WETHERELL, Robert Charles (1805-1845)
(biography in preparation)
A detailed biography on the architect Robert C. Wetherell, prepared by Stephen A. Otto, was published in 2004 by the Hamilton Heritage Foundation. This work, entitled Robert Wetherell and Dundurn: An Architect in Early Hamilton, is cited in the entries below.
HAMILTON, ONT., Christ Church (Anglican), James Street North, 1835-39; demol. 1872 (Montreal Gazette, 24 Oct. 1835, 2, cornerstone ceremony; Toronto Constitution, 10 Feb. 1837, 3, descrip.; Canadian Church Magazine & Mission News [Toronto], Vol. 1, Nov. 1887, 406-08, descrip.; Christ's Church Cathedral Hamilton 1835-1935, 1935, 15, illus.; Marion Macrae & Anthony Adamson, Hallowed Walls, 1975, 87-90, illus.; Hal Kalman, History of Canadian Architecture, 1994, 182-83, illus. & descrip.; S.A. Otto, 2004, 20-23, illus. & descrip.)
HAMILTON, ONT., Dundurn Castle, a mansion for Sir Allen Napier MacNab, York Street at Dundurn Street North, 1835; still standing in 2020 and now a designated National Historic Site (Marion Macrae, MacNab of Dundurn, 1971, 55-72, descrip.; 96 ff., illus.; Janet Wright, Architecture of the Picturesque in Canada, 1984, 78-80, illus.; S.A. Otto, 2004, 9-16, illus. & descrip.)
HAMILTON, ONT., “Barton Lodge”, a villa for James Matthew Whyte, on Hamilton Mountain, above Beckett's Drive, 1835; burned 1930 (S.A. Otto, 29-30, illus. & descrip.; David G. Burley & Ronald Rubin, “A Gentleman's Country Villa: James Matthew Whyte, Robert C. Wetherell and Barton Lodge, Hamilton, Upper Canada 1834-1843”, in the Journal of the Society for the Study of Architecture in Canada, xliv, No. 2, 2019, 56-73, illus. & descrip.)
(attributed) HAMILTON, ONT., “ West Lawn”, a large residence for Colin Ferrie, York Street at Queen Street, 1836; demol. 1957 (S.A. Otto, 25-28, illus. & descrip.)
TORONTO, ONT., a villa for Robert Sympson Jameson, Front Street West, west of Spadina Avenue, 1836; altered, with an addition for Frederick Widder, in 1854, by Cumberland & Storm (dwgs. at OA, Horwood Coll.; S. Otto, 2004, 23-4, illus.)
(attributed) HAMILTON, ONT., The Gore Bank, King Street at Hughson Street, 1844 (S.A. Otto, 39-40, illus.)
d###COMPETITIONS
PHILADELPHIA, PENN., Girard College, 1832-33. The call for entries in this important national architectural competition was published in June 1832, and 21 designs were received including submissions from some of the luminaries of American architecture such as William Strickland of Philadelphia, Town & Davis of New York, and Thomas U. Walter of Philadelphia. One of the entries submitted was a joint effort from Robert Higham of New York City who collaborated with an architect named Robert Wetherall [sic]. This is almost certainly the same Robert Wetherell, who was listed as an architect in New York during the following year in 1833 (Longworth's New York Directory, 1833-34, p. 641). He lived and worked in New York City in 1832-33, and later arrived in Toronto in November 1833. The competition for the college was won by Thomas Ustick Walter. A full list of the competitors, including Higham & Wetherall of New York, was published in Hazard's Register of Pennsylvania [Philadelphia], Vol. xi, Jan-June 1833, p. 27. An illustrated catalogue on the exhibition of drawings from the competition was published by the Athenaeum in Philadelphia in 1994 (Bruce Laverty, Girard College Architectural Collections, 1994, p. 6, list of competitors).
NEW YORK CITY, N.Y., The Merchant's Exchange, 1835-36. Many prominent architects submitted plans in February 1836 for this New York landmark, including Town & Davis (New York City), John Haviland (Philadelphia), and a person named Robert Wetherell, likely the Canadian architect who, by then, had left New York and settled in Hamilton, Ont. (Lois Severini, The Architecture of Finance – Early Wall Street, 1983, 42-6). The winner of the competition was Isaiah Rogers of Boston.