Edwin Dodge

Edwin Sherrill Dodge (1874–1938) was an American architect.

Personal background

Dodge was born into a wealthy family of Newburyport, Massachusetts, the son of the manufacturer Elisha Perkins Dodge. He trained as an architect at MIT, graduating in 1897.^[1] In 1902, he graduated from the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

In November 1904, Dodge married art patron and writer Mabel Dodge Luhan, then known as Mable Ganson Evans. Their unconventional marriage is described in her autobiographies Intimate Memories and European Experiences. The couple also appear in The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas.

In Arcetri, near Florence, they lived in the palatial Villa Curonia and undertook extensive, expensive renovations that consumed their incomes for years;^[2] the house "drank money".^[3] They continued to live together, more or less, in Florence until 1911, when Dodge returned to the U.S. and established architectural offices in New York and Boston. After a long separation and scandal, their divorce was finalized in June 1916.

Professional background

In 1914, Dodge partnered with John Worthington Ames (1871–1954), who had trained at Harvard and at the École des Beaux-Arts. Together, they formed the architectural firm of Ames & Dodge.

Dodge's architectural designs include:

• Newburyport High School, Newburyport, Massachusetts, circa 1912
• Ellen T. Brown Memorial Chapel, Oak Hill Cemetery, Newburyport, Massachusetts, 1914^[4]
• Edwin Booth Memorial, with sculptor Edmond Thomas Quinn, Gramercy Park, New York City, 1918^[5]
• Hartford Fire Insurance Company Building, Asylum Hill, Hartford, Connecticut, 1921
• multiple buildings in the quadrangle at Smith College, as Ames, Dodge & Putnam, 1922–1936^[6]
• Cabot Hall at Cabot House, now part of Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1936^[7]
• Lotta Fountain, Charles River Esplanade, Boston, with sculptor Katherine Lane Weems, 1939

References