Charles Follen McKim

One of the foremost American architects, died September 14, 1909 at his summer home in St. James, Long Island, New York. He was born in Chester County, Pennsylvania, August 24, 1847. He spent a year at the Lawrence Scientific School at Harvard University and in 1867 went to Paris to enter the Ecole des Beaux-Arts as a pupil of Daumet. On his return from Europe in 1872, he established himself as an architect in New York. In 1877 he was joined in partnership by William R. Mead and two years later by Stanford White, when the firm of McKim, Mead & White was formed. Some of the best known works executed by the firm are the Boston Public Library; the Rhode Island State House, Providence; Madison Square Garden, New York; and the Agricultural Building at the Columbian Exposition, Chicago. In New York they erected Columbia University Library, the Hall of Fame of New York University, the Museum of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences, University and Century clubs, the J. P. Morgan Library, and the Pennsylvania Railroad Station. Mr. McKim received a gold medal at the Paris Exposition of 1900, and King Edward of England presented hi a gold medal in 1903 for valuable services to architecture. The American Institute of Architects awarded him its gold medal in 1909, although the presentation was not made until December 15, 1909, when it was received by his partner, Mr. Mead. Harvard gave him the degree of M.A. in 1893; Columbia that of Litt. D. in 1904; and the University of Pennsylvania the degree of LL.D. in 1909. He was elected an Associate of the American Institute of Architects in 1875 and a Fellow in 1877 and was its president from 1902 to 1903. He was elected an Associate of the National Academy of Design in 1905 and an Academician in 1907. He was president of the American Academy at Rome and was an honorary member of the National Society of Mural Painters and the National Sculpture Society. He had been a member of the Architectural League of New York since 1889. He was a charter member of the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects, a trustee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and a member of the Congressional Commission for the Improvement of the Park System of the City of Washington.