Henry Bacon 1866-1924, American architect, b. Watseka, Ill. He began his professional career with the firm of McKim, Mead, and White, but after 1903 he practiced independently. Among the important structures designed by him are the Lincoln Memorial at Washington, D.C. (completed 1917), and the World War Memorial at Yale Univ.

Bacon, Henry (1866–1924). Illinois-born American architect, much influenced by his elder brother, Francis Henry Bacon (1856–1940), architect, who had been involved in archaeological expeditions in Asia Minor in the 1880s. In 1889 Henry Bacon himself travelled in Greece and Asia Minor, before returning to the prestigious firm of McKim, Mead, & White, where he contributed to the designs of RI State House (1891–1903), the World's Columbian Exposition and the Brooklyn Museum (both 1893), and the J. P. Morgan Library (1902–6). In 1897 he set up his own practice, producing buildings of scholarly refinement and exquisite detail, including a large number of monuments and mausolea. His expertise in this field led to the commission to design the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC (1911–22), which terminates the axis of the Mall at the Potomac River: it is one of the finest examples of Neo-Classical Greek Revival architecture in the world.

Bibliography

Hitchcock (1977);
Kidney (1974);
V. J. Scully (1988)

BACON, HENRY 1866-1924

Architect

Leader in the Beaux -Arts Style

Henry Bacon's greatest accomplishment was designing the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. (completed in 1917 and dedicated in 1922), a project that reflects his profound commitment to American democratic ideals. In his time Bacon was respected as one of the most talented exponents of the fashionable Beaux-Arts style of architecture, so-called because it was taught at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Based on a careful study of antiquity and often combining an eclectic use of other historic elements, this style placed great emphasis on refinement of taste and made up in elegance and sophistication what it sometimes lacked in vitality and originality. Bacon's contribution to the American interpretation of Beaux-Arts design was a pure classicism born of his great love for ancient Greek and Roman art and architecture. Yet perhaps his most significant legacy to American architecture was his collaboration with some of the foremost sculptors of his day, including Daniel Chester French (who sculpted the statue of Abraham Lincoln for the Lincoln Memorial) and Augustus Saint-Gaudens.

Training and Apprenticeship

Henry Bacon was born on 28 November 1866 in Watseka, Illinois, a village near Chicago. He studied engineering and architecture at the University of Illinois in 1884-1885, leaving to work for Chamberlin and Whidden, an architectural firm in Boston, where he was first exposed to the Beaux-Arts style. Three years later he moved to the celebrated firm of McKim, Mead and White in New York City. His work at Chamberlin and Whidden qualified him to enter the prestigious Rotch traveling-scholarship competition, which he won in 1889 with his design for an "Art College in a City Park." This scholarship permitted Bacon to spend two years in Europe, where he immersed himself in a study of classical architecture. Returning to McKim, Mead and White in 1891, he remained with the firm until 1897, when he became cofounder of Brite and Bacon. Five years later he formed his own independent firm.

Monuments and Memorials

Although his schools, hospitals, libraries, railroad stations, and banks were also admired, Bacon's memorials and monuments seemed to embody best the classical ideals he brought to his work. Among them are the base of the memorial to Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman in New York and the memorial to Charles Parnell in Dublin, Ireland, one of several on which he collaborated with Saint-Gaudens. Bacon believed that these memorials ought to inspire reverence and mystery in the viewer and often set his monuments in secluded areas, "for then, in quiet, and without distraction of the senses or mind, the beholder is alone with the lesson which the object is designed to teach and inspire." He began preliminary work on the Lincoln Memorial in 1911, chosen because of his extensive training in Beaux-Arts architecture during his association with McKim, Mead and White. With its row of fluted Doric columns, the memorial was inspired by the Parthenon, which Bacon had visited on his European travels. The Lincoln Memorial has become one of the best-loved monuments in America, a symbol of liberty for succeeding generations.

Awards

In 1923 Bacon won the Gold Medal of the American Institute of Architects for his Lincoln Memorial design. He was also a member of the National Academy of Arts and Sciences, as well as the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He died on 16 February 1924.

Sources:

William Dudley Hunt Jr., Encyclopedia of American Architecture, revised by Robert T. Packard and Balthazar Korab (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1994);

Christopher Alexander Thomas, "The Lincoln Memorial and Its Architect, Henry Bacon (1866—1924)," dissertation, Yale University, 1990.