John Cameron Greenleaf
BornJune 2, 1878 (1878-06-02)
Lenox, Massachusetts, U.S.
DiedJanuary 18, 1958(1958-01-18) (aged 79)
Tarrytown, New York, U.S.
Alma mater
OccupationArchitect
Practice
  • John C. Greenleaf
  • Mills & Greenlead

John Cameron Greenleaf, AIA, (June 2, 1878 – January 18, 1958), was an American architect based in New York City who practiced in the early 20th–century under his own name and as partner in the firm of Mills & Greenleaf.[1][2]

Early life

Greenleaf was born in Lenox, Massachusetts.[1] He was the son of Adalein E. (née Stone) and Dr. Richard C. Greenleaf, a physician.[1] His father came to Lenox from Boston in 1875 and built a summer home on Yonkun Avenue; the property was sold to the Lenox Club in 1913.[3]

He attended Westminster School.[1] Next, he enrolled in Yale University's Sheffield Scientific School, graduating in 1899.[1][2] While at Yale, he was a member of the Fraternity of Delta Psi (St. Anthony Hall), the Renaissance Club, the University Banjo Club, and Yale's crew team.[1][4] He was also a Cup Man and was chairman of the Triennial Committee.[1] In addition, he served on the governing board of the University Club.[1]

He studied architecture at Columbia University from 1899 to 1901.[1] In the summer of 1901, he moved to Paris.[1] From April 18, 1903, to 1905, he studied architecture at the Ecole des Beaux Arts.[1]

Career

Greenleaf returned to the United States in August 1905.[1] He worked for a New York City architectural firm for eighteen months before establishing Mills & Greenleaf in 1907 with J. Laying Mills, a 1901 graduate of Yale University.[1][5] Their offices were at 345 Fifth Avenue in New York City.[1]

As Mills & Greenleaf, the firm was many times awarded. In 1908, by the Board of Awards, in Albany, New York, and judged to be among the most meritorious designs for a competition entered for a state prison.[6] They were referenced as among the associate architects attached to the new state prison erected in Peekskill, New York, located on an unusually high plateau overlooking the Hudson River.[7]

In 1908, Mills & Greenleaf designed a Tudor Revival brick orphanage, the St. Marguerite's Home, in Mendham, New Jersey.[5] This building is now part of The Community of St. John Baptist National Register Historic District.[5]

Mills & Greenleaf were selected "from the sixty-two designs submitted by the leading architects of the country for the great water gate and Fulton memorial which is to be erected in Riverside Drive between 114th and 116th Streets at an approximate cost of $2,500,000. The just of award of the Robert Fulton Monument Association announced yesterday at the Engineers' Club the names of the ten successful competitors in the preliminary competition. The award's jury consisted of two architects, Thomas Hastings and George B. Post; two laymen, Robert Fulton Cutting and Isaac Guggenheim, and Lansing C. Holden as advisory architects. Each of these ten competitors received a prize of $500. The successful contestants are Charles P. Huntington, Mills & Greenleaf. Lawrence F. Peck, J. H. Freedlander, Bosworth & Holden, and Harold Van Buren Magonigle of New York City…."[8][9][10]

Mills & Greenleaf designed the Wedgewood, a mansion for August Cheney in Manchester, Connecticut which was completed in 1911.[11] However, they split sometime around 1910.[5] This was around the time of the death of Greenleaf's father who would have left his son a sizable inheritance.[5]

As a solo practitioner, Greenleaf focused on residential projects.[5] In 1913, Greenleaf was hired to remodel his family's former summer house in Lenox, Massachusetts into the Lenox Club.[3] Greenleaf also designed additions to Wedgewood in 1921.[11] His other residential projects include homes for Marshall Prentiss in Litchfield, Connecticut, and for E S. Mills in Hewlett, Long Island.[5]

He was very likely related to architect Lewis Greenleaf Adams, as that architect founded his first practice (Adams & Prentice) at offices in 15 West 38th Street, Manhattan, in 1929, which had been the premises of Greenleaf himself from as early as 1919 to as late as 1924.[12]

Professional affiliations

He was a charter member of Society of Beaux Arts Architects in New York City.[2][3] He was also a member of the American Institute of Architecture and the Municipal Art Society in New York City.[1][2]

Personal life

On May 25, 1907, Greenleaf married Marion Constance Bacon in Lenox, Massachusetts.[1] They had a son, John C. Greenleaf Jr., and three daughters, Adeline Emily (1908) and Elizabeth (1910).[1][2] In 1910, the family lived at Pelham Manor in New York.[1] He later lived in the San Carlos Hotel in New York.[2]

He was a member of The Graduate Club of New Haven, the Pelham Country Club, the St. Anthony Club of New York, the University Club of New York, the Yale Club of New York City[1][3] Greenleaf was also a member of the Yale Graduate Advisory Rowing Committee.[2][3]

