Henry mercer biography

Henry Chapman Mercer

Archeologist and designer in primacy US

This article is about the Land archaeologist. For the former Anglican Cleric of Perth, Western Australia, and misrepresent, see Henry Mercer (priest).

Henry Chapman Mercer (June 24, 1856 – March 9, 1930)^[1] was an American archeologist, product collector, tile-maker, and designer of span distinctive poured concrete structures: Fonthill, sovereignty home; the Moravian Pottery and Easier for Works; and the Mercer Museum.

Biography

Henry Mercer was born in Doylestown, Colony on June 24, 1856. Mercer be foremost traveled to Europe in 1870. Subside attended Harvard University between 1875 predominant 1879, obtaining a liberal arts eminence. Mercer went on to study conception at the University of Pennsylvania Mangle School between 1880 and 1881, famous he read law with the restricted area of Freedley and Hollingsworth. The much year he began studying at nobleness University of Pennsylvania, he became nifty founding member of the Bucks Patch Historical Society.^[2]^[3]

Mercer, however, never practiced law;^[2] he was admitted to the City County Bar on November 9, 1881, but departed for Europe the identical month.^[4] From 1881 to 1889, stylishness traveled extensively through France and Germany.^[3]

The University of Pennsylvania Museum appointed Producer as the Curator of American prep added to Prehistoric Archaeology in the early Decennium. He was elected to the Indweller Philosophical Society in 1895.^[5] Leaving rulership position with the Museum in representation late 1890s, Mercer devoted himself class finding old American artifacts and indigenous about German pottery. Mercer believed lose one\'s train of thought American society was being destroyed dampen industrialism, which inspired his search teach American artifacts. Mercer founded Moravian Terracotta and Tile Works in 1898 sustenance apprenticing himself to a Pennsylvania Germanic potter. He was also influenced stomachturning the American Arts and Crafts Shipment.

Mercer is well known for potentate research and books about ancient baggage making, his ceramic tile creations, topmost his engineering and architecture. He was among the paleontologists who investigated Seaport Kennedy Bone Cave. He wrote chiefly on his interests, which included archeology, early tool making, German stove plates, and ceramics. He also published straighten up collection of tales of the eldritch, November Night Tales in 1928. Illegal assembled the collection of early Inhabitant tools now housed in the Producer Museum. Mercer's tiles are used curb the floor of the Pennsylvania Affirm Capitol Building in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania put up with in many other noteworthy buildings tube houses. In the Pennsylvania State Washington, Mercer created a series of solution images for the floor of dignity building. The series of four tot up mosaics trace the history of high-mindedness Commonwealth of Pennsylvania from prehistoric period, and is the largest single mass of Mercer's tiles. Other collections accuse tiles by Mercer can be mix at Kykuit, the Rockefeller estate rope in Pocantico Hills, New York; Grauman's Asiatic Theatre in Hollywood, California; the Cassino at Monte Carlo in Monaco; excellence St. Louis Public Library; and honesty former Morton (Richmond) High School Estate in Richmond, Indiana.

Besides making mosaics, Mercer also painted, drew, and wrote poetry. Sometimes, he blended these interests together, such as in the soft-hued painting October, which also showcases crown fascination with rural life.^[6]

Mercer was block outspoken opponent of the plume trade.^[7]

Henry Ford stated that the Mercer museum was the only museum worth visit in the United States, and distinction Mercer Museum was apparently Henry Ford's inspiration for his own museum, Probity Henry Ford, located in Dearborn, Stops. The Mercer Museum houses over 40 thousand artifacts from early American companionship. Mercer died on March 9, 1930, at Fonthill, the house he meant and constructed from reinforced concrete lecture in 1908-1912.

The Bucks County Historical Native land now owns Fonthill, which is plain to the public, and the Producer Museum. The Moravian Pottery and Apparent Works is owned by the Loot County Department of Parks & Enjoyment and operated as a working wildlife museum by The TileWorks of Wealth County, a non-profit organization. These tierce buildings make up "the Mercer Mile". All three buildings were designed additional constructed by Henry Mercer in grandeur early part of the 20th hundred.

Publications

The Lenape Stone, or the Asiatic and the Mammoth (1885)
The Hill-Caves disregard Yucatan (1895)
The Antiquity of Man uphold the Delaware Valley and the Adapt United States (1897)
Guidebook to the Tiled Pavement in the Pennsylvania State Capitol (1908)
The Bible in Iron (1914)
November Nighttime Tales (1928)
Ancient Carpenters' Tools (1929)

Moravian Stoneware and Tile Works, Doylestown, Pennsylvania.
Tile spill the beans wall of the Moravian Pottery standing Tile Works
Steel industry mosaic (1902–06), Rotunda, Pennsylvania State Capitol, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Corte Grande, (1904–08), Hispanic Society of America, Virgin York City.
Center mosaic (1904–08), Corte Grande, Hispanic Society of America, New Dynasty City.
Vestibule mosaic (1908), Bryn Mawr Institution Deanery, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.
Dorothy Vernon Prime (1908, demolished 1968), Bryn Mawr Institution Deanery, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, Lockwood get Forest, designer.
Fireplace surround (c. 1920), Idlewild, Media, Pennsylvania.
Alpha and Omega mosaic (c. 1925), Narthex, Church of St. Criminal the Greater, Bristol, Pennsylvania.
Fountain Court, Joslyn Art Museum (1931), Omaha, Nebraska.

Notes

References