarsh (1838-39, altered). Other buildings by the Pratts include the First Congregational Church of Easthampton (1835, burned 1929) and the Hadley Town Hall (1841). During the winter of 1840-41 the younger Pratt and his brothers traveled to Jamaica to build a mill for Whitmarsh. In 1849, upon winning the commission to design the new Town Hall, now City Hall, of Northampton, he left his father to work on his own account. He was active as an architect for most of his life, although there were setbacks. For example, in 1878 a local recession is thought to have caused his bankruptcy. In 1882 he was joined in partnership by his son, William F. Pratt Jr., and the two practiced as W. F. Pratt & Son. In 1893 the Pratts retired from active practice, though the younger Pratt continued to practice architecture from his home. The official successor of the partnership was H. R. Hayden, of whom nothing is known.

Pratt was not an architectural innovator and followed trends. His earliest works with his father were Greek Revival in style, and his works before the Civil War were in the typical mid-Victorian Gothic Revival and Italianate styles, following the precedent set by Andrew Jackson Downing. After the war, continued to work with more elaborate interpretations of the Gothic and Italianate styles, while also adopting the Second Empire, Queen Anne, and other typical styles of the late nineteenth century.

Henry R. Hayden graduated from the Storrs Agricultural School of Connecticut in 1886. Probably Henry Rogers Hayden Jr., 1867-1959

Architectural works[edit]

Gallery of architectural works[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ Now Hopkins House of Smith College.
  2. ^ Originally built at Skinnerville near Haydenville in Williamsburg, but was taken apart and relocated to Holyoke after Mill River Flood of 1874.
  3. ^ Now Park House of Smith College.

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c Paul F. Norton, Amherst: A Guide to Its Architecture (Amherst: Amherst Historical Society, 1975)
  2. ^ Historic Building Detail: WLM.11
  3. ^ a b Margaret Birney Vickery, Smith College: An Architectural Tour (New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2007)
  4. ^ Sarah S. Kilborne, An American Phoenix: The Remarkable Story of William Skinner, a Man Who Turned Disaster into Destiny (New York: Free Press, 2012)
  5. ^ Charles Albert Wight, Some Old Time Meeting Houses of the Connecticut Valley (Chicopee Falls: Charles Albert Wight, 1911)
  6. ^ Historic Building Detail: NTH.2186
  7. ^ Historic Building Detail: EAH.605
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