George B. Post
Encyclopedia
George Browne Post was an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 architect trained in the Beaux-Arts tradition.

Biography

Post was a student of Richard Morris Hunt
Richard Morris Hunt
Richard Morris Hunt was an American architect of the nineteenth century and a preeminent figure in the history of American architecture...

 (1858–60), but unlike many architects of his generation, he had previously received a degree in civil engineering
Civil engineering
Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including works like roads, bridges, canals, dams, and buildings...

 (Scientific School, New York University, 1858). In 1860 he formed a partnership with a fellow-student in Hunt's office, Charles D. Gambrill, with a brief hiatus for service in the Civil War.

Many of his most characteristic projects were for commercial buildings where new requirements pushed the traditional boundaries of design. Many of them have also been demolished, since their central locations in New York
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 and other cities made them vulnerable to rebuilding in the twentieth century. Some of his lost buildings were landmarks of their era, nevertheless. His eight-story Equitable Life Assurance Society (1868–70), was the first office building designed to use elevators; Post himself leased the upper floors when contemporaries predicted they could not be rented. His Western Union Telegraph Building (1872–75) at Dey Street in Lower Manhattan, was the first office building to rise as high as ten stories, a forerunner of skyscraper
Skyscraper
A skyscraper is a tall, continuously habitable building of many stories, often designed for office and commercial use. There is no official definition or height above which a building may be classified as a skyscraper...

s to come. When it was erected in "Newspaper Row" facing City Hall Park
New York City Hall
New York City Hall is located at the center of City Hall Park in the Civic Center area of Lower Manhattan, New York City, USA, between Broadway, Park Row, and Chambers Street. The building is the oldest City Hall in the United States that still houses its original governmental functions, such as...

, Post's twenty-story New York World Building
New York World Building
The New York World Building was a skyscraper in New York City designed by early skyscraper specialist George Browne Post and built in 1890 to house the now-defunct newspaper, The New York World. It was razed in 1955.-History:...

 (1889–90) was the tallest building in New York City.

His vast New York Produce Exchange (1881–84) at 2 Broadway
2 Broadway
2 Broadway is an office building located on Broadway in New York City.- History :The plot is located next to the historic Bowling Green. The building that used to stand there was the Produce Exchange Building, which was a representative structure constructed out of brick with terracotta decorations...

 faced Bowling Green
Bowling Green (New York City)
Bowling Green is a small public park in Lower Manhattan at the foot of Broadway next to the site of the original Dutch fort of New Amsterdam. Built in 1733, originally including a bowling green, it is the oldest public park in New York City and is surrounded by its original 18th century fence. At...

. Its grand skylighted hall, based on French retail structures, cast daylight into the lower floors.

At the World's Columbian Exposition
World's Columbian Exposition
The World's Columbian Exposition was a World's Fair held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. Chicago bested New York City; Washington, D.C.; and St...

, Chicago, 1893, Post was named to the architectural staff by Burnham and Root
Burnham and Root
Burnham and Root was the name of the company that John Wellborn Root and Daniel Hudson Burnham established as one of Chicago's most famous architectural companies of the nineteenth century....

 and assigned the Manufactures and Liberal Arts Building, which exceeded by a few feet the clear span of the Machinery Building at the Paris Exposition of 1889. Post's on-site engineer E.C. Shankland of Chicago, has been over-credited in its design, Winston Weisman noted in 1973.

He also designed more staid public and semi-public structures: the New York Stock Exchange Building
New York Stock Exchange
The New York Stock Exchange is a stock exchange located at 11 Wall Street in Lower Manhattan, New York City, USA. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed companies at 13.39 trillion as of Dec 2010...

 and the Wisconsin State Capitol
Wisconsin State Capitol
The Wisconsin State Capitol, in Madison, Wisconsin, houses both chambers of the Wisconsin legislature along with the Wisconsin Supreme Court and the Office of the Governor. Completed during 1917, the building is the fifth to serve as the Wisconsin capitol since the first territorial legislature...

. Among the prominent private houses by Post were the French chateau for Cornelius Vanderbilt II
Cornelius Vanderbilt II
Cornelius Vanderbilt II was an American socialite, heir, businessman, and a member of the prominent United States Vanderbilt family....

 (1879–82) that once stood at Fifth Avenue and 57th Street (that was photographed by Albert Levy
Albert Levy (photographer)
Albert Levy is a French photographer active in the 1870s-1890s. He is a pioneer on architectural photography that focused his work in Europe and the United States....

 while being built), and the palazzo that faced it across the street, for Collis P. Huntington
Collis P. Huntington
Collis Potter Huntington was one of the Big Four of western railroading who built the Central Pacific Railroad as part of the first U.S. transcontinental railroad...

