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INDIANAPOLIS

Monumental Indy

 


Crown Hill Cemetery
Crown Hill Cemetery
Indiana Division of Historic Preservation
and Archaeology

Indianapolis built on its classical roots to become a city of grand public places and buildings in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement to create beautiful public places embraced cemeteries, government buildings, two major war memorials, formal parks, and public sculpture. At the beginning in 1821, Alexander Ralston envisioned Indianapolis as a grand capital. His formal plan reserved spaces for large public buildings, balanced on the east and west sides of a circular drive.

Crown Hill Cemetery was constructed in response to a movement for a new cemetery in the 1860s. Unlike the tidy rows of pioneer cemeteries, Crown Hill was large in scale and picturesque in appearance. Its massive stone gates and Romanesque Revival waiting station gave the cemetery an imposing quality. The individual stones and mausoleums provide a remarkable collection of sculptural work.

While not grand, the Marion County Courthouse of the 1820s was suitably formal – a brick, cubical “coffee grinder” building with Palladian windows, likely inspired by earlier such courthouses in New England. The State of Indiana followed with its first permanent government
building in the new capital. In the 1830s, the General Assembly retained architects Town & Davis for the design work. The nationally-known pair conceived of a Greek Revival Statehouse, capped by a Roman Revival dome. Either due to poor craftsmanship, maintenance, or design, the stucco-covered brick exterior walls and metal roof did not withstand Hoosier weather conditions.

Indiana World War Memorial Plaza

Indiana World War Memorial Plaza-Obelisk
Indiana Division of Historic Preservation
and Archaeology

The decades of the late 19th century saw the replacement of the Statehouse and Marion County Courthouse and the beginning of major civic space planning in the city. The Marion County Courthouse was a bombastic French Second Empire building of brick and limestone, encrusted with sculpture. In the decades of its service, prior to demolition in 1962, the courthouse was an important downtown landmark.

Planning and creation of a monument to honor Indiana’s Civil War veterans signaled a dramatic change toward monumental civic architecture. The Indiana General Assembly appointed a committee to plan the State Soldiers and Sailors Monument in 1887. The c. 285-feet-tall monument transformed the heart of the city into a grand commemorative space, when it was completed in 1901.

The trend toward grand classicism would continue in the 20th century. Nearly 50 years in planning and execution, the Indiana World War Memorial Plaza, a National Historic Landmark, is nationally recognized as one of the largest and most harmonious City Beautiful-era spaces of its kind. The city’s and nation’s movement to create grand places came at a time when limestone mills in southern Indiana were just stepping up production. Thanks to steam power and new industrial techniques, Indiana limestone would produce the sparkling image of classicism most Americans would recognize.

The City of Indianapolis helped set the trend of grand classicism on the Plaza. In 1916, famed Hoosier poet James Whitcomb Riley left a generous bequest for the city library system upon his death. Along with other donations and funds, the city amassed enough for a grand Central Library. Nationally known architect Paul Phillipe Cret planned this chaste limestone Doric building at the north end of the mall. Even Frank Lloyd Wright had to admit that Central Library was a fine classical statement when he came to Indianapolis decades later. The grand main circulation room is one of the best classically inspired spaces in town. The Old Indianapolis City Hall, another Indiana limestone building, was completed in 1909 and served as City Hall until the 1960s. It, too, is classicism at its American best, and the interior is splendid.

University Park

University Park
Indiana Division of Historic Preservation
and Archaeology

The city’s park system is monumental by any measure – 3,400 acres of the system are listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Citizen concern for planned open spaces began in the late 19th century but came to fruition during the early 20th century. George Edward Kessler planned the system and also contributed several specific park designs, such as University Park. The park is part of the World War Memorial Plaza and combines the themes of open space planning, classicism, and beautification. The park doubles as an art gallery with its large bronzes by artists such as Henry Hering, Laredo Taft, and Alexander Calder.

Classical concepts of balance and restraint continue to shape civic planning in Indianapolis. In 1960, the new City-County Building that replaced the 1876 building took the form of a central tower with symmetrical wings. By the 1990s, state officials decided to consolidate offices in a new Indiana Government Center complex. The intent was to harmonize with the classicism of the Statehouse and State Library.

Some of Indy’s suburbs have followed the classical tradition in urban planning. Today, the remarkably formal and monumental spaces of Indianapolis stand in marked contrast to the typically informal and inviting homes of the city.

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