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Col. Frank Hoppin
Born
Francis Laurens Vinton Hoppin

(1866-10-07)October 7, 1866
Providence, Rhode Island, US
DiedOctober 9, 1941(1941-10-09) (aged 75)
Newport, Rhode Island, US
Alma mater
OccupationArchitect
Spouses
Sarah Carnes Weeks
​
​
(m. 1893, divorced)​
Mary Latham Gurnee
​
​
(m. 1910)​
Practice
ProjectsThe Mount, New York City Police Headquarters, Wadsworth Mansion, Springwood

Colonel Francis Laurens Vinton Hoppin (October 7, 1866 – October 9, 1941)[1] was a prominent American architect and painter from Providence, Rhode Island.

Early life

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Hopping was born on October 7, 1866, in Providence, Rhode Island. He was a son of Dr. Washington Hoppin (1824–1867), a homeopathic physician, and Louise Claire (née Vinton) Hoppin (1832–1891). Among his siblings was Howard Hoppin, Louise Claire Hoppin (a founder of the Red Cross),[2] Harriet (née Hoppin) Jacob,[3] and Washington Hoppin, Jr.[4]

Francis was from a prominent and talented Providence family; his paternal grandparents were Thomas Coles Hoppin and Harriet Dunn (née Jones) Hoppin.[5] His maternal grandparents were Maj. John Rogers Vinton (who was killed during the Siege of Veracruz and became the namesake of Fort Vinton) and Lucretia Dutton (née Parker) Vinton of Boston. Among his paternal uncles were Augustus Hoppin, a prominent illustrator (who wrote about the family in his novel, Recollections of Auton House),[6] and Dr. Courtland Hoppin, also a homeopathic physician, was the grandfather of Courtland Hector Hoppin, a pioneer in the field of animated film. His maternal uncle, David Hammond Vinton, Quartermaster General of Florida (who married Pamela, a daughter of Maj. Gen. Jacob Brown), was the father of The Right Reverend Alexander Hamilton Vinton, the first Bishop of Western Massachusetts, and Harriette Arnold Vinton (wife of Dr. John Clarkson Jay, son of Dr. John Clarkson Jay).

After early training at the Trinity Military Institute, Providence, he prepared for a career in the U.S. Army, but left to study architecture at Brown University and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.[7] After MIT, he went to Paris for training, but apparently not at the École des Beaux Arts as has been reported.[8]

Career

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Hoppin's drawing of the design for The Brooklyn Museum.

On returning to the United States, Hoppin joined the firm of McKim, Mead and White in 1886. Reportedly, while with the firm, McKim noted Hoppin's exceptional skill at rendering with one architectural historian writing: "Among architects that had a facility for perspective Francis L.V. Hoppin stands out..." He became the office specialist in perspective, exemplified in his drawings for the Century Club and The Brooklyn Museum. Fellow office architect, Egerton Swartwout, characterized Hoppin's drawings as "colored, blue sky and trees where there aren't any, and flying shadows on the building, you know, a real snappy piece of work."[8]

In 1890, he joined his brother Howard and Spencer P. Read to form a new firm was known as Hoppin, Read & Hoppin.[9] They worked together until 1896, when Francis left to found the firm of Hoppin & Koen in New York City with Terence A. Koen. The firm was based is known for police stations, fire stations and dignified town houses in the Beaux Arts style.[7] Among his apprentices at Hoppin & Koen were Robert P. Huntington and Dudley Newton, Jr., the son of a prominent Newport architect.[8]

The firm became well known for its large country houses in the most fashionable parts of America during the Gilded Age.[10] They designed homes for Francis Vinton Greene (a relative), James F. D. Lanier, Andrew C. Zabriskie, John J. Wysong, Harris C. Fahnestock, Charles Oliver Iselin, Henry Clews, and William Watts Sherman.[8] One of Hoppin's best known works was The Mount, Edith Wharton's home in Lenox. Wharton commissioned the firm to design her Lenox residence (with major input from her at every stage of the process), after having a falling out with Ogden Codman, Jr. Hoppin retired in 1923 to pursue a career as an artist,[11] and Koen died the following year in 1923.[12]

When the Spanish–American War began, Hoppin enlisted in the 12th Regiment of the New York National Guard, reaching the rank of Major, and at one time was Adjutant General of the First Brigade, New York National Guard. He was later granted the title of "Colonel" by Gov. Charles Seymour Whitman, which he answered for the rest of his life.[8]

Painting career

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In 1925 and 1929, Hoppin gave a one-man show of his watercolors in New York. He largely painted on location at visits to Soissons, Rheims, Arras, Ypres, Rome, Paris, Newport and Bar Harbor, Maine.[1]