 (1889–94). In Newport, Rhode Island
Newport, Rhode Island
Newport is a city on Aquidneck Island in Newport County, Rhode Island, United States, about south of Providence. Known as a New England summer resort and for the famous Newport Mansions, it is the home of Salve Regina University and Naval Station Newport which houses the United States Naval War...

 he built for the president of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad
Louisville and Nashville Railroad
The Louisville and Nashville Railroad was a Class I railroad that operated freight and passenger services in the southeast United States.Chartered by the state of Kentucky in 1850, the L&N, as it was generally known, grew into one of the great success stories of American business...

, C.C. Baldwin, "Chateau-Nooga" or the Baldwin Cottage (1879–80), a polychromatic exercise in the "Quaint Style" with bargeboards and half-timbering; John La Farge provided stained glass panels.

He trained architect Arthur Bates Jennings
Arthur Bates Jennings
Arthur Bates Jennings was an American architect, working primarily out of New York, New York. He married Caroline Jerusha Allen of West Meriden, Connecticut and had three children, Edward Allen Jennings, Arthur B. Jennings, Jr., and Helen Bates Jennings.He earned an A.B. from College of the City...

.

A true member of the American Renaissance
American Renaissance
In the history of American architecture and the arts, the American Renaissance was the period in 1835-1880 characterized by renewed national self-confidence and a feeling that the United States was the heir to Greek democracy, Roman law, and Renaissance humanism...

, Post employed noted artists and artisans to produce decorative sculpture and murals. Among those who worked with him were the sculptor Karl Bitter
Karl Bitter
Karl Theodore Francis Bitter was an Austrian-born United States sculptor best known for his architectural sculpture, memorials and residential work.- Life and career :...

 and the painter Elihu Vedder
Elihu Vedder
Elihu Vedder was an American symbolist painter, book illustrator, and poet, born in New York City....

. he was a founding member of the National Arts Club
National Arts Club
The National Arts Club is a private club in Gramercy Park, New York City, New York, USA. It was founded in 1898 to "stimulate, foster, and promote public interest in the arts and to educate the American people in the fine arts". Since 1906 the organization has occupied the Samuel J...

 and served as its president from 1898 to 1905. In 1905 his two sons were taken into the partnership. The firm carried on under Post's grandson Edward Everett Post (1904–2006) until the late twentieth century.

Post served as the sixth president of the American Institute of Architects
American Institute of Architects
The American Institute of Architects is a professional organization for architects in the United States. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the AIA offers education, government advocacy, community redevelopment, and public outreach to support the architecture profession and improve its public image...

, 1896-99. His extensive archives are at the New-York Historical Society
New-York Historical Society
The New-York Historical Society is an American history museum and library located in New York City at the corner of 77th Street and Central Park West in Manhattan. Founded in 1804 as New York's first museum, the New-York Historical Society presents exhibitions, public programs and research that...

. Sarah Bradford Landau
Sarah Landau
Dr. Sarah Bradford Landau is a noted architectural historian who taught for many years in the Department of Art History at New York University.Landau earned her B.F.A. at the University of North Carolina . She earned her M.A. and Ph.D...

, George B. Post, Architect: Picturesque Designer and Determined Realist (1998) inspired the retrospective exhibition at the Society, 1998–99 that reassessed Post's work.

Selected works by George B. Post

  • The original Williamsburgh Savings Bank
    Williamsburgh Savings Bank
    The Williamsburgh Savings Bank was an important institution in Brooklyn, New York, from the mid-19th to the mid-20th centuries. A series of bank mergers brought it into the HSBC group late in the 20th century...

    , Brooklyn, New York, 1870-1875. Solidly classicizing and capped with a dome, "it might easily have been prepared in the nineties. Indeed it prefigures McKim
    Charles Follen McKim
    Charles Follen McKim FAIA was an American Beaux-Arts architect of the late 19th century. Along with Stanford White, he provided the architectural expertise as a member of the partnership McKim, Mead, and White....

    's famous Columbia Library", Henry-Russell Hitchcock
    Henry-Russell Hitchcock
    Henry-Russell Hitchcock was the leading American architectural historian of his generation. A long-time professor at Smith College and New York University, he is best known for writings that helped to define Modern architecture.-Biography:...

     noted in his biography of H.H. Richardson
  • Troy Savings Bank
    Troy Savings Bank
    Troy Savings Bank, now owned by First Niagara Financial Group is a bank in Troy, Rensselaer County, New York, U.S.A.. It is notable for having a music hall constructed on the second floor above the bank itself, the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall, which is renowned for its acoustics and includes a...

    , Troy, New York, 1875
  • Brooklyn Historical Society
    Brooklyn Historical Society
    Founded in 1863, the Brooklyn Historical Society is a museum, library, and educational center preserving and encouraging the study of Brooklyn's rich 400-year past. The Brooklyn Historical Society houses materials relating to the history of Brooklyn and its people. These holdings supply...

