Robert Swain Peabody


Robert Swain Peabody was a prominent Boston architect who was the cofounder of the firm Peabody & Stearns.

Early life

Peabody was born in New Bedford, Massachusetts on February 20, 1845. He was a son of Rev. Ephraim Peabody and Mary Jane Peabody. His older sister, Ellen Derby Peabody, was the wife of Charles William Eliot, the 21st President of Harvard University. Another sister, Anna Huidekoper Peabody, was the wife of Henry Whitney Bellows, president of the United States Sanitary Commission. His younger brother was the Rev. Francis Greenwood Peabody, Dean of the Harvard Divinity School.
He attended Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts and the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

Career

He was an early supporter of the Colonial Revival style and had an affection for English styles and the Picturesque Movement and Beaux-Arts architecture. He was elected an Associate of the American Institute of Architects in 1874 and a Fellow in 1889. He was president of the Institute from 1900 to 1901. He was also a member of the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects and the Boston Architectural Club. He was chairman of the Boston Park Commission.

Notable works

On June 8, 1871, Peabody was married to Annie Putnam, the daughter of John Phelps Putnam, a Boston Aldermen, and Harriette Putnam. Together, the couple had five children:
After the death of his first wife in 1911, he remarried to Helen Lee, daughter of Charles Carroll Lee, on January 25, 1913.
Peabody died on September 23, 1917, aged 72, in Marblehead, Massachusetts.