He produced dozens of watercolors usually of architectural subjects or of gardens.[8]

Notable architectural projects

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New York City Police Headquarters, 1909
James F. D. Lanier Residence, 1901–1903

As Hoppin, Read & Hoppin, 1890–1896:

  • Charles Street Grammar School (1891), 291 Charles St., Providence, RI - Demolished.[13]
  • Olney Street Fire Station (1892), 355 Hope St., Providence, RI[14]
  • Psi Upsilon Residence (1892), 4 Manning St., Providence, RI - Demolished in 1972.[15]
  • Harry A. Waldron Residence (1893), 9 Stimson Ave., Providence, RI[16]
  • Hayter Reed Residence (1894), Ottawa, Ontario - Demolished in 1970.[11]
  • Howard Hoppin Residence (c. 1894), 86 Brown St., Providence, RI - His brother's residence.[17]
  • Maxcy Hall (1895), 108 George St., Brown University, Providence, RI - Altered.[18]
  • Stephen A. Cooke Residence (1895), 37 Manning St., Providence, RI[19]

As Hoppin & Koen, 1896–1922:

Personal life

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On June 3, 1893,[28] Hoppin was married to Sarah Carnes Weeks (1863–1956) at Oyster Bay on Long Island.[29] She was the youngest daughter of John Abeel Weeks (son of Robert D. Weeks, co-founder and president of the New York Stock Exchange) and Alice Hathaway (née Delano) Weeks (a distant cousin of Franklin D. Roosevelt).[30] Sarah was a first cousin of Henry W. DeForest and Robert W. DeForest.[31][32]

In 1910, he married, secondly, to Mary Latham Gurnee (1880–1968),[33] a daughter of Walter Scott Gurnee and Mary Isabelle (née Barney) Gurnee (daughter of Danford N. Barney, president of Wells Fargo & Company).[34] After his retirement, the Hoppins were frequent hosts at their homes in Newport,[35][36][37] and Palm Beach.[38]

Hoppin died at Auton House, his residence on Harrison Avenue in Newport, Rhode Island, on October 9, 1941.[1] Hoppin had two services, first at Emmanuel Episcopal Church in Newport and second at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in New York City before being buried at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery at Tarrytown, New York.[39] After his death, his widow remarried twice; first to Alfred Hudson Townley in 1949 (former Justice of the First Judicial Department in New York and widower of Martha Depew Strang, niece of U.S. Senator Chauncey Depew);[40] and, after his death in 1954,[41] Cyril Barthurst Judge (whose late wife, Annie Lyman, had also died in 1954)[42] past president of the Newport Country Club, in 1963.[43]

