The Corliss–Brackett House, also known as the Charles Brackett House, is an historic house in the
College Hill neighborhood of
Providence, Rhode Island
Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts Bay ...
. The house is located at 45 Prospect Street at the southeast corner of Prospect and
Angell Street Angell Street is a major one-way thoroughfare on the East Side of Providence, Rhode Island. It was named for Thomas Angell, an early settler in Providence.
Route
Angell Street runs roughly east to west across the East Side of Providence. The str ...
s. According to Richard B. Harrington of the Rhode Island State Historical Preservation Commission, "There remain anywhere very few very formally and more monumentally treated durable masonry examples of the 'Italian (Tuscan) Villa style.'"
Architecture
The house maintains its original exterior appearance. The structure stands three full stories above a low basement; a tower in the house's northwest corner stands a story taller. A two-story service wing to the house's east is separated at street level by a tunnel-like
porte-cochère. The house is constructed in the Italian Villa style, which emerged in the United States in the 1840s; the structure is thus slightly retardataire.
History
The house was built between 1875 and 1882 by
George Henry Corliss, inventor of the
Corliss Steam Engine. Corliss' second wife, Emily Shaw, suffered from an illness for which a doctor recommended she spend her winters in
Bermuda
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. Corliss sought to fulfill the prescription locally by "bringing" the temperate climate of Bermuda to Providence. To this end, he constructed a
radiantly heated house, potentially the first in America to employ a radiant heating system controlled by a thermostat. Other unconventional technologies Corliss integrated into the structure include a hydraulic elevator and concealed insect screens.
The house was inherited by
screenwriter
A screenplay writer (also called screenwriter, scriptwriter, scribe or scenarist) is a writer who practices the craft of screenwriting, writing screenplays on which mass media, such as films, television programs and video games, are based.
...
and relative of Corliss,
Charles Brackett in 1929. Brackett donated the structure to
Brown University
Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...
in 1955. It was added to the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
in 1970. From 1973 to 2013, the house served as the Admission Office for Brown. It is currently occupied by the Brown University Department of Philosophy.
The exterior of its carriage house was used on the television series ''
Doctor Doctor'' to represent Dr. Stratford's office.
Gallery
File:Historic American Buildings Survey, Laurence E. Tilley, Photographer, May, 1958 WEST (fRONT) AND SOUTH ELEVATIONS. - George H. Corliss House, 45 Prospect Street, Providence, HABS RI,4-PROV,14-1.tif, The house in May 1958
File:Corliss-Brackett House North (Angell St) side.jpg, Angell Street side (North side)
File:Corliss-Brackett House front (Prospect St) view.jpg, The house from Prospect Street
See also
*
National Register of Historic Places listings in Providence, Rhode Island
References
External links
Houses completed in 1875
Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Rhode Island
Brown University buildings
Houses in Providence, Rhode Island
National Register of Historic Places in Providence, Rhode Island
Historic district contributing properties in Rhode Island
1875 establishments in Rhode Island
University and college buildings completed in 1875
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