Massachusetts : a guide to its places and people, Part 18

Author:
Publication date: 1937
Publisher: Boston : Houghton Mifflin Company
Number of Pages: 802

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Main Street and Village Green

years languished in an unprecedented state of decadence. To the per- versions of the then prevalent Victorian Gothic the genius of Henry Hobson Richardson vigorously superimposed, and with his Trinity Church began the emancipation of American architecture.

The shape of the lot, triangular in form, bounded by three streets, made impossible the usual long nave and dominant entrance front, and invited the defiance of tradition. Richardson found in the Romanesque of south- ern France a medium well suited to the problem. He turned also to the IIth-century work of the cities of Auvergne in central France where the central tower was developed to such proportion as to become the main portion of the structure. The resultant plan was compact and cruciform with all its limbs nearly equal - apse, nave, transepts, and chapel form- ing the base of the tower obelisk. The massive tower is the dominant feature of the design and the composition as a whole is a romantic and picturesque mass studied for its effectiveness from all angles. For the tower design, Richardson was inspired by the cathedral of Salamanca, in Spain.

The architect early decided that Trinity should be a 'color church.' The walls are of yellowish Dedham granite laid up in rock-faced ashler with trim of reddish-brown Longmeadow freestone. Cut stone, in alter- nating patterns of light and dark, decorates some of the walls. Through- out, the building is animated by rich and powerful carvings, the best of which are seen in the West Porch, a posthumous work completed in 1897, from Richardson's designs, by Evans and Tombs of Boston.

Richardson entrusted the decoration of the interior to John La Farge under whose direction the great barrel vaults came to glow with some of the fire of San Marco. The dominant color of the interior walls is red, the great piers a dark bronze green with gilded capitals and bases. The best of the windows were by Sir Edward Burne-Jones, executed by Wil- liam Morris, John La Farge, and by Clayton and Bill of London. Trinity stands as the masterpiece of the 'Richardsonian Romanesque' which gave rise to a new though short-lived school, which nevertheless formed the first milestone in the radical school of architecture of today.

Adjoining the church outside, on the Huntington Avenue side, is the Saint-Gaudens statue of Phillips Brooks and Christ, still adversely criticized in Boston. By optical illusion the placing of the pastor in front of a slender figure of Christ, and on a lower level, suggests a short, stocky man, whereas Phillips Brooks was six feet four inches tall, a fact which undoubtedly added to his singularly magnetic personality. The union of symbolism and realism is also regarded as unhappy by many critics. Ninety-five thousand dollars had poured in in voluntary public contribu- tions for this statue, and the disappointment of the donors was keen.

2. The Boston Public Library (open weekdays 9-10; Sun. 2-9; June 15- Sept. 15, 9-9; closed holidays) faces east on Copley Square. The strong tide of classicism that emanated from the Chicago Exposition of 1893 found its first important expression in this Albertian building finished in

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1895 from plans by McKim, Mead and White. For inspiration, Charles Follen McKim turned to the bold lines of Labrouste's Italian Renais- sance masterpiece, the Bibliothèque Sainte Geneviève in Paris. Not content, he fused with this influence, the more robust character of Al- berti's San Francesco at Rimini. The interior court, one of the finest features, is an almost servile adaptation of the Palazzo della Cancelleria in Rome.

Situated at the west end of Copley Square the 'great palace of books' stands upon a granite platform elevated by six broad steps above the level of the Square. The façade consists of thirteen deep raked arches, separated by massive piers. The entrance or central motif is composed of three lofty and deeply revealed arches, above which are exquisitely sculptured panels by Saint-Gaudens illustrating the seals of the Library, the City, and the Commonwealth.

