Nathan Franklin Barrett (November 19, 1845 - October 16, 1919) was an American landscape architect. He is best known for his designs for company town of Pullman, Illinois

Pullman, Chicago

Pullman, one of Chicago's 77 community areas, is a neighborhood located on the city's South Side. Twelve miles from the Chicago Loop, Pullman is situated adjacent Lake Calumet....

, the Hotel Ponce de Leon in Florida and 'Naumkeg' in Stockbridge Massachusetts. Barrett was a founding member and president of the American Society of Landscape Architects. He also maintained a long working relationship with many noted architects and firms of the time including those of McKim, Mead & White, Carrère and Hastings and Horace Trumbauer.

Early Life

Barrett was born in 1845 near present day New Brighton on Staten Island. His father, John Thorndike Barrett was a wealthy dye manufacturer with deep roots in New England. His uncle, Col. Nathan Barrett built one of the earliest industrial parks in the country at "Factoryville" on Staten Island. Barrett went to sea for a brief period before returning to serve in the army during the Civil War. Barrett served with distinction as a 1st Lieutenant of the 156th New York Infantry. Barrett began his training as a landscape architect in 1866 by running his brother's nursery and educating himself in formal designs by available literary sources and with instruction from the family's Irish gardener.

Career

Barrett's first commissions began in 1869. His early works were largely rail stations in which he received a contract from the Central Railroad of New Jersey. From this early starting point Barrett began to gain notoriety.

In 1880 he gained his most significant commission when he was hired by George Pullman

George Pullman

George Mortimer Pullman was an American inventor and industrialist. He is known as the inventor of the Pullman sleeping car, and for violently suppressing striking workers in the company town he created, Pullman .-Background:Born in Brocton, New York, his family moved to Albion,...

 to oversee the layout and design of the company town of Pullman

Pullman, Chicago

Pullman, one of Chicago's 77 community areas, is a neighborhood located on the city's South Side. Twelve miles from the Chicago Loop, Pullman is situated adjacent Lake Calumet....

 with architect Solon S. Beman

Solon Spencer Beman

Solon Spencer Beman was an American architect who was based in Chicago, best known as the architect of the planned Pullman community and adjacent Pullman Company factory complex. Several of his other largest commissions, including the Pullman Office Building, Pabst Building, and Grand Central...

. Beman designed all the structures, while Barrett developed the streets, parks, and artificial lake. His work at Pullman led to other municiple commission throughout the 1880s and 90s including those at Fort Worth, Texas, Chevy Chase, Maryland, and Birmingham, Alabama. Barrett's association with Pullman continued with the design of Pullman's estate in New Jersey. The two men would remain friends til Pullman's death in 1897.

In 1885 Barrett was hired by Carrère and Hastings to lay out the grounds and surrounding area of the Hotel Ponce de Leon in St. Augustine, Florida. The success of the commission enabled Barrett to become the foremost proponent of formal garden design in the country. Following his work in Florida Barrett began a long relationship overseeing the landscape designs of numerous country houses for noted architects. His most significant and surviving example from this period is at 'Naumkeg' the Stockbridge home of Ambassador J. H. Choate. "Naumkeg" is one of the earliest instances in which Barrett is known to have worked with Stanford White. Barrett would go one to design many other major American country estates including "Lynnewood Hall" in Elkins Park PA,(design by Horace Trumbauer), "Woodlea" in Scarborogh NY (also by Mckim Mead & White) and "Hammersmith Farm" the Newport home of Hugh Auchincloss.

In addition to his many towns and country estates he also designed numerous parks and public grounds most prominently working under Frederick Law Olmsted for the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago, Illinois . In 1895 he was appointed landscape architect for the Parks Commission of Essex County, New Jersey. During his period with Essex County he formed a partnership with fellow design John Bogart. The only known and surviving work of Bogart and Barrett is Branch Brook Park in Newark, New Jersey. In 1900 he was appointed a commissioner of the Palisades Interstate Park Commission by Theodore Roosevelt and Foster M. Voorhees. He was the only commissioner of the Palisades Park to serve on both the New Jersey Commission and the New York Commission and the only commission to have served as a landscape architect of the Palisade Park as well. Barrett is also responsible for Rochelle Park in New Rochelle, New York where he resided for nearly twenty years several of which were in a home within the park itself.

