The ''White Pine Series of Architectural Monographs'', subtitled "A Bi-Monthly Publication Suggesting the Architectural Use of White Pine and Its Availability Today as a Structural Wood", was a landmark publication of drawings, photographs and descriptions of early American architecture. The original series was first published in 1915 and was out of print by World War II; it was revived from 2006 to 2014. Both the original series and revival were discovered to have published content based on fabricated New England communities.

History

The series was launched in 1915 as an advertising campaign by the White Pine Bureau, a joint venture of the Northern Pine Manufacturer's Association of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan and the Associated White Pine Manufacturers of Idaho. Architect Russell F. Whitehead was hired to supervise the series with Julian Buckly as photographer. During the first 10 years, the series was limited to the exterior details of residences constructed with Eastern white pine, as suited its advertising purpose. Often the notable structures of a single village would be documented together in one issue. By 1920, the editor's collection of unpublished photographs became so extensive that Whitehead and his colleague Hubert Ripley invented the fictional town of Stotham, Massachusetts, to justify their use. The fiction went undiscovered until the late 1940s when Leicester Bodine Holland, head of the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

' Department of Fine Arts related his inability to locate the town to Whitehead, eliciting an explanation of the subterfuge. In 1924, the White Pine Bureau ceased its advertising campaign and Whitehead determined to continue the series independently, selling advertising space to Weyerhauser Forest Products. He also modified the focus of the series, including documentation of churches and public buildings and the recording of interiors and

millwork Millwork is historically any wood mill produced decorative materials used in building construction. Stock profiled and patterned millwork building components fabricated by milling at a planing mill can usually be installed with minimal alter ...

details. He also expanded the geographic scope of the project, documenting buildings in the southern states, many of which had been framed with

Southern pine Southern may refer to: Businesses * China Southern Airlines, airline based in Guangzhou, China * Southern Airways, defunct US airline * Southern Air, air cargo transportation company based in Norwalk, Connecticut, US * Southern Airways Express, ...

or Cypress. In 1932, the Monograph series became absorbed into the ''

Pencil Points A pencil () is a writing or drawing implement with a solid pigment core in a protective casing that reduces the risk of core breakage, and keeps it from marking the user's hand. Pencils create marks by physical abrasion, leaving a trail ...

'' architectural journal as a regular feature. The documentation of historic structures with photographs and measured drawings complemented the "Comparative Details" feature which published construction details for contemporary projects. The Monograph series was ended abruptly in June 1940. Many of its contributors became involved in the

Historic American Buildings Survey Heritage Documentation Programs (HDP) is a division of the U.S. National Park Service (NPS) responsible for administering the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), Historic American Engineering Record (HAER), and Historic American Landscapes ...

Re-issue and revival

Eagerly collected by architects and historians, the monographs have been re-issued in bound editions several times. In 1987, the National Historical Society of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, began publishing a series of hardbound books, the ''Architectural Treasures of Early America,'' drawn entirely from the ''White Pine Monographs''. They reorganized the individual editions into geographic regions and re-set all the type in order to produce a consistent presentation. They were also able, in many cases, to make use of the original photographs which had been given to Weyerhauser by Whitehead's widow. In 2006, the

Northeastern Lumber Manufacturers Association The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each ...

(NELMA) revived the title for a new series of publications documenting the production and use of Eastern white pine lumber in construction. In 2011, another hoax was discovered; similar to the 1920s hoax about Stotham, Massachusetts, a 2010 monograph discussing the town of

New Milford, New Hampshire New Milford is a fictional town in New Hampshire, United States. It was the subject of a hoax article published in 2010 by the ''White Pine Series of Architectural Monographs'', which described the community as being a flourishing Victorian-era vill ...

, was found to have been a fabrication. The series has not been published since 2014.

References

* Magruder, C. (March, 1963). “The White Pine Monograph Series.“ ''The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians''. 22(1): pp. 39–41 * Davis, William C. (1987) "Historical Introduction to the Series." ''Survey of Early American Design'', Vol. 1 of Lisa C. Mullins, ed., ''Architectural Treasures of Early America''. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. pp. 5–7

External links

* {{Google books, 8LIAAAAAYAAJ , ''White Pine Series of Architectural Monographs'', Volumes III and IV Advertising campaigns Architecture magazines Publications established in 1915 Architecture books 1987 non-fiction books