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    The American Builder's Companion
    The American Builder's Companion
    The American Builder's Companion
    Ebook249 pages1 hour

    The American Builder's Companion

    By Asher Benjamin

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    There is scarcely a New England town which does not contain houses, church spires, or ornamental interior details derived from the Late Colonial architectural designs of Asher Benjamin (1773–1845). Benjamin disseminated his ideas chiefly through his publications, of which this book is the most important.
    Books such as The American Builder's Companion were written for local carpenters to be used as manuals and guides. They made it possible for small-town carpenters, who were already skilled in rudimentary carpentry and house construction, to give their buildings sophistication and style. There were instructions for raising and supporting several types of roofs, constructing winding stairs, spacing fluting evenly on columns, modeling and mounting friezes, etc. Carpenters were thus able to plan, build, and decorate complex, ornate structures.
    The American Builder's Companion includes rules and definitions of practical geometry and discussion of methods for drawing basic shapes and cutting them out of solids. There are designs for interior ornament — patterns for decorative cornices, moldings, banisters, stucco ceiling ornaments, mantels, etc., as well as designs for doorways and windows. Benjamin also deals with problematic structural elements, and finally provides full plans and elevations for private houses, wooden churches, and a court house.
    Important as one of the single, major disseminators of a style which became almost ubiquitous in the Northeast, Benjamin's book also contains a rich store of evidence on problems and achievements of early American builders. Direct references to tools, materials, common practices and processes, and unconscious indication of taste and aesthetic values of the time will be invaluable to students of architecture, experts in restoration, and readers interested in American history and culture. New introduction by William Morgan. 70 plates.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDover Publications
    Release dateDec 13, 2012
    ISBN9780486138718
    The American Builder's Companion

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      Book preview

      The American Builder's Companion - Asher Benjamin

      DOVER BOOKS ON ARCHITECTURE

      ALADDIN BUILT IN A DAY HOUSE CATALOG, 1917, The Aladdin Co. (0-486-28591-X)

      CONCRETE COUNTRY RESIDENCES: Photographs and Floor Plans of Turn-of-the-Century Homes, Atlas Portland Cement Company. (0-486-42733-1)

      BADGER’S ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE OF CAST-IRON ARCHITECTURE, Daniel D. Badger. (0-486-24223-4)

      BENNETT’S SMALL HOUSE CATALOG, 1920, Ray H. Bennett Lumber Co., Inc. (0-486-27809-3)

      BICKNELL’S VICTORIAN BUILDINGS, A. J. Bicknell. (0-486-23904-7)

      THE GREAT PYRAMID OF GIZA: History and Speculation, James Bonwick. (0-486-42521-5)

      ANCIENT EGYPTIAN CONSTRUCTION AND ARCHITECTURE, Somers Clarke and R. Engelbach. (0-486-26485-8)

      TURN-OF-THE-CENTURY HOUSE DESIGNS, William T. Comstock. (0-486-28186-8)

      THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL, Clarence Cook. (0-486-28586-3)

      GREAT BUILDINGS OF BOSTON, George M. Cushing, Jr. (0-486-24219-6)

      THE ARCHITECTURAL PLATES FROM THE ENCYCLOPEDIE, Denis Diderot. (0-486-2 7954-5)

      THE ARCHITECTURE OF COUNTRY HOUSES, Andrew J. Downing. (0-486-22003-6)

      VICTORIAN COTTAGE RESIDENCES, Andrew J. Downing. (0-486-24078-9)

      PRINCIPLES OF VICTORIAN DECORATIVE DESIGN, Christopher Dresser. (0-486-28900-1)

      PALLADIO’S ARCHITECTURE AND ITS INFLUENCE: A Photographic Guide, Joseph C. Farber and Henry Hope Reed. (0-486-23922-5)

      VICTORIAN HOUSES: A Treasury of Lesser-Known Examples, Edmund Gillon and Clay Lancaster. (0-486-22966-1)

      PHILADELPHIA THEATERS: A Pictorial Architectural History, Irvin R. Glazer. (0-486-27833-6)

      117 HOUSE DESIGNS OF THE 20s, Gordon-Van Tine Co. (0-486-26959-0)

      MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE, Edward Warren Hoak and Willis Humphrey Church. (0-486-42231-3)

      FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT’S FALLINGWATER: The House and Its History, Donald Hoffmann. (0-486-27430-6)

      UNDERSTANDING FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT’S ARCHITECTURE, Donald Hoffmann. (0-486-28364-X)

      HOLLY’S PICTURESQUE COUNTRY SEATS, Henry Hudson Holly. (0-486-27856-5)

      LATE VICTORIAN HOUSE DESIGNS: 56 AMERICAN HOMES AND COTTAGES WITH FLOOR PLANS, D. S. Hopkins. (0-486-43598-8)

      VICTORIAN ORNAMENTAL CARPENTRY, Ben Karp. (0-486-24144-0)

      GOTHICK ARCHITECTURE: A Reprint of the Original 1742 Treatise, Batty Langley and Thomas Langley. (0-486-42614-9)

