Fred Wesley Wentworth

Fred Wesley Wentworth (August 3, 1864 – October 5, 1943) was an American architect known for his many buildings in Downtown Paterson, New Jersey, as well as several residences and theaters in northeastern New Jersey. Wentworth had a major impact on shaping Paterson after a wind-driven fire decimated much of the central business district in 1902. His body of work consisted of institutional, commercial, residential, religious and healthcare buildings as well as some of the nation's first movie theaters designed exclusively for motion pictures. He was a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects.

Background and education
Wentworth was born August 3, 1864, in Boxborough, Massachusetts, and raised in Dover, New Hampshire. He graduated Dartmouth College in 1889 with a degree in architecture. He married Florence Agnes Marie Hurlburt on May 9, 1893. They had no children. He died on October 5, 1943, and is interred in Pine Hill Cemetery in Dover.

Downtown Paterson
Wentworth worked in Paterson between 1888 and 1943. It was a small manufacturing town when he arrived but grew rapidly and its population nearly tripled during the time he was there. He designed many of the new property types needed, the post office, the court house, movie theatres, parking garages, aeronautics factories and other commercial buildings. In 1902 a fire devastated most of the center of the city and Wentworth was responsible for much of the rebuilding work needed afterwards. He designed numerous buildings some in collaboration with his draftsman and later partner Frederick J. Vreeland. Many fall within the Downtown Commercial Historic District.


 * United States Post Office (1899)
 * Passaic County Courthouse (1902), supervising architect
 * Walton Building (1903), 121 Ellison Street
 * First National Bank Building (1910), Elliison Street
 * Elbow Building (1913), 242-244 Main Street
 * Gerstley Building (1913) 160 Main Street
 * Barnert Hospital (1914) Broadway, demolished
 * 622 Main Street (1920)
 * Kitay Building (1920s)
 * Masonic Temple (1923) 385-405 Broadway
 * Alexander Hamilton Hotel (1925), 39-55 Church Street
 * Alexander Hamilton Garage, demolished
 * YM-YWHA Building (1925), Van Houten Street
 * Fabian Building (1926), 31-51 Church Street
 * Paterson General Hospital (1926), demolished
 * YMCA Building (1929) 128 Ward Street
 * Paterson Evening News Building

Other public buildings

 * Public School #10, Paterson
 * Public School #13, Paterson
 * Passaic County Tuberculosis Sanitarium (1928), aka Preakness Hospital Preakness, abandoned 2009
 * Passaic County Welfare Home (1936), Haledon and Wayne
 * Valley View Sanitarium (1927–31), known as the Preakness Building
 * Nurses Residence, known as Passaic County Juvenile Detention Center
 * Storage Building
 * Loomis Sanitarium Library

Religious buildings

 * Broadway Baptist Church, Paterson
 * Temple Emanuel (1929), Eastside Park Historic District, Paterson

Movie theaters
Wentworth was commissioned to build the several movie theatres by Jacob Fabian including The Regent which was the first facility built exclusively for the exhibition of moving pictures and other movie palaces. Fabian is recalled in the cinema at City Center Mall, the Fabian 8.
 * Regent Theater (1914), Downtown Paterson (demolished)
 * Branford Theater (1920), Four Corners, Newark
 * Fabian Theater (1925), Downtown, Paterson
 * Ritz Theatre (1926), Midtown, Elizabeth
 * Stanley Theater (1928), Journal Square, Jersey City

Residences

 * Psi Upsilon Fraternity House (1907), Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire
 * Fred Wesley Wentworth House, Eastside Park Historic District, Paterson
 * John W. Griggs House, Eastside Park Historic District, Paterson
 * Hobart Manor (1915 expansion) for Garret Hobart, now part of William Paterson University, Wayne, New Jersey
 * Atwood-Blauvelt mansion (1896–97), Oradell, New Jersey
 * Casque and Gauntlet addition (1923), Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire
 * Lucius Varney House, Dover, New Hampshire