In 1958, he died in a retirement community in Tarrytown, New York at the age of eighty.[13][2] He was buried in the Lenox Cemetery-on-the-hill in Lenox, Massachusetts.[3]

Selected works

  • 1907: 171 Second Street, a six-story brick and stone tenement at 171 2nd Street, New York City for Margaret W Folsom of Waverley, Massachusetts for the expected cost of $31,000[12][14][5]
  • 1908: Associate architects for the Sing Sing Prison Competition, Peekskill, New York[12]
  • 1908: St. Marguerite's Home, two-story brick building with wings, Mendham Township and Mendham Borough, New Jersey (National Register Historic District)[5]
  • 1908: renovations to 311 East 13th Street, New York City for the expected cost of $5,000[5]
  • 1911: Wedgeway, the Austin Cheney residence, 99 Hartford Road, Manchester, Connecticut[11]
  • 1913: Renovation of the Lenox Club, Lenox, Massachusetts[3]
  • 1916: 15 East 64th Street, a five-story fireproof residence for Helen C. Thorpe of 6 East 69th Street for the expected cost of $100,000[12][5]
  • 1919: 118 West 13th Street, a two-story brick laundry and infirmary for the Ladies' Christian Union of New York City for the expected cost of $31,000[12]
  • 1921: Additions to Wedgeway, the Austin Cheney residence, 99 Hartford Road, Manchester, Connecticut[11]
  • 1923: 8–10 West 37th Street, a ten-story brick store and loft building for a speculative development corporation for the expected cost of $$300,000.[12]
  • Residence for E. S. Mills in Hewlett, Long Island[5]
  • Residence for Marshall Prentiss in Litchfield, Connecticut[5]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Osborne A. Day, ed., Decennial Record: Yale University Sheffield Scientific School, Class of 1899 (New Haven, Connecticut: The Tuttle, Morehouse & Taylor Company, 1910), p.45-46
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 "John C. Greenleaf" (PDF). New York Times. January 19, 1958. p. 86. Retrieved 2022-08-29.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "John C. Greenleaf, Architect, 80, Designed Lenox Club". The Berkshire Eagle (Pittsfield, Massachusetts). January 20, 1958. p. 11. Retrieved August 28, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  4. ↑ "Catalogue of the members of the fraternity of Delta Psi - 1912". www.familysearch.org. Retrieved 2022-08-10.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Cradic, Amy (March 7, 2007). "National Register of Historic Places Registration Form: The Community of St. John Baptist". National Park Service. Retrieved August 28, 2022.
  6. ↑ "Building News: New York" The American Architect and Building News, July 29, 1908, p.17, Contained in The American Architect and Building News, Vol. XCIV: July to December 1908 (New York)
  7. ↑ "Communication: By Mr. Franklin B. Ware, New York State Architect, Addressed to the Board of Awards, New Sing Sing Prison Competition: Illustrations" The American Architect and Building News, July 15, 1908, p.23, Contained in The American Architect and Building News, Vol. XCIV: July to December 1908 (New York)
  8. ↑ "Fulton Monument Awards, Prized Given to Architects Winning Preliminary Contest." New York Times 2 July 7, 1910 (Retrieved 25 April 2011) Filed in "Plan to Call Out 3,000 More Strikers; Union Ready to Punish Manufacturers Who Have Been Doing Non-Union Work Secretly", Excerpted: "….The successful contestants are Charles P. Huntington, Mills & Greenleaf. Lawrence F. Feck, j J-I. Freedlander, Bosworth & Holden, and Harold Van Buren...."
  9. ↑ See also "Vitrified Clay Curbing Selected for Streets and Roads – Fulton Memorial, Water Gate", Engineering News, Vol. 63: No. 2, p.44 (January 13, 1910)
  10. ↑ See also Fourteenth Annual Report of the New York State Commission of Prisons for the Year of 1908: Transmitted to the Legislature February 23, 1909 p.42.
  11. 1 2 3 4 "Cheney Brothers National Historic Landmark District Map". Manchester History. Retrieved 2022-08-29.
  12. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Office for Metropolitan History, "Manhattan NB Database 1900-1986," (Accessed 15 Apr 2011). Archived 15 February 2013 at the Wayback Machine
  13. ↑ Stern, Robert A. M.; Stamp, Jimmy (2016). Pedagogy and Place: 100 Years of Architecture Education at Yale. New Haven: Yale University Press. p. 17. ISBN 9780300211924.
  14. ↑ "Projected Buildings: Borough of Manhattan: South of 14th Street," Real Estate Record and Builders' Guide, vol. 80, no. 2066 (October 19, 1907): 614
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