The structure's salient function being to house one of the largest collec- tions of books in the world, its plan shows a directness and general sim- plicity of arrangement. The walls of the vestibule are of unpolished Ten- nessee marble. The three doorways leading into the Entrance Hall are copies from the Erechtheum at Athens. The double bronze doors, which contain graceful, allegorical figures in low relief, were designed by Daniel Chester French. The Entrance Hall itself, with its low mosaic-covered vaults and arches supported by walls and massive square columns of Iowa sandstone, is Roman in design. The walls of the Stair Hall are of rich-veined yellow Siena marble and the steps of French Échaillon marble lead to the Main Corridor. The upper walls of the stair hall are divided into eight arched panels and within these spaces and on one wall of the Main Corridor are symbolic murals by Puvis de Chavannes. Bates Hall, the main reading-room, has a rich barrel vault with half domes at the ends, and stretches the full breadth of the façade, 218 feet. Abbey's large frieze, 'The Quest of the Holy Grail,' occupies the upper portion of the walls of the Delivery Room. On the upper or special libraries floor is a corridor known as Sargent Hall and on its walls are Sargent's murals depicting 'The Triumph of Religion.'

Besides its vast collection of volumes for circulation or reference, the Boston Public Library houses special collections of particular significance. Outstanding among these is the Sabbatier collection, an unusual assort- ment of books dealing with Saint Francis of Assisi. Likewise important is its remarkable newspaper collection, covering every city of importance in the world. Of note also are the libraries of John Adams, Nathaniel Bowditch, George Ticknor, and the Reverend Thomas Prince (which includes the first book printed in the English Colonies of America - the 'Bay Psalm Book'); a comprehensive assortment of manuscript letters relating to the anti-slavery movement in the United States; Webster's 'Reply to Hayne,' in manuscript; Bentley's collection of accounting books before 1900; the Lewissohn collection of Washingtoniana; and a collection of Benjamin Franklin's books and engravings. The unique Trent Defoe collection and the collection of incunabula are especially noteworthy.

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3. The Old South Church (Third), 645 Boylston St., corner of Dartmouth St., built in 1875 from the plans of Cummings and Sears, is probably the least distressing example of the Ruskinian or Victorian Gothic trend that corrupted taste in the late nineteenth century. The campanile, which soars to a height of 248 feet, was for many years the 'leaning tower of Copley Square.' Built on filled ground and entirely of massive masonry work, the tower sank out of plumb. When, in 1932, it was in danger of toppling, it was removed, each stone catalogued and stored away. In 1937, steel skeleton anchored to deep-sunk piles chased the superficial form and the original masonry followed its course. So now, the 'leaning tower' - its spine once more erect - serves as an effective companion piece to the Library Building.

4. Boston University, 688 Boylston St., founded in 1869 by Lee Claflin, Isaac Rich, and Jacob Sleeper, with its first department the Boston Theological Seminary, has grown to be one of the largest universities in the United States. Despite its name, it is not a city college, but is sup- ported, like any other private institution, by endowments and tuition fees. Its present student body numbers about fifteen thousand, re- presenting every State and thirty-two foreign countries. The three found- ers were religious men, but the noteworthy thing is that, although all were Methodists, they showed themselves broader, more tolerant, and more liberal than the founders of almost any other privately endowed institution in the State; for from the very beginning they prescribed that the University should never discriminate on denominational or sectarian lines. To these liberal tendencies which still endure may be attributed the rapid growth of the University.

Boston University is co-educational, with the exception of the College of Practical Arts and Letters and the Sargent College of Physical Education, which last was transferred to Boston University in 1929. Both are ex- clusively for women.

The proposed site for a new building to house the entire University except the Law and Medical Schools is on the banks of the Charles River where Alexander Graham Bell, a professor at Boston University, will be signally honored by a memorial tower 375 feet high.

In 1937 the University had no definite campus. The different schools were housed in various parts of the city as follows:

College of Liberal Arts, 688 Boylston Street.

College of Business Administration, 525 Boylston Street.

College of Practical Arts and Letters, 27 Garrison Street.

College of Music, 178 Newbury Street.

