15.25 Linear feet (Boxes 1-17, 35, 37; reels 5750-5777)
Type:
Archival materials
Date:
1897-1957, undated
Scope and Contents note:
From its earliest days, the American Academy in Rome has included architects, painters, and sculptors among its Trustees. After its merger with the American School of Classical Studies in Rome, classical scholars and archaeologists were added.
See Appendix for a list of trustee biographies.
Arrangement note:
Records maintained by the Board of Trustees are arranged into three subseries.
2.1: Legal Documents, Minutes and Reports of Trustees, 1897-1946
2.2: Board of Trustees Committee Minutes, 1905-1946, undated
2.3: Records of Officers, 1897-1957, undated
Appendix: Trustee Biographies:
Chester H. Aldrich: architect; became a trustee of the American Academy in Rome in 1925; member of the Committee on the School of Fine Arts from 1927 until 1935, serving as its chairman from 1933 until 1935; in 1935 he was appointed director in Rome, where he remained until his death in 1940.
John Lambert Clarke Cadwalader: a New York attorney and former assistant secretary of state; an incorporator of the American Academy in Rome in 1905 and a life member; acted as an advisor for the incorporation process, was influential in endowment fundraising activities, and played an important role in the transfer of Villa Mirafiore; although trustee minutes indicate he attended some meetings, it is unclear whether Cadwalader was actually a trustee.
Gilmore D. Clarke: member of the Fine Arts Committee and chairman of the Special Committee on Villa Aurelia from 1944 to 1945.
James C. Egbert: professor of classics at Columbia University; served as the annual professor at the Rome School of Classical Studies in 1903/04; trustee of the American Academy in Rome from 1911 to 1945; became a member of the Committee on the School of Classical Studies in 1914 and served as its chairman between 1927 and 1940; during the 1930s he served on the Committee on Nominations, and from 1940 until 1944 was vice president of the academy.
Barry Faulkner: a fellow in painting at the American Academy in Rome from 1907 to 1910, and annual professor of fine arts from 1922 to 1923; for many years he was president of the Association of Alumni of the Academy; elected a trustee in 1930, he was appointed a member of the Committee on the School of Fine Arts that same year, and eventually became committee chairman; during World War II, he represented the American Academy in Rome on the Citizens Committee for the Army-Navy Triptych Project; awarded the American Academy in Rome medal for outstanding service in 1960.
Allan C. Johnson: professor of classics at Princeton University; trustee of the American Academy in Rome between 1929 and 1946; professor of classical studies during the academic year 1933/34, and for many years served as a member of the Committee on the School of Classical Studies, of which he was chairman from 1940 through 1945.
William M. Kendall: an architect and partner in the firm of McKim, Mead, and White, Kendall; was an incorporator, in 1905, and trustee of the American Academy in Rome from 1905 to 1941; served as a member of the Committee on the School of Fine Arts for many years.
C. Grant La Farge: a practicing architect who was active in the affairs of the American Institute of Architects; was elected a trustee of the American Academy in Rome in 1909, served on its executive committee, and was secretary to the board of trustees from 1912 to 1938.
Edward P. Mellon: architect and nephew of Andrew Mellon; became a trustee of the American Academy in Rome and served as acting secretary of the board from 1917 to 1918; served on the Endowment Committee, circa 1919-1923, first as its treasurer and later becoming its chairman.
Norton, Charles Dyer: a banker who was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury and private secretary to President Taft, from 1908 to 1911; elected a trustee of the American Academy in Rome in 1913; a member of the executive and finance committees, and served on the endowment committee from 1913 to 1917.
Charles A. Platt: became a trustee of the American Academy in Rome in 1919; an architect who joined the Committee on the School of Fine Arts in 1921 and was its chairman from 1927 until 1928; elected president in 1928, serving until his death in 1933.
John Russell Pope: first recipient of the Rome Prize in Architecture at the American School of Architecture in Rome from 1895 to 1897; a trustee of the American Academy in Rome from 1926 to 1933; served on the Committee on the School of Fine Arts, 1927-1938, and was president of the board from 1933 until his death in 1937.
Edward K. Rand: professor of Latin at Harvard University, Rand; elected a trustee of the American Academy in Rome in 1911; served for many years on the Committee on the School of Classical Studies, and during 1912/13 was a professor at the School of Classical Studies; resigned from the board in 1929 due to pressures of his Harvard workload, but many years later resumed his position as a trustee.
John C. Rolfe: professor of Latin at the University of Pennsylvania; taught at the American School of Classical Studies in Rome from 1907 to 1908, and at the American Academy in Rome from 1923 to 1924; served as a member of the Committee on the School of Classical Studies from 1921 to 1940; also served on the Committee on Publications for an undetermined period, and was its chairman during 1927.
James Kellum Smith: after holding the Stewardson Fellowship in Architecture of the University of Pennsylvania and the American Academy in Rome from 1920 to 1923, Smith joined the firm of McKim, Mead, and White; first elected a trustee in 1933, he was a member of the Committee on the School of Fine Arts and served as its chairman; president of the American Academy in Rome from 1937 until 1958 and in 1961 was awarded its medal for outstanding service.
S. Breck Trowbridge: an incorporator of the American Academy in Rome in 1905; became a trustee in 1906; chairman of the Committee on the School of Fine Arts from 1915 (and possibly earlier), served as vice president from 1917 to 1925, and was chairman of the endowment fund committee from 1919 to 1921.
Ferruccio Vitale: a landscape architect and trustee of the American Academy in Rome; instrumental in the founding of its landscape architecture department and establishing scholarships in landscape architecture; served on the Committee on the School of Fine Arts, 1921-1931 and was active in the Committee on Endowment's fundraising campaigns, 1914-1920.
John Quincy Adams Ward: Sculptor John Quincy Adams Ward was among the artist members of the first board of trustees of the American Academy in Rome in 1897.
Andrew F. West: professor of Latin at Princeton University, and later Dean of the Princeton Graduate School; chairman of the managing committee of the American School of Classical Studies in Athens; served as a trustee of the academy from 1911 to 1928, and from 1917 as chairman of the Advisory Committee on the School of Classical Studies.
William L. Westerman: professor of history at the universities of Wisconsin, Cornell, and Columbia; served as a trustee from 1921 until 1932; Professor in Charge of Classical Studies at the American Academy in Rome from 1926 to 1927, and a member of the Committee on the School of Classical Studies from 1922-1935.
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Collection Citation:
American Academy in Rome records, 1855-2012. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
