The Architecture of Colonial America

by Harold Donaldson Eberlein

OLD PHILADELPHIA COURT HOUSE. BUILT 1707.

definite instance is cited. We shall, therefore, use certain specified houses for the sake of example. The first of these to claim our attention is Wynnestay, shown in one of the accompanying illustrations, the ancient home of the Wynne family, on the borders of the Welsh Barony. When built in 1689, it was in deep country; now it is surrounded by a suburban growth. Practically the only alteration that Wynnestay has ever undergone was raising the ridgepole of the roof, on the oldest part, to the line of the 1700 addition at a time when it was found necessary to make some repairs. Save this, and what has been built at the back to meet increased domestic needs, Wynnestay remains to-day in its pristine state and is, therefore, valuable as a well-preserved example of Welsh Colonial work. Doors and windows are low, but of generous breadth, and capped by heavy stone lintels made of thick, oblong slabs that must have cost no ordinary exertion and energy to set them in place. The two dormers have the same sharply-pointed peaks that we shall see in another Colonial example. As might be expected, the walls are thick and everything about the building is of the most solid construction.

When Wynnestay was built, the colonists had had no time to evolve new architectural forms, so we may be sure that in erecting their dwellings they followed as closely as they were able all traditions and precedents with which they had been familiar in the old country. That Wynnestay and its contemporaries faithfully represent the farmhouses and small manor houses of Wales and England we may feel the more certain because capable artisans, both house carpenters and stone masons, accompanied the earlier settlers and by this time had arrived in considerable numbers in the colony, and of course were working by the principles instilled into them in their apprentice days.

The masonry of the Pennsylvania Colonial type has been highly admired time and time again by architects in all sections of the country. The same sort of masonry work is being done by local stone masons today, and so individual and characteristic is it that they are sometimes sent for to erect walls at a great distance from their own locality, because no other masons can be found to put quite the same touch into the face of the wall or lay the stones in quite the same way. But the charm for which their handiwork is justly famed is due to the fact that they are merely following the tradition handed down to them by the old Welsh and English masons who came over with the first settlers. The tradition has been faithfully perpetuated ever since. We find it in strong evidence in all the old houses of that type, in fact in all the old buildings. It will be adverted to, in the chapter on old Colonial churches, in connexion with St. David’s, Radnor. Again we see it in such a building as Waynesborough, which, by the way, is particularly interesting as marking the transition from the early Colonial type to the early Georgian.

Although Waynesborough was not built until a few years after Graeme Park or Hope Lodge, those striking examples of the first phase of the Middle Colonies’ Georgian, it has, nevertheless, retained in certain features a strong resemblance to the early Colonial Welsh type. The masonry is precisely the same, but more noticeable even than this are the lintels of the doors and windows, constructed of a number of stones vertically set in a flattened or elliptical arch. This form is to be seen in much of the early Welsh work concurrently with the great slabs noted at Wynnestay.

In general character Wynnestay is similar to the other Welsh houses near by, such as Pencoyd, at Bala, built in 1633, or Harriton, built a little later, but it has suffered less change in the lapse of years than its near neighbours in Lower Merion township or other sections in which the Welsh influence was felt, and it is better fitted to represent the type. The house is built of native grey fieldstone of varied sizes—some of the stones were probably turned up in the course of clearing the fields round about—lined with white mortar and presents an interesting feature in the bold moulding of the cornices. A continuation of the cornice from the eaves, following the same horizontal line, traverses the face of the wall at each gable end, making, with the gable cornice, a complete triangle. This arrangement of the cornice as a string course across the gable ends gives the roof a downright, positive appearance. The cornice in this arrangement is not dissimilar from the penthouse so often used on structures of this date between the first and second floors. Wynnestay was built at two different periods. The first part, built in 1689, has a penthouse along the front with a triangular hood; the later addition, built in 1700, has the penthouse between the first and second floors, but without the triangular hood above the door. Still another feature showing the close connexion of Waynesborough with the early Colonial type, as exemplified by Wynnestay, is the hood over the house door. Although the penthouses have disappeared the hood has remained, and indicates very plainly a certain line of descent.

Wynnestay and other old houses just like it were the forerunners of a type of structure that has come to be known as the Pennsylvania Colonial farmhouse type; very worthy the type is, truly comfortable, homelike and sensible, and deserving the popularity accorded it, so long as it sticks closely to its severe simplicity and avoids all attempt at pretence. The very moment, however, we depart from time-honoured tradition and attempt to begaud this sort of building with Georgian embellishments and furbelows—a thing far too often done—it looks unseemly and ludicrous. Before leaving the subject one should add that the Pennsylvania Colonial farmhouse is found in roughcast as well as stone, and that the buildings erected by the English settlers, though similar, were apt to be somewhat higher than the old, squat dwellings of the Welsh, whose natural predilection for “stumpiness” is well exemplified by the towers of their churches.

Our next Colonial example is Wyck in Germantown, at the corner of Walnut Lane and Germantown Road. Like Wynnestay, Wyck has undergone scarcely any change since its staunch walls were reared. Furthermore, Wyck has never been sold, but has passed from owner to owner by inheritance, and as its possessors have always been careful to maintain everything in its original condition, it can readily be seen that a more trustworthy example of Pennsylvania Colonial architecture could not be chosen. Wyck represents the German influence in Colonial architecture. The structure is really two houses joined together. The first was built about 1690 or earlier; the second, though built somewhat later, nevertheless dates also from an early period. Through the first part of the connecting portion, that links the two houses into one, ran a passage or waggon way. This passage was afterward closed in and now forms a great hallway from which open outwards big double doors almost as wide as barn doors, with a long transom of little lights above them.