Sargent College of Physical Education, 6 Everett Street, Cambridge, Mass. School of Theology, 72 Mt. Vernon Street.

School of Law, 1I Ashburton Place.

School of Medicine, 80 East Concord Street.

School of Education, 84 Exeter Street.

School of Religious and Social Work, 28 Mt. Vernon Street.

Graduate School, 688 Boylston Street.

Retrace Boylston St .; L. from Boylston St. on Dartmouth St.

A FLASHBACK IN EARLY PRINTS

FOR a flashback on the Massachusetts scene prior to photog- raphy we are indebted to early artists, engravers, and lithographers. The prints that follow afford a fair prospect of old Boston that has all but disappeared, and make pictorial historical events that we still celebrate. The Remick drawing recalls the provision of 1643 by which Governor Winthrop set the Common aside for a ' trayning field and pasture for cattell.' The house beyond the fence on the top of the hill is the Hancock Mansion; the wooden tower back of it is the old beacon which for a century and a half surmounted the hill. In the picture of forty years later, the Bulfinch State House stands on the land where Hancock's cows grazed, while the old beacon has been replaced by a monument.

As shown in the Bird's-Eye View of the city, a water-line still existed in 1850 along Charles Street below the Common. Here in 1775, before the extension of Beacon Street blocked the way, the British soldiers boarded their boats and rowed across to Cambridge on the eve of their battle in Concord. 1

Less than a century after the settlement of the Bay Colony, an Englishman, describing the activity in Boston Harbor, said the masts of the ships here ' made a kind of wood of trees.' The city grew with its commerce, gradually encroaching on the harbor as well as on the back bay. Water Street in Post Office Square was the original shore-line. One of the prints shows a dock just below Quincy Market and Faneuil Hall; the market was built on made land in 1825.

The set of four prints of the Old State House reveals the changes this building underwent and the variety of its architectural expressions. Today the lion and the unicorn up- hold their corners of the roof as they did in the Paul Revere picture of 1770.

Engraving from one of America's earliest historical paintings, by Earle in 177

NORTH BRIDGE, CONCORD

BOSTON COMMON IN 1768, SHOWING THE HANCOCK HOUSE AND THE OLD BEACO From a Renick water color

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BUTCHER'S HALL

Engraved Printed & Sold by PAUL REVERE BOSTON

THE OLD STATE HOUSE AND THE 'BLOODY MASSACRE,' 1770

THE OLD STATE HOUSE IN ISO1, THE LION AND UNICORN REMOVED

OLD STATE HOUSE FIRE, 1832. Note new balconies and chimneys

OLD STATE HOUSE IN 1876 WITH MANSARD ROOF AND ADVERTISEMENTS

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SOUTHEAST VIEW OF BOSTON IN 1743, FROM THE HARBOR

THE CITY IN 1848, VIEWED FROM EAST BOSTON

Lithograph after the Price engraving

IE OLD BEACON ON BEACON HILL IS THE NINTH SPIRE FROM THE LEFT

THE NEW STATE HOUSE IS JUST RIGHT OF THE CENTER OF THE PICTURE Lithograph by Whitefield

BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF BOSTON AROUND 185

BEFORE THE BACK BAY WAS FILLED IN

Lithograph by Sarony and Major

Lithograph by Pendleton

FANEUIL HALI. AND THE OLD SHORE LINE

NEW STATE HOUSE AND THE BULFINCH BEACON, ABOUT 1810 Lithograph by Pendleton

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5. The Boston Art Club Gallery (open to the public during exhibitions), corner of Dartmouth and Newbury Sts., features exhibitions of con- temporary painting and sculpture of New England artists.

L. from Dartmouth St. on Commonwealth Ave. (central gravel mall).

Commonwealth Ave., Marlborough St., and Beacon St., parallel thorough- fares, are 'The Three Streets' of Boston - impeccable residential ad- dresses in their lower numbers.