References

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Notes
  1. ^ President John F. Kennedy privately leased the estate as his summer White House for his planned 1964 summer season, but was assassinated in 1963.[21]
  2. ^ Southways was known as the "Winter White House" after President Warren Harding stayed there as a guest.[27]
Sources
  1. ^ a b c "COL. F. L. V. HOPPIN, NEWPORT COLONIST; Retired New York Architect Dies in Home at the Resort After Suffering Stroke". The New York Times. 10 September 1941. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  2. ^ "Miss Louise C. Hoppin, 100, Red Cross Founder, Dies". Providence Journal. September 18, 1959. p. 30.
  3. ^ Social Register, Summer. Social Register Association. 1907. p. 127. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  4. ^ "Washington Hoppin". Hartford Courant. 20 May 1914. p. 9. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  5. ^ Hoppin, Louise Clare (1937). The Hoppin Family: Sketches From Memory. OCLC 754953661. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  6. ^ Haley, John Williams; Martin, Christopher (transcribed by) (1931). "Auton House". quahog.org. Quahog.org. Archived from the original on 30 July 2021. Retrieved 28 July 2020. Originally from an Old Stone Bank educational pamphlet published by the Providence Institution for Savings on March 2, 1931.
  7. ^ a b "Francis L. V. Hoppin". oxfordreference.com. Oxford Reference. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  8. ^ a b c d e f Champlin, Richard L. (1986). "Colonel Hoppin's Newport". Newport History. 59 Issue 201 Article 3 (Winter 1-1-1986). Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  9. ^ "Hoppin, Read & Hoppin, Architects". Industries and Wealth of the Principal Points in Rhode Island. 1892.
  10. ^ Hanson, Conrad (April 11, 2013). "BEAUX ARCHITECTS OF THE HUDSON VALLEY: HOPPIN AND KOEN AROUND THE CORNER —". schoolfieldcountryhouse.com. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  11. ^ a b "Hoppin & Koen". dictionaryofarchitectsincanada.org. Biographical Dictionary of Architects in Canada. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  12. ^ "Died. KOEN". The New York Times. 17 May 1923. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  13. ^ Annual Report of the Superintendent of Public Buildings for the Year 1891 . 1892.
  14. ^ Historic and Architectural Resources of the East Side, Providence: A Preliminary Report. 1989.
  15. ^ American Architect and Building News 10 Sept. 1892.
  16. ^ Woodward, Wm. McKenzie. Providence: A Citywide Survey of Historic Resources. 1986.
  17. ^ "RI National Register Search: Hoppin, Howard House". http://www.ri.gov/. n.d. Web.
  18. ^ Engineering News 19 Jan. 1895: 143.
  19. ^ American Architect and Building News 30 March 1895: xvi.
  20. ^ "Illustrations". American Architect and Architecture. J. R. Osgood & Company: 112. 1904. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  21. ^ L, Zach (June 26, 2012). "Armsea Hall". BEYOND THE GILDED AGE. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  22. ^ New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission; Dolkart, Andrew S.; Postal, Matthew A. (2009). Postal, Matthew A. (ed.). Guide to New York City Landmarks (4th ed.). New York: John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-0-470-28963-1., p.106
  23. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m "Hoppin & Koen architectural drawings and photographs, 1900-1922". findingaids.library.columbia.edu. Avery Drawings & Archives Collections | Columbia University Libraries Finding Aids. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  24. ^ "Rear View of the House of Newbold Morris, Esq., Lenox, MA, 1913, Hoppin & Koen". stcroixarchitecture.com. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  25. ^ "Albany County". nycourts.gov. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  26. ^ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. March 13, 2009.
  27. ^ Rose, Rick (2017). Palm Beach: The Essential Guide to America's Legendary Resort Town. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 49. ISBN 9781493028900. Retrieved 7 March 2018.
  28. ^ "Hoppin -- Weekes". The New York Times. 4 June 1893. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  29. ^ "Mrs. Frank Hoppin". The New York Times. 30 March 1956. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  30. ^ "Mrs. Francis Laurens Vinton Hoppin (1863-1956)". nyhistory.org. New-York Historical Society. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  31. ^ Greene, Richard Henry; Stiles, Henry Reed; Dwight, Melatiah Everett; Morrison, George Austin; Mott, Hopper Striker; Totten, John Reynolds; Pitman, Harold Minot; Forest, Louis Effingham De; Ditmas, Charles Andrew; Mann, Conklin; Maynard, Arthur S. (1900). The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record. New York Genealogical and Biographical Society. p. 246. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  32. ^ American Ancestry. 1895. p. 90. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  33. ^ "JUDGE--Mary Latham (Gurnee)". The New York Times. 21 April 1968. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  34. ^ "MISS MARY L. GURNEE TO WED.; Daughter of Mr. and Mrs. W. S. Gurnee Betrothed to F. L. V. Hoppin". The New York Times. 31 August 1909. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  35. ^ "COL. FRANCIS HOPPIN HOST AT NEWPORT; Entertains at Luncheon and Acts as Reviewing Officer of the Apprentice Seamen". The New York Times. 2 October 1936. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  36. ^ "COL. FRANCIS HOPPIN HOST ON BIRTHDAY; He Entertains With a Dinner Party at His Newport Home on 67th Anniversary. MRS. C.A. BALDWIN ARRIVES Misses Wetmore Give Luncheon -- Mrs. LeBrun Rhinelander Returns to the Viking". The New York Times. 8 October 1936. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  37. ^ "LUNCHEONS MARK DAY IN NEWPORT; Mrs. Herbert Shipman, Mrs. C.L. Blair and Mrs. Albert Sidney Have Guests FRANCIS HOPPINS HOSTS Mrs. Peyton J. Van Rensselaer Gives Tea--Francis Taylors Entertain at Dinner". The New York Times. 26 July 1940. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  38. ^ "STUART DUNGANS FETED IN FLORIDA; Col and Mrs. Francis L.V. Hoppin Have a Large Dinner for Them in Palm Beach". The New York Times. 24 February 1935. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  39. ^ "Service for Col. F. L. V. Hoppin". The New York Times. 11 September 1941. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  40. ^ "MRS. MARY HOPPIN IS WED IN FLORIDA; Widow of Architect the Bride in Palm Beach of Alfred H. Townley, Retired Jurist". The New York Times. 1 December 1949. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  41. ^ "Judge Alfred Townley Of 'Auton House' Dies". Newport Daily News. 31 July 1954. p. 2. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  42. ^ "Mrs. Cyril B. Judge". The New York Times. 18 July 1954. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  43. ^ "Cyril B. Judge". The New York Times. 16 January 1973. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
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