      THE CITY OF TOMORROW AND ITS PLANNING, Le Corbusier. (Available in U.S. only.) (0-486-25332-5)

      THE OPULENT INTERIORS OF THE GILDED AGE: All 203 Photographs from Artistic Houses, with New Text, Arnold Lewis, James Turner, and Steven McQuillin. (0-486-25250-7)

      THE ARCHITECTURE OF McKIM MEAD & WHITE IN PHOTOGRAPHS, PLANS AND ELEVATIONS, McKim, Mead, and White. (0-486-26556-0)

      BROADWAY THEATRES: History and Architecture, William Morrison (0-486-40244-4)

      THE BROWN DECADES: A Study of the Arts in America, 1865—1895, Lewis Mumford. (0-486-20200-3)

      PALLISER’S NEW COTTAGE HOMES, 1887, Palliser & Co. (0-486-42816-8)

      A CONCISE DICTIONARY OF ARCHITECTURAL TERMS, John Henry Parker. (0-486-43302-1)

      EMPIRE STYLEBOOK OF INTERIOR DESIGN: All 72 Plates from the Recueil de decorations intérieures with New English Text, Charles Percier and Pierre Fontaine. (0-486-26754-7)

      AN ALBUM OF MAYA ARCHITECTURE, Tatiana Proskouriakoff. (0-486-42484-7)

      SMALL HOUSES OF THE TWENTIES: The Sears, Roebuck 1926 House Catalog, Sears, Roebuck and Co. (0-486-26709-1)

      THE FIVE BOOKS OF ARCHITECTURE, Sebastiano Serlio. (0-486-24349-4)

      TURN-OF-THE-CENTURY HOUSES, COTTAGES AND VILLAS: Floor Plans and Line Illustrations for 118 Homes from Shoppell’s Catalogs, R. W Shoppell et al. (0-486-24567-5)

      AMERICAN BARNS AND COVERED BRIDGES, Eric Sloane. (0-486-42561-4)

      MORE CRAFTSMAN HOMES, Gustav Stickley. (0-486-24252-8)

      PLANTATIONS OF THE CAROLINA Low COUNTRY, Samuel Gaillard Stoney. (0-486-26089-5)

      FORM AND DESIGN IN CLASSIC ARCHITECTURE, Arthur Stratton. (0-486-43405-2)

      COUNTRY AND SUBURBAN HOMES OF THE PRAIRIE SCHOOL PERIOD, H. V. von Holst. (0-486-24373-7)

      BRIDGES OF THE WORLD: THEIR DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION, Charles S. Whitney. (0-486-42995-4)

      CALIFORNIA BUNGALOWS OF THE TWENTIES, Henry L. Wilson. (0-486-27507-8)

      Paperbound unless otherwise indicated. Available at your book dealer, online at www.doverpublications.com, or by writing to Dept. 23, Dover Publications, Inc., 31 East 2nd Street, Mineola, NY 11501. For current price information or for free catalogs (please indicate field of interest), write to Dover Publications or log on to www.doverpublicadons.com and see every Dover book in print. Each year Dover publishes over 500 books on fine art, music, crafts and needlework, antiques, languages, literature, children’s books, chess, cookery, nature, anthropology, science, mathematics, and other areas.

      Manufactured in the U.S.A.

      Asher Benjamin (1773-1845)

      Courtesy Greenfield Public Library

      Copyright © 1969 by Dover Publications, Inc.

      All rights reserved under Pan American and International Copyright Conventions.

      This Dover edition, first published in 1969, is an unabridged republication of the sixth (1827) edition, as published by R. P. & C. Williams.

      This reprint also contains a new introduction by William Morgan.

      9780486138718

      Standard Book Number: 486-22236-5

      Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 68-58318

      Manufactured in the United States of America

      Dover Publications, Inc.

      31 East 2nd Street, Mineola, N.Y 11501

      Table of Contents

      DOVER BOOKS ON ARCHITECTURE

      Title Page

      Copyright Page

      INTRODUCTION - TO THE DOVER EDITION

      DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS, TO WIT.

      PREFACE, - TO THE THIRD EDITION.

      PUBLISHERS’ ADVERTISEMENT, - TO THE SIXTH EDITION.

      THE AMERICAN BUILDER’S COMPANION.

      INDEX.

      INTRODUCTION

      TO THE DOVER EDITION

      THE architecture of the first forty years of the nineteenth century has been vaguely called Anglo-Greco-Roman in England, but perhaps a better term for this period in America, especially until 1830, would be Federal Neo-Classic. Charles Bulfinch was the dominant architectural force in post-Revolutionary Boston and it was Bulfinch who, thoroughly taken by the work of Robert and James Adam, introduced the Federal-Adamesque style into Boston upon his return from England in 1787. Bulfinch transformed Boston from a provincial capital into an urbane and elegant city. Drawing his inspiration from the brothers Adam, James Gibbs, and Sir William Chambers, and ignoring the more progressive work he had seen in France (and which served as a source for more avant-garde architects such as Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Latrobe), Bulfinch correctly adjudged the conservative and still English-oriented taste of Boston and filled the city with his version of the Adamesque.