6. The Statue of William Lloyd Garrison in the center of the walk, memo- rialized (1886) the celebrated Abolitionist. The declaration inscribed beneath his statue is dynamic: I am in earnest. I will not equivocate. I will not excuse. I will not retreat a single inch, and I will be heard. Yet the. seated figure by Olin L. Warner shows him as a kindly deacon. It was James Russell Lowell who said:

There's Garrison, his features very Benign for an incendiary.

Retrace on Commonwealth Ave.

7. The First Baptist Church (formerly New Brattle Square Church), corner of Clarendon St., designed by H. H. Richardson and built in 1870- 72, marks the beginning of the architect's professional maturity. The exigencies of the corner site resulted in an asymmetrical composition, with the entrance located on a side street and the tower placed on the corner. The first Richardsonian work definitely Romanesque rather than Victorian Gothic, its style is still far from true Romanesque and not typi- cally 'Richardsonian Romanesque.' Once vacated because of its failure acoustically, the church is notable mainly for its tower, with the heavy frieze by Bartholdi, a fellow student of Richardson at the École des Beaux Arts. This frieze of trumpeting angels is responsible for the irreverent but affectionate name: 'The Church of the Holy Beanblowers.' Bostonians like their Beanblower tower so well that a group of them have purchased it privately, so that it can never be torn down without their consent.

L. from Commonwealth Ave. on Berkeley St.

8. The First Church in Boston (Unitarian) (open daily 9-5, through Marl- borough St. entrance, or on Sunday by main entrance on Berkeley St.), corner of Marlborough St., originally Congregational, was formed by Governor Winthrop in 1630 as the first parish. A bronze Statue of Winthrop, by R. S. Greenough, stands on the lawn at the side.

Retrace Berkeley St .; L. from Berkeley St. on the Commonwealth Ave. mall. 9. The Statue of Alexander Hamilton, is a nine-foot, full-length granite carving by William Rimmer, a self-taught Boston sculptor and teacher of Daniel Chester French. Rimmer had a theory, ahead of his time, of working impressionistically without models. Though contemporary criticism was violently adverse, the statue was admired by Hamilton's own family for its graceful and somewhat aloof pose, characteristic of its subject. Its ultra-modern qualities receive present-day recognition.

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Straight ahead into the Public Garden; L. from entrance on first path within the Garden.

IO. The Public Garden, with its academically labeled trees of rare vari- eties, its formal flower beds and its celebrated swan boats, has been a treasured feature of Boston ever since it was laid out in the middle of the nineteenth century on the 'made land' along the Charles. All the newer fashionable residential district west of this point was once a broad marshy tidal basin: this region is still called 'the Back Bay.'

II. The Ether Monument (1867), is not an artistic masterpiece, but none commemorates a greater humanitarian achievement than 'the discovery that the inhaling of ether causes insensibility to pain, first proved to the world at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, October, 1846.' 12. The George R. White Memorial Fountain, by Daniel Chester French, is a tribute to a citizen who bequeathed a large fund to the city for use in health education.

L. from the Public Garden path on Beacon St .; R. from Beacon St. on Em- bankment Rd.

13. The Esplanade is a grassy promenade along the Charles River where in an open shell summer evening concerts are given by members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

R. on Chestnut St.

Beacon Hill is a conservative residential section where new buildings are considered extremely regrettable, though occasionally necessary. The correct building material is plain red brick.

This level end of Chestnut St. was once popularly known as Horse- Chestnut St. because the stables of the wealthy householders of the Hill were here. Some of these stables may still be seen, converted into studios. Crossing Chestnut St. is Charles St., once the home of Boston's literati, but now widened and lined with small markets and antique shops. L. from Chestnut St. on Charles St.

