Early Life and Career
Wheelwright was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, educated at Roxbury Latin School and graduated from Harvard University in 1876. He studied architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and later in Europe, after which he worked in the offices of Peabody and Stearns and of firms in New York and Albany.
In 1883 he started a business of his own and afterwards became a member of the firm of Wheelwright & Haven, more recently Wheelwright, Haven & Hoyt.
In June 1887, Wheelwright married Elizabeth Boott Brooks.
In 1893 Wheelwright and R. Clipston Sturgis were chosen by the trustees of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston to spend a year studying art museums throughout Europe; they later contributed to the ongoing design of the museum's building on Huntington Avenue.
Wheelwright, who designed the Harvard Lampoon Building, also oversaw the construction. It was first opened on February 19, 1909. Wheelwright while attending Harvard University was one of the founders of the Harvard Lampoon. Wheelwright's design was inspired in part by an old church in Jamestown, Virginia, and by the Flemish Renaissance details of Auburn Street buildings in its vicinity.
He was a fellow of the American Institute of Architects, serving on its Board of Directors from 1892-1894 and 1898-1900, as well as a fellow of the Boston Society of Architects. He published two books on school architecture: "The American Schoolhouse" and "School Architecture."
Charles Donagh Maginnis had been his apprentice.
After suffering a nervous breakdown from overwork, he lived at a Thompsonville, CT sanitarium for 2 years before passing away on August 14, 1912. He was just 57 years of age. His obituary is in the August 15, 1912 edition of the New York Times.
Read more about this topic: Edmund M. Wheelwright
Famous quotes containing the words early life, early, life and/or career:
“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“O troubled forms, O early love unfortunate and hard,
Time has estranged you into a jewel cold and pure;”
—Edna St. Vincent Millay (18921950)
“The true poem is not that which the public read. There is always a poem not printed on paper,... in the poets life. It is what he has become through his work. Not how is the idea expressed in stone, or on canvas or paper, is the question, but how far it has obtained form and expression in the life of the artist. His true work will not stand in any princes gallery.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)
“In time your relatives will come to accept the idea that a career is as important to you as your family. Of course, in time the polar ice cap will melt.”
—Barbara Dale (b. 1940)