Clarence H. Johnston, Sr. - Biography

Biography

Johnston's parents, Alexander Johnston and Louise Johnston (née Buckhout), moved to Waseca County, Minnesota in 1856, along with a few other families. They established a settlement named Okaman on the shores of Lake Elysian. Their first son, John Buckhout Johnston, was born in 1858, and became a prominent manufacturer and businessman. Clarence Johnston was born on August 26, 1859. The family then moved to Wilton, which was then the county seat of Waseca County, and Alexander Johnston took over the publication of a local newspaper. In 1861, the family moved to Faribault. Their third child, Grace, was born on March 2, 1862. They moved again, to St. Paul, where their fourth child, Charles Albert, was born in 1864. They moved briefly to Hastings, and then returned to St. Paul permanently in 1868. Alexander Johnston was then a reporter for the St. Paul Daily Pioneer, now the St. Paul Pioneer Press.

Clarence started attending St. Paul High School in 1872, and also took on a job as a clerk at the law firm of Rogers and Rogers. His mother died on May 8, 1874, at age 42. That same year, Clarence quit the job as clerk and went to work at the firm of Abraham M. Radcliffe as a draughtsman. Radcliffe's firm was a local training ground for aspiring architects at the time. In September 1876, Cass Gilbert joined Radcliffe's firm as an apprentice, and Gilbert and Johnston soon became very good friends. In the fall of 1878, Gilbert and Johnston entered the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. They met James Knox Taylor, who also grew up in St. Paul and had joined MIT as an architectural student a year earlier. Gilbert and Johnston, along with Taylor, had opted to take the special two-year course in architecture, rather than the full four-year degree-granting program. Johnston was forced to drop out after one term due to financial reasons. He moved back to St. Paul and worked in the firm of Edward Bassford, where the firm was more conscious of costs to the client in the design and construction costs. This influenced Johnston's work, because he viewed economic constraints as a challenge to be solved by inventiveness, instead of being a restriction on his artistry. During these years, Gilbert and Johnston kept in touch through a large number of letters.

In January 1880, Cass Gilbert departed to Europe for an architectural tour. Gilbert wrote to Johnston urging him to make a similar trip, but around that time, Johnston received a job offer from Herter Brothers in New York. One of the projects on which he worked was J.P. Morgan's brownstone house on Madison Avenue at 36th Street. In the midsummer of 1880, Cass Gilbert returned from Europe and settled in New York, working for the firm of McKim, Mead & White. Gilbert and Johnston, along with their MIT classmate Francis Bacon, shared rooms at 40 Irving Place. In the summer of 1880, Johnston, Gilbert, Bacon, Taylor, and William A. Bates founded the Sketch Club which later became the Architectural League. Accounts vary on which members were actually the founders of the club.

In February 1883, Johnston went abroad, traveling in Europe and Asia Minor. In 1886, Mr. Johnston established his own practice in Saint Paul. Five years later, he was retained by the State Board of Control, preparing plans for the Minnesota State Prison and other institutions. He was architect for the Board of Regents of the University of Minnesota and drew plans for all buildings on the new campus and some on the older portion. He was a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects and a past president and director of the Minnesota chapter.

Johnston's son, Clarence Johnston Jr., was also an architect. He designed Coffman Memorial Union and other buildings within the University of Minnesota system, as well as the limestone Tri-State Telephone Company building (now CenturyLink)at 70 W. 4th Street, built in 1937.