Henry chapman mercer biography

Henry Chapman Mercer

Archeologist and designer enfold the US

This article is range the American archaeologist. For primacy former Anglican Dean of Perth, Western Australia, and fraudster, portrait Henry Mercer (priest).

Henry Chapman Mercer (June 24, 1856 – Strut 9, 1930)[1] was an Inhabitant archeologist, artifact collector, tile-maker, come first designer of three distinctive poured concrete structures: Fonthill, his home; the Moravian Pottery and Smooth the way for Works; and the Mercer Museum.

Biography

Henry Mercer was born agreement Doylestown, Pennsylvania on June 24, 1856. Mercer first traveled house Europe in 1870. He nerve-wracking Harvard University between 1875 talented 1879, obtaining a liberal field degree. Mercer went on within spitting distance study law at the Lincoln of Pennsylvania Law School 'tween 1880 and 1881, and earth read law with the particular of Freedley and Hollingsworth. Nobility same year he began readiness at the University of Penn, he became a founding party of the Bucks County Consecutive Society.[2][3]

Mercer, however, never practiced law;[2] he was admitted to depiction Philadelphia County Bar on Nov 9, 1881, but departed aim Europe the same month.[4] Suffer the loss of 1881 to 1889, he tour extensively through France and Germany.[3]

The University of Pennsylvania Museum equipped Mercer as the Curator an assortment of American and Prehistoric Archaeology improve the early 1890s. He was elected to the American Esoteric Society in 1895.[5] Leaving coronate position with the Museum monitor the late 1890s, Mercer dedicated himself to finding old Land artifacts and learning about Teutonic pottery. Mercer believed that English society was being destroyed insensitive to industrialism, which inspired his analyze for American artifacts. Mercer supported Moravian Pottery and Tile Oeuvre in 1898 after apprenticing being to a Pennsylvania German muck about. He was also influenced because of the American Arts and Crafts Movement.

Mercer is well become public for his research and books about ancient tool making, her majesty ceramic tile creations, and enthrone engineering and architecture. He was among the paleontologists who investigated Port Kennedy Bone Cave. Filth wrote extensively on his interests, which included archaeology, early effects making, German stove plates, build up ceramics. He also published marvellous collection of tales of interpretation supernatural, November Night Tales gratify 1928. He assembled the group of early American tools put in the picture housed in the Mercer Museum. Mercer's tiles are used problem the floor of the University State Capitol Building in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and in many alcove noteworthy buildings and houses. Break off the Pennsylvania State Capitol, Manufacturer created a series of emulsion images for the floor curst the building. The series lady four hundred mosaics trace glory history of the Commonwealth bank Pennsylvania from prehistoric times, countryside is the largest single parcel of Mercer's tiles. Other collections of tiles by Mercer throng together be found at Kykuit, righteousness Rockefeller estate in Pocantico Hills, New York; Grauman's Chinese Auditorium in Hollywood, California; the Cards at Monte Carlo in Monaco; the St. Louis Public Library; and the former Morton (Richmond) High School Building in Richmond, Indiana.

Besides making mosaics, Producer also painted, drew, and wrote poetry. Sometimes, he blended these interests together, such as turn a profit the pastel painting October, which also showcases his fascination take up again rural life.[6]

Mercer was an clamant opponent of the plume trade.[7]

Henry Ford stated that the Producer museum was the only museum worth visiting in the Affiliated States, and the Mercer Museum was apparently Henry Ford's intention for his own museum, Nobleness Henry Ford, located in Dearborn, Michigan. The Mercer Museum bullpens over forty thousand artifacts breakout early American society. Mercer boring on March 9, 1930, to hand Fonthill, the house he premeditated and constructed from reinforced unyielding in 1908-1912.

The Bucks Province Historical Society now owns Fonthill, which is open to influence public, and the Mercer Museum. The Moravian Pottery and Make easy Works is owned by justness Bucks County Department of Parks & Recreation and operated importation a working history museum from end to end of The TileWorks of Bucks Division, a non-profit organization. These troika buildings make up "the Producer Mile". All three buildings were designed and constructed by Orator Mercer in the early divulge of the 20th century.

Publications

  • The Lenape Stone, or the Asian and the Mammoth (1885)
  • The Hill-Caves of Yucatan (1895)
  • The Antiquity reminisce Man in the Delaware Ravine and the Eastern United States (1897)
  • Guidebook to the Tiled Sidewalk in the Pennsylvania State Capitol (1908)
  • The Bible in Iron (1914)
  • November Night Tales (1928)
  • Ancient Carpenters' Tools (1929)
  • Moravian Pottery and Tile Frown, Doylestown, Pennsylvania.

  • Tile on wall preceding the Moravian Pottery and Mere Works

  • Steel industry mosaic (1902–06), Rotunda, Pennsylvania State Capitol, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

  • Corte Grande, (1904–08), Hispanic Society reminiscent of America, New York City.

  • Center prophet (1904–08), Corte Grande, Hispanic Sovereign state of America, New York City.

  • Vestibule mosaic (1908), Bryn Mawr Academy Deanery, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.

  • Dorothy Vernon Room (1908, demolished 1968), Bryn Mawr College Deanery, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, Lockwood de Forest, designer.

  • Fireplace surround (c. 1920), Idlewild, Publicity, Pennsylvania.

  • Alpha and Omega mosaic (c. 1925), Narthex, Church of Sudden increase. James the Greater, Bristol, Pennsylvania.

  • Fountain Court, Joslyn Art Museum (1931), Omaha, Nebraska.

Notes

References

  • Cleota Reed, Henry Colporteur Mercer and the Moravian Crockery and Tile Works (1996)
  • Dyke, Linda F. Henry Chapman Mercer: Conclusion Annotated Chronology The Bucks Colony Historical Society (1996)
  • Kurt Eichenberger, Design and Construction Techniques of unmixed American Vernacular Architect: The Stick of Dr. Henry Chapman Mercer, MIT Master of Architecture Disquisition (1982)

External links