PRESTON, William Gibbons (1842-1910) was an important civic and commercial architect in Boston who gained a reputation for his innovative interpretation of the Italian Reniassance and, in his later career, of the Queen Anne Revival style. Born in Boston he was the son of the architect Jonathan Preston and trained under his father from 1857 to 1860. He began his own practice at the young age of nineteen in 1861 and remained active until his death in 1910. Some of his major works in Boston include the Museum of Natural History (1863), the Rogers Building at M.I.T. (1867), the Vendome Hotel (1872) and the Rothschild Park housing development (1879). Shortly after the Great Fire in Saint John, N.B. on 20 June 1877, Preston visited the city and arranged to collaborate with W.M. Smith and R.C. John Dunn (Saint John Globe, 11 July 1877, 3). He won the competition for the Police Court & Temperance Hall (1877) and designed the Hook & Ladder House adjacent. In 1881 he completed plans for several buildings on Campobello Island, N.B., providing him with an opportunity to explore themes of the emerging Eastlake style. Preston died in Boston on 26 April 1910 (obit. Boston Evening Transcript, 27 April 1910, 1; biog. in H. Withey, Biographical Dictionary of American Architects, 1956, 486-7). The Boston Public Library holds a substantial collection of original drawings by Preston documenting over 600 projects, including the Canadian projects listed below.
A biography and illustration of several projects by Preston, including a summer mansion in Alexandria Bay, in the Thousand Islands region of the St. Lawrence River, was prepared by James O'Gorman and published in the 1989 exhibiton catalogue entitled On The Boards - Drawings by Nineteenth Century Boston Architects, pages 91-98.
SAINT JOHN, N.B., Whittaker Block, King Street, 1877 (dwgs. at Boston Public Library)
(with Smith & Dunn) SAINT JOHN, N.B., Police Station, King Street East, 1877 (Morning Freeman [Saint John], 1 Nov. 1877, 3, descrip.; American Architect & Building News [Boston], iii, 4 May 1878, 157, descrip. and plate illus.; dwgs. at Boston Public Library)
SAINT JOHN, N.B., Hook & Ladder House, 1877 (American Architect & Building News [Boston], ii, 10 Nov. 1877, plate illus.; dwgs. Boston Public Library)
(with Smith & Dunn) SAINT JOHN, N.B., Sheffield House Hotel Block, Market Square at Dock Street, 1877-78 (Daily News [Saint John], 24 Nov. 1877, 3, descrip.; dwgs. at Boston Public Library)
(with Smith & Dunn) SAINT JOHN, N.B., Ferry Toll House, Princess Street at Water Street, 1878 (Morning Freeman [Saint John], 5 Oct. 1878, 3, descrip.)
CAMPOBELLO ISLAND, N.B., Owen Hall Hotel, 1881 (American Architect & Buildings News [Boston], xi, 15 April 1882, plate illus.; dwgs. at Boston Public Library)
CAMPOBELLO ISLAND, N.B., residence for Gen. E.S. Pike, 1881 (dwgs. at Boston Public Library)
CAMPOBELLO ISLAND, N.B., park pavilion at Friars Head, 1882 (American Architect & Buildings News [Boston], xi, 10 June 1882, 270 and plate illus.; L. Maitland, Queen Anne Revival Style in Canadian Architecture, 1990, 117, illus.; dwgs. at Boston Public Library)