    , Brooklyn, New York, 1878–1880, originally for the Long Island Historical Society; it employed architectural terracotta
  • New York Post Building, 1880–1881, in which a deep central recess provided light and air to the interiors, a feature that quickly became standard for large commercial structures
  • Mills Building
    Mills Building (New York City)
    The Mills Building was a 10 story structure which stood at 15 Broad Street and Exchange Place in Manhattan, with an L to 35 Wall Street. It adjoined the building which was the home of Equitable Trust. It also adjoined the J. P. Morgan & Company Building on both Broad and Wall Streets.George B. Post...

    , New York City, 1881–1883, called "the first modern office building", on a two-story base, the upper eight floors reached by ten elevators, it used architectural terracotta panels, which Post had helped to introduce to the United States, and eliminated the conventional mansard roofline
  • Produce Exchange, New York City, 1881–1885, in a modified neo-Renaissance
    Neo-Renaissance
    Renaissance Revival is an all-encompassing designation that covers many 19th century architectural revival styles which were neither Grecian nor Gothic but which instead drew inspiration from a wide range of classicizing Italian modes...

     mode that clad an interior iron skeletal framing
  • New York Cotton Exchange
    New York Cotton Exchange
    The New York Cotton Exchange was a commodities exchange founded in 1870 by a group of one hundred cotton brokers and merchants at 1 Hanover Square in New York City.- History :...

     (razed), New York City, 1883–1885
  • New York World Building
    New York World Building
    The New York World Building was a skyscraper in New York City designed by early skyscraper specialist George Browne Post and built in 1890 to house the now-defunct newspaper, The New York World. It was razed in 1955.-History:...

    , or Pulitzer Building, New York City, 1889–1890, at the time of its completion the tallest building in the world
  • New York Times Building, 41 Park Row
    41 Park Row
    41 Park Row, often called the New York Times Building is located near New York City Hall in the New York City borough of Manhattan, was the longtime home of The New York Times, until it moved to Longacre Square, now known as Times Square...

    , New York City, 1888–89
  • Union Trust Building (razed), 78-82 Broadway, New York City, 1889–1890
  • The Prudential Buildings
    Prudential Headquarters
    Prudential Financial, as it is known today, began as The Widows and Orphans Friendly Society in 1875. For a short was called the Prudential Friendly Society, and for many years after 1877 was the Prudential Insurance Company of America, a name still widely in use...

    , Newark, New Jersey, 1894, Romanesque, one for many years the largest in the state
  • Park Building, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 1896, remodeled in the 1960s
  • St. Paul Building
    St. Paul Building
    The St. Paul Building was a skyscraper in New York City built in 1898 to designs by George B. Post that repeated the same Ionic order for each floor, to little cumulative effect. At 315 feet it was one of the tallest skyscrapers of its era. The building was 26 stories tall...

    , New York City, 1898
  • New York Stock Exchange
    New York Stock Exchange
    The New York Stock Exchange is a stock exchange located at 11 Wall Street in Lower Manhattan, New York City, USA. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed companies at 13.39 trillion as of Dec 2010...

    , New York City, 1901–1903
  • College of the City of New York
    City College of New York
    The City College of the City University of New York is a senior college of the City University of New York , in New York City. It is also the oldest of the City University's twenty-three institutions of higher learning...

     Campus, New York City, 1903–1907, in Gothic Revival style
  • Old Montreal Stock Exchange Building, Montreal, Quebec, 1904, now housing the Centaur Theatre
    Centaur Theatre
    The Centaur Theatre Company is a theatre company based in Montreal, Quebec. It was founded in 1969 by The Centaur Foundation for the Performing Arts with Maurice Podbrey as the Artistic and Executive Director, and Herb Auerbach as Chairman of the Board....

  • The Wisconsin State Capitol
    Wisconsin State Capitol
    The Wisconsin State Capitol, in Madison, Wisconsin, houses both chambers of the Wisconsin legislature along with the Wisconsin Supreme Court and the Office of the Governor. Completed during 1917, the building is the fifth to serve as the Wisconsin capitol since the first territorial legislature...

    , Madison, Wisconsin, 1906
  • Cleveland Trust Company, Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio
    Cleveland, Ohio
    Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...

    , 1908
  • Pontiac Hotel
    Pontiac Hotel
    Pontiac Hotel is a historic hotel located at Oswego in Oswego County, New York. It was built in 1912 and designed by architect George B. Post . It was originally a four story, "U" shaped structure; in 1955 a one story ballroom was added at the rear of the structure in the exterior courtyard. It...

    , Oswego, New York
    Oswego, New York
    Oswego is a city in Oswego County, New York, United States. The population was 18,142 at the 2010 census. Oswego is located on Lake Ontario in north-central New York and promotes itself as "The Port City of Central New York"...

    , 1912

External links

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