14. Charles Street Church, at the corner of Charles and Mt. Vernon Sts., was built in 1807. The red-brick Federal structure with well-designed façade and low cupola was designed by Asher Benjamin, who, as author of 'The Country Builder's Assistant' and other preceptorial works on architecture, propagated the mode set by Bulfinch and McIntire.

Retrace on Charles St .; L. from Charles St. on Chestnut St.

15. Francis Parkman's House (private), 50 Chestnut St., with its arched recessed doorway, slate hip roof, and high flues, was built in 1824 and was for many years the home of the noted historian.

16. The Home of Edwin Booth (private), 29A Chestnut St., has a few of the original purple window-panes once favored in this district, which sun and time have transformed to a lilac hue, the despair of imitators. To have a house with original purple panes is practically to have a patent of Bostonian aristocracy. This house has the small, wrought-iron second-

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Boston

story balconies introduced by Bulfinch and Benjamin. It is the only house on the street with a main entrance at the side, facing a small lawn. The arched Georgian doorway with Corinthian portico is beautiful, and the entire house has a princely, brooding air suggestive of 'Hamlet,' Booth's most famous rôle.

17. The Home of Julia Ward Howe and later of John Singer Sargent (private), 13 Chestnut St., is attributed to Bulfinch. It is a four-story brick structure, with a delicate-columned Georgian doorway, ivory-color, and second-story long windows with wrought-iron balconies. Such win- dows indicate a second-story drawing room, a hallmark of fashion in Boston. For many years this house was the meeting-place of the Radical Club that succeeded the noted Transcendental Club.

L. from Chestnut St. on Walnut St.

18. The Ellery Sedgwick House (private), 14 Walnut St., the home of the recently retired editor of the Atlantic Monthly, built in 1805, is the most individualistic house on the Hill. It has three stories and gray-painted brick ends, with black blinds, the south side wall being of wood painted gray. On that side is a large tree-shaded garden, which, owing to the slope of the Hill, is elevated high above the street and buttressed by a base-wall of hand-hewn granite blocks.

R. from Walnut St. on Mt. Vernon St.

19. Thomas Bailey Aldrich's House (private), 59 Mt. Vernon St., is dis- tinguished by its white marble portico and a white marble band between the second and third stories.

20. The Home of Charles Francis Adams, Sr. (private), 57 Mt. Vernon St., is of a conservative elegance to be expected of the Civil War Ambassador to England, son of John Quincy Adams, and father of the author of 'The Education of Henry Adams.' Its four substantial stories face a trim lawn. The white doorway has an unusual richly carved lintel. There are tall second-story windows, the one over the door distinguished by a covered balcony.

Retrace Mt. Vernon St.

21. The Sears House (Second Harrison Gray Otis House, 1800) (private), 85 Mt. Vernon St., is a good example of Bulfinch's domestic design, some- what resembling his notable group on Franklin Crescent. The square house with roof balustrade is excellently proportioned and has the typical Bulfinch arched recesses surrounding the lower windows. The upper stories are enlivened by four Corinthian pilasters. Although somewhat altered, the architecture of this dignified Federal mansion remains im- pressive.

R. from Mt. Vernon St. into Louisburg Square.

22. Louisburg Square, looking much like some square in London's May- fair, is the epitome of Beacon Hill style. Noted residents have included William Dean Howells, Louisa May Alcott and her father, Amos Bronson Alcott, Jenny Lind, and Minnie Maddern Fiske. The houses, inhabited by

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elderly and ultra-conservative families, are large three- or four-story brick dwellings, mostly with bow-fronts and plain doorways, the whole in synchronous monotone. The central green, enclosed by an iron fence with no gate, belongs to the proprietors of the Square. The small statue of Aristides the Just, at the south end, and that of Columbus at the north, have been adopted affectionately by the residents through many years of custom, but when their donor, Joseph Iasigi, a wealthy Greek living at No. 3, included also a fountain, it was hastily removed.

