James Marston Fitch
Encyclopedia
James Marston Fitch was an architect and a Preservationist, one of the founders of the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation
at Columbia University
in 1964. He was a member of the faculty there from 1954 to 1977, and received an honorary Litt.D. in 1980. The Schools has established a lecture series in his honor, and endowed a named professorship, currently held by Andrew Dolkart
.
After leaving the Columbia faculty, he become director of historic preservation at the private architecture and planning firm, Beyer Blinder Belle. He led the fight that prevented the construction of an expressway through Soho, to save the buildings at what is now the South Street Seaport, and, in the 1990s, he supervised the renovation of Grand Central Terminal.
The James Marston Fitch Foundation, established in his honor in 1988, awards $25,000-dollar research grants for historic preservation.
The activist Jane Jacobs
considered that Fitch "was the principal character in making the preservation of historic buildings practical and feasible and popular."
Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation
The Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation at Columbia University in New York City, also known simply as GSAPP, is regarded as one of the most important and prestigious architecture schools in the world...
at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
in 1964. He was a member of the faculty there from 1954 to 1977, and received an honorary Litt.D. in 1980. The Schools has established a lecture series in his honor, and endowed a named professorship, currently held by Andrew Dolkart
Andrew Dolkart
Andrew Scott Dolkart is the James Marston Fitch Associate Professor of Historic Preservation at the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation and Director of the school's Historic Preservation Program...
.
After leaving the Columbia faculty, he become director of historic preservation at the private architecture and planning firm, Beyer Blinder Belle. He led the fight that prevented the construction of an expressway through Soho, to save the buildings at what is now the South Street Seaport, and, in the 1990s, he supervised the renovation of Grand Central Terminal.
The James Marston Fitch Foundation, established in his honor in 1988, awards $25,000-dollar research grants for historic preservation.
The activist Jane Jacobs
Jane Jacobs
Jane Jacobs, was an American-Canadian writer and activist with primary interest in communities and urban planning and decay. She is best known for The Death and Life of Great American Cities , a powerful critique of the urban renewal policies of the 1950s in the United States...
considered that Fitch "was the principal character in making the preservation of historic buildings practical and feasible and popular."
Publications
- American Building: The Environmental Forces that Shape It (1947, updated 1999)
- Historic Preservation: Curatorial Management of the Built World (1982).