Main content
Radnor Historical Society architectural drawings collection
Notifications
Held at: Radnor Historical Society [Contact Us]113 West Beech Tree Lane, Wayne, PA, 19087
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Radnor Historical Society. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
Overview and metadata sections
The collection contains the records of a number of Delaware and Montgomery County (Pa.) and West Philadelphia residential developers, architects, and builders, much of which reflects the rapid suburban development of this area circa 1890-1930. Prominent among the materials are those of the developer Walter B. Smith, for which manuscript items are available giving the names of architects, clients, and communities related to Smith's work. Builders J.D. Lengel and Alan G. Smith have drawings and specifications for several projects in the collection, as do the architects Heacock and Hokanson; D. Knickerbacker Boyd; D. Judge DeNean; Horace Trumbauer; Boyd, Abel and Gugert; Thomas W. Sears; Karcher & Smith; Robert W. Pollock; Louis H. Rush; Alexander Mackie Adams; Willing, Sims & Talbutt; Zantzinger, Borie & Medary; Walter F. Price; Frank L. and William L. Price; as well as others. The New York firm of Delano & Aldrich is named on a landscape drawing for a Bryn Mawr property. Prominent among the clients is Isaac H. Clothier, Jr.
The collection is organized in three series: I. Architectural drawings & prints. II. Maps, survey drawings and ground plans. III. Specifications and other manuscript project file materials. Series I, which comprises the bulk of the collection, is arranged by architectural project sets, most of which are represented by individual RLIN VIM records. See RLIN record nos. PAPV92-F844, F1893-F1901, F1949-F1957, F1998-F2015, F2029-F2039, F2061-F2071, F2116-F2127, F2146-F2165, F2193-F2205, F2245-F2254, F2280-F2293, F2321-2325, F2476-2479. Manuscript items, which relate to project records cataloged as visual materials, have been added to these records as accompanying material.
This collection is on loan to the Athenaeum of Philadelphia, with the support of the Pew Charitable Trusts through its Museum Loan Program. Contact the Athenaeum of Philadelphia to access this collection.
Many individual items are cataloged in the Athenaeum's Philadelphia Architects & Buildings Database as “Pew Museum Loan - Radnor Historical Society Collection.” See http://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/co_display_overview.cfm/484260.
This collection is on long-term loan to the Athenaeum of Philadelphia, Archival Collections PEW/RHS/1.
There is a record for this collection in the Athenaeum of Philadelphia's Athena Library Catalog, “Radnor Historical Society (Wayne, Pa.): Architectural drawings and specifications,1890-1930,” (872 items) PPA Library | Archival Collections | PEW/RHS/1.
304 items from the collection are individually cataloged in the Athenaeum of Philadelphia's Philadelphia Architects & Buildings Database as “Pew Museum Loan - Radnor Historical Society Collection” (http://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/co_display_overview.cfm/484260).
There is also a word-processed item-level inventory of the collection available from the Radnor Historical Society.
Summary descriptive information on this collection was compiled in 2012-2014 as part of a project conducted by the Historical Society of Pennsylvania to make better known and more accessible the largely hidden collections of small, primarily volunteer run repositories in the Philadelphia area. The Hidden Collections Initiative for Pennsylvania Small Archival Repositories (HCI-PSAR) was funded by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
This is a preliminary finding aid. No physical processing, rehousing, reorganizing, or folder listing was accomplished during the HCI-PSAR project.
People
- Adams, Alexander Mackie, 1879-1967
- Adams, Louis A.
- Allbright, Chester E.
- Boyd, David Knickerbacker, b. 1872
- Brockie, Arthur H.
- Brown, C. P.
- Clothier, Isaac H.
- Cookman, William H.
- Cridland, Robert B.
- Cuppy, Robert Overton
- DeNean, D. Judge
- Edwards, E. Nelson
- Garrigues, Smauel M.
- Green, Van Rensselaer
- Greene, Van R. H.
- Gugert, Francis A.
- Huston, Joseph M.
- Johnson, Joseph.
- Keast, W. R. Morton
- Lathrop, John
- Lengel, J. D.
- Lewis, Stanford B.
- McDowell, A. P.
- Oglesby, Paul
- Page, George Bispham
- Parker, Charles S.
- Pollock, Robert W.
- Price, Frank L.
- Price, Walter F., 1857-1951
- Price, William L., 1861-1916
- Rabenold, Charles
- Reeser, Victor
- Rogers, Alva L.
- Rush, Louis H., 1880-1942
- Sears, Thomas W.
- Seeburger, Frank
- Shaw, J. William
- Smedley, Walter
- Smith, Alan G.
- Smith, W. Gordon (William Gordon), 1928-
- Smith, Walter B. (Walter Bassett)
- Stout, Penrose V.
- Street, J. Fletcher
- Trumbauer, Horace, 1869-1938
- Wadsworth, Reginald J.
- Warner, Robert A.
- Webb, A. J.
- Wendell, E. J.
- White, Ralph E.
- Yerkes, Milton R.
Organization
- Addis & Ashmead
- Boyd & Abel
- Boyd, Abel & Gugert
- Boyd, Coneys and Abel
- Dagit Bros.
- DeArmond, Ashmead and Bickley
- Delano & Aldrich
- Edwards & Hoffman
- Heacock & Hokanson
- Mackenzie & Wiley
- McIlvain and Roberts
- Overbrook Farms (Overbrook, Philadelphia, Pa.)
- Paul, Paul and Ford
- Pennsylvania Railroad Company
- R.C. Hunter & Bro.
- Radnor Realty Company
- Tilden, Register & Pepper
- Wallace and Warner
- Walter T. Karcher and Livingston Smith (Firm)
- Watson and Huckel
- Wendell and Smith
- Willing, Sims and Talbutt
- Zantzinger, Borie & Medary
Subject
- Apartment houses
- Architecture, American--History--20th century--Designs and plans
- Barns
- Garages
- Houses
- Housing developments
- Stables
Place
- Publisher
- Radnor Historical Society
- Finding Aid Author
- Finding aid prepared by the Historical Society of Pennsylvania's Hidden Collections Initiative for Pennsylvania Small Archival Repositories using data provided by the Radnor Historical Society and the Athenaeum of Philadelphia
- Access Restrictions
-
This collection is on long-term loan to the Athenaeum of Philadelphia, with the support of the Pew Charitable Trusts through its Museum Loan Program. Contact the Athenaeum for information about accessing this collection.