At Christmas each year the Square echoes with Christmas carols, sung by trained voices usually selected from musical groups with sufficient social prestige to be asked to contribute carolers. Bellringing and the keeping of open house are additional features of the program.

R. from Louisburg Square on Pinckney St.

Pinckney St. was named for South Carolina's Charles Cotesworth Pinck- ney, famous for his reply to Talleyrand: 'Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute.' The street is the border-line between wealth and poverty and beyond it a less proud district slopes down the back of the Hill.

L. from Pinckney St. on Joy St .; R. from Joy St. on Cambridge St.

23. The Harrison Gray Otis House (open, 10-5, fee 25¢), 141 Cambridge St., built in 1795, has been since 1916 the headquarters of the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities. The interior has not been greatly altered, and the Society has restored the exterior to its former beauty by replacing on the façade the semi-circular porch, Palladian window, and third-story fan window that are the main decorative fea- tures. This square hip-roofed mansion has an interior finished with unusual refinement and delicacy. It is attributed to Bulfinch.

24. The Old West Church (West End Church) was built in 1806 from designs by Asher Benjamin, architect-writer. Characteristic of his work, it is of well-studied proportions, but more solid and masculine than the work of his contemporaries, Bulfinch and McIntire. Its façade, with stepped gable and lofty tower, is capped by a square gilt-domed cupola. The church has for some time been converted to the uses of a branch library.

Retrace Cambridge St .; L. from Cambridge St. on Joy St .; R. from Joy St. on Beacon St.

25. The Women's City Club (open by permission), 40 Beacon St., although built in 1818, is believed to be a Bulfinch work. Today, beautifully pre- served, it exemplifies the gracious tradition of Post-Colonial architecture. Its beautiful spiral stairway is as fine as any in New England.

26. The Wadsworth House (Third Harrison Gray Otis House) (private), 45 Beacon St., built in 1807, reveals the influence of Bulfinch's sojourn in France by his use of an oval drawing-room on the garden side and perhaps also by his placing the entrance at ground level and the important .

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Boston

rooms on the story above. The façade shows a uniform range of five windows, with a novel departure from Colonial precedent in the type of enframement. The entrance, too, is unusually handled, a rectangular portico with four columns - coupled columns and coupled pilasters behind - being used as the door enframement. The house is a fine example of an aristocratic city mansion of the Federal period.

Retrace Beacon St.

27. The Robert Gould Shaw Memorial, facing the State House from the edge of the Common, is a notable group statue in high relief, by Augustus Saint-Gaudens. Colonel Shaw, his horse, and the Negro troopers are all sculptured with remarkable sensitivity to the medium and the subject. Charles F. McKim designed the frame, a wide pink granite exedra with crouching eagles, Greek urns, and low benches, shadowed by two enor- mous English elms.

28. The State House (open weekdays 9-5), with its golden dome, crowns the Hill. Built in 1795, the 'Bulfinch Front' of the State House stands as a monument to the architectural genius of Charles Bulfinch and as an ex- pression of classicism in American design. Unhappily, this original portion of the present State House is now sandwiched between huge, inept wings. The 'Bulfinch Front' cannot be seen merely as a unit of the structure; its quality sets it apart as a thing to be known and revered independent of its setting. Bulfinch was the first professional architect of the Republic. The State House was his greatest work. He spread across its front a colossal portico; he topped it with a high and dominant gilded dome. The Corinthian colonnade that surmounts the projecting arcade of the first story, the arched windows with classical enframement, the pediment that breaks the line of the dome, the sweep and lift of the dome itself, contribute to the classicism vibrant in Bulfinch's work, strongly in- fluenced at this period by that of Sir William Chambers, an older London contemporary.

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Massachusetts : a guide to its places and people, Part 18

Author: Publication date: 1937 Publisher: Boston : Houghton Mifflin Company Number of Pages: 802

Author:
Publication date: 1937
Publisher: Boston : Houghton Mifflin Company
Number of Pages: 802