Barrett was also involved with many professional societies. He was a founding member of the American Society of Landscape Architects of which he became the society president in 1903. He was also active with the National Sculpture Society, for whom he organized numerous exhibitions of works and the National Arts Club.

Later Years

Barrett remained busy in the last decade of his life overseeing the designs of public and private works and also publishing numerous works on the subject of landscape architecture. In 1902 he opened a school of landscape architecture within his residence in New Rochelle, New York. He worked up until several months before his death. He died October 16, 1919 at Mount Vernon Hospital in Mount Vernon, New York from throat cancer. His remaining projects and alterations to his projects were taken on Olmsted Brothers and Jacques-Henri-Auguste Gréber, whom he worked closely with on many projects and of whom were also rivals for work in his later years.

Personal Life

Barrett was married June 06, 1870 at Athens, Georgia to Lucy Mildred Lampkin, the daughter of a Confederate officer and of the prominent Cobb family of Georgia. The couple had seven children of which only one survived beyond his father. Lucy Mildred Barrett died May 30, 1886 after which Barrett married Clara Adele Weiss, the daughter of a prosperous Yonkers merchant. The couple had three children of which their son Dettmar died in a electrical accident in Rochelle Park at the age of 16. ...

Major Works

The following sites were major known projects of Nathan F. Barrett. He was known to have done projects as far west as California but many of his projects have not been recorded. Many of the sites below of have been altered by later designers or demolished by developers.

• Town & Development Plans

1. Atlanta, GA (Peters Park development)
2. Bergen Point, NJ
3. Birmingham, AL
4. Chevy Chase, MD
5. Deal Lake, NJ
6. Decatur, AL (a.k.a. New Decatur and Albany)
7. Elberon, NJ
8. Fort Worth, TX (North Fort Worth, currently known as Blemont Terrace)
9. Pullman, IL
10. Winter Harbor, ME
11. Yonkers, NY (Van Cortlandt Terrace development)

• Country Estates

1. Ballingary, Spring Lake, NJ - for Martin Maloney (demolished)
2. Bayberry Point, Islip, NY - for H. O. Havemeyer
3. C. B. Alexander Residence, Tuxedo, NY
4. Dunmere, Narragansett Pier, RI (house demolished grounds and out-buildings remain)
5. Fairlawn, Elberon, NJ - for George M. Pullman (demolished)
6. F. D. Adams Residence, Seabright, New Jersey
7. Hammersmith Farm, Newport, RI - for H. D. Auchincloss Sr.
8. Hill Crest, Red Bank, NJ - for W. F. Havemeyer
9. John Butler Residence, Pelham, NY
10. Lynnewood Hall, Elkins Park, PA - for P.A.B. Widener
11. Naumkeg, Stockbridge, MA - for Joseph H. Choate
12. Norman B. Ream estate, Thompson, CT (house demolished grounds remain)
13. Roslyn Hall , Wheatley Hills, NY - for Stanley Mortimer
14. R. W. Lesley Residence, Haverford, PA - for Mrs. Robert W. Lesley
15. Woodlea, Scarborough, NY - for Elliot F. Shepard and later Margaret Vanderbilt Shepard

• Parks and Cemeteries

1. Arcade Park, Pullman, IL
2. Branch Brook Park, Newark, NJ
3. Delano Park, Decatur, AL
4. Circle Park, Fort Worth, TX
5. Hillsdale Cemetery, Anniston, Ala.
6. Lordship Park, Stratford, CT
7. The Palisade Interstate Park , NY and NJ
8. Rochelle Park, New Rochelle NY
9. The White City, 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago, IL (under direction of F. L. Olmsted)

• Hotels/Resorts

1. Ponce-de-Leon Hotel, St. Augustine, FL (now Flagler College)
2. Grindstone Inn, Grindstone Neck, Winter Harbor,ME

• Other

1. Actor's Home, West Brighton, NY (demolished)