Stephen Geary

Stephen Geary (1797 – 28 August 1854) was a British architect, inventor, entrepreneur, and, from 1850, Temperance activist.

Early life

Geary was born in Dean's Yard, Westminster, London, on 31 August 1797. At the age of 13 he was apprenticed to the architect Thomas Leverton.[1] In 1817 he joined the Royal Academy architecture schools.[2] He exhibited drawings and models at the Royal Academy on six occasions.

Cemetery work

His best known work was Highgate Cemetery, opened in 1839, and later to be his resting place, where he designed the Egyptian Avenue and the Terrace Catacombs: he was also founder of the London Cemetery Company, established by Act of Parliament in 1836, which owned Highgate Cemetery and Nunhead Cemetery.

He is also associated with Gravesend, Nunhead and Brompton Cemeteries and produced a design for a Brighton cemetery that was never built.

Inventor

Between 1838 and 1847, Geary registered seven patents.

  • 'Improved Fuel'[3]
  • 'Wood Paving'[4]
  • 'Street Watering Machine' [5]
  • 'Fire proofing buildings and fire escapes' <[6]
  • 'Street Watering Machine' [7]
  • 'Supplying piped water to streets for cleaning and fire fighting [8]
  • 'Motive Power' [9]

He displayed several of his inventions at the Great Exhibition in 1851.[10]

Other works
  • St Pancras Collegiate School, London. Designed but not built.
  • A short-lived monument, consisting of a building, with a statue of King George IV on top (it was erected in 1836, the statue was demolished in 1842, the building in 1845), that gave its name to Kings Cross.[11][12]
  • Gin palaces.[13][14] Geary was noted in his day for designing gin palaces. Only one is known to survive, The Bell in Pentonville Road. He is reputed to have designed the first gin palace in London (around 1829), although that accolade is usually given to the gin palace built for wine merchants Thompson & Fearon in Holborn (1829-1832) and was designed by John Buonarotti Papworth (the building no longer exists).

Bibliography
  • Cemetery Designs for Tombs and Cenotaphs ; London: Tilt & Bogue; 1840
  • Exhibition Tracts No. 1: How to reward all the exhibitors. London: W.J. Adams.1851.
  • ‘The British Temperance Banner, an anthem' in BUCKINGHAM, J.S.(Ed.). 1853. The Temperance Offering. London: W. Tweedie. 1853.

Legacy

Geary's grave in Highgate Cemetery, is located to the east of the main path between Comforts Corner and the Egyptian Avenue. The small headstone is a Grade II listed object.[15]

References
  1. Registers in Goldsmiths Hall
  2. Royal Academy Registers.
  3. Patent No. 7654/1838
  4. Patent No. 8085/1839
  5. Patent No. 9836/1843
  6. Patent No. 7654/1838
  7. Patent No. 10,356/1844
  8. Patent No. 10,383/1844
  9. Patent No. 11,570/1847
  10. Great Exhibition Catalogue, Classes 5 and 7
  11. The London Encyclopaedia
  12. A sketch can be seen on page 79 of Contrasts, a book by Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin
  13. Entry in Oxford Reference
  14. Williams, Olivia; Gin Glorious Gin: How Mother's Ruin Became the Spirit of London; Headline; 2015; 336pp; ISBN 978-1472215345
  15. Object 1403435 on the website of Historic England
  • H.M. Colvin, A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects, 1600-1840 (1997) ISBN 0-300-07207-4


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