      New England was enjoying a period of unprecedented prosperity, and Boston, rivaled only by Philadelphia, was the artistic and cultural center of the nation. Asher Benjamin was one of several young architects who were attracted to Boston around this time. (Alexander Parris, Isaiah Rogers, and Solomon Willard were some of the other men who were to play a role in the burgeoning growth of the city.) It was only natural that these architects should have imitated the work of Bulfinch, and Benjamin, whose American Builder’s Companion of 1806 included a number of Bulfinch inspired designs, was no exception.

      Asher Benjamin was born in Hartland, Connecticut, about 1773 and received his early training from a local builder. The first thirty years of his life were spent in the Connecticut River Valley, where he built houses in Greenfield, Massachusetts, and Suffield, Connecticut; a school building in Deerfield; and a church in Northampton, Massachusetts. Benjamin also lived in Windsor, Vermont, and is credited with at least two houses and a church in that community. By 1803 he was living in Boston and was listed in the city directory as a housewright.

      In Boston Benjamin built a number of houses in the Bulfinch manner which contributed to the restrained red brick elegance of Beacon Hill. The twin houses at 54 and 55 Beacon Street, opposite Boston Common, with their gently bowed fronts, delicate iron balconies, pilasters, and doorways flanked with slender sidelights and topped with semi-circular fanlights remain as examples of Benjamin’s work, as does the range of houses (including his own) on West Cedar Street. Benjamin also designed two churches in Boston which survive, the West Church built in 1806 and the Charles Street Meetinghouse of 1807. Although basically similar to earlier Bulfinch churches (such as the Church of the Holy Cross), particularly in their belfried clock towers, they are superb pieces of architecture in their own right. Benjamin executed other buildings outside of Boston, including the Rhode Island Union Bank in Newport, which, before its recent demolition, was one of that city’s finest public buildings.

      Although these buildings show him to be a competent architect, Asher Benjamin’s real contribution to American architecture was his seven handbooks or builder’s guides. The first book on architecture printed in America was Abraham Swan’s British Architect: or, the Builder’s Treasury of Staircases, published in Philadelphia in 1775, but the work was merely a reprint of an earlier London edition of 1745. The first original American architectural work was Benjamin’s The Country Builder’s Assistant: Containing a Collection of New Designs of Carpentry and Architecture, published in Greenfield in 1797, twenty-two years after the British Architect. The Country Builder’s Assistant was the first of several books on architecture that altogether ran to forty-four editions and which profoundly influenced the architecture of New England in the early nineteenth century.

      In addition to The Country Builder’s Assistant, Benjamin wrote The American Builder’s Companion (1806 and following), The Rudiments of Architecture (first published in 1814), The Practical House Carpenter (1830), The Practice of Architecture (1833), The Builder’s Guide (1839), and The Elements of Architecture (1843). Of these, The Practical House Carpenter was the most popular, although each book was published in several editions. Architectural books had had an effect on pre-Revolutionary American architecture, but Asher Benjamin’s books were designed specifically for the American builder. In an age which marks the infancy of the architectural profession (Benjamin was one of the men who formed the American Institution of Architects in 1837, the predecessor of the American Institute of Architects), these books served as the only architectural education for carpenter-builders throughout New England. Benjamin’s publications contained basic designs and practical instruction on the construction of elementary structural and geometric forms, but more importantly, they spread the Bulfinch-Benjamin interpretation of the Adamesque to the countryside beyond Boston. That plates from Benjamin’s books were the inspiration for many Northern New England houses and churches is borne out by numerous Federal style buildings along the Maine coast and in the river valleys of New Hampshire and Vermont. Long believed to have been designed by Bulfinch, the elegant row of Federal houses in Orford, New Hampshire, were, in all likelihood, the work of a local builder who used one of Benjamin’s books for a guide. Drawings made by Alexander Parris in 1807 for a church in Portland suggest that Parris may have freely borrowed a church design from the first edition of Benjamin’s The American Builder’s Companion; Plate 33 of The Country Builder’s Assistant was the design used by Vermont builder Lavius Fillmore in his first Congregational Church in Bennington in 1806.

      As the Bennington Church illustrates, Benjamin leaned somewhat on English sources such as James Gibbs’ Book of Architecture, and in the preface to the third edition of The American Builder’s Companion he acknowledged his indebtedness to Sir William Chambers’ incomparable Treatise on Civil Architecture and to P. Nicholson’s excellent books. But Benjamin relied on tried designs only in so much as the conservative nature of his rural carpenter-builder consumers demanded. He added new plates and details in subsequent editions of his books and by 1827 the sixth and final edition of The American Builder’s Companion offered the Grecian architecture that was replacing the Federal style. This edition included the Doric Order of the Temple of Minerva, at Athens, called Parthenon, and the Ionic Temple on the River Ilissus, at Athens, as well as a comparison of the Greek and Roman Doric.

      The American Builder’s Companion; or, A New System of Architecture Particularly Adapted to the Present Style of Building in the United States of America, was first published in Boston in 1806 by Etheridge and Bliss. This second work of Benjamin’s was jointly authored with stucco worker Daniel Raynerd, however, Raynerd sold his rights to

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