. William Newton Morgan, Sr. (December 14, 1930 – January 18, 2016) was an American architect and author, based in

Jacksonville Jacksonville is a city located on the Atlantic coast of northeast Florida, the most populous city proper in the state and is the List of United States cities by area, largest city by area in the contiguous United States as of 2020. It is the co ...

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and ...

. One of William Morgan's famous creations is the neo modern house in Ormond Beach, Florida. Built for the Root family, creators of the iconic Coca-Cola bottle and owners of the Coca-Cola Bottling, the building is a luxury oceanfront home. It consists of two three-story concrete towers connected by two bridges. It has marvelous metal, glass and stone walls. Solid copper stairs, transparent brass mesh walls, and exotic wood showcase Morgan's modern architecture. Morgan won a National Honor Award from the

American Institute of Architects The American Institute of Architects (AIA) is a professional organization for architects in the United States. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the AIA offers education, government advocacy, community redevelopment, and public outreach to s ...

(AIA) for thi
house
Morgan grew up in Jacksonville and graduated with a bachelor's degree from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...

before serving in the

U.S. Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage o ...

during the

Korean War {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Korean War , partof = the Cold War and the Korean conflict , image = Korean War Montage 2.png , image_size = 300px , caption = Clockwise from top:{ ...

. After the war he returned to Harvard to study architecture. He studied in Italy on a Fulbright Scholarship (

U.S.-Italy Fulbright Commission The U.S.- Italy Fulbright Commission is a bi-national, non-profit organization promoting opportunities for study, research, and teaching in Italy and the United States through competitive, merit-based grants. Since 1948, the commission acts as exe ...

) and then returned to Jacksonville in 1961 to open his architecture practice in the city where he had grown up. Three of his designs are included on the Florida Association of the

list of Florida's top 100 buildings (The Williamson House in Ponte Vedra Beach; Morgan's residence in Atlantic Beach; and Dickinson Hall at the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

, formerly the Museum of Natural History). He has written five books including his most recent, ''Earth Architecture'' (2008). In 2012 the

awarded Morgan an honorary doctor of arts degree as well as the first recipient of its School of Architecture's Lifetime Achievement Award. Morgan has been described as a pioneer of

sustainable design Environmentally sustainable design (also called environmentally conscious design, eco-design, etc.) is the philosophy of designing physical objects, the built environment, and services to comply with the principles of ecological sustainability ...

Morgan's five books cover the architecture of pre-industrial cultures, including those in

pre-Columbian North America In the history of the Americas, the pre-Columbian era spans from the original settlement of North and South America in the Upper Paleolithic period through European colonization, which began with Christopher Columbus's voyage of 1492. Usually, th ...

and

Micronesia Micronesia (, ) is a subregion of Oceania, consisting of about 2,000 small islands in the western Pacific Ocean. It has a close shared cultural history with three other island regions: the Philippines to the west, Polynesia to the east, ...

. He died in Jacksonville after a long illness on January 18, 2016, aged 85. Gville UF Dickinson Hall04

Works

*Work of William N Morgan, FAI
US ModernistOcean Shore House
* Williamson House, Ponte Vedra Beach (1966), AIA Florida Award of Merit (1964) and listed on AIA's list of Top 100 buildings in Florida *

Museum of Science and History The Museum of Science & History (MOSH) is a museum in Jacksonville, Florida. It is a private, non-profit institution located on the Southbank Riverwalk, and the city's most visited museum. It specializes in science and local history exhibits. It ...

(1969), adjacent to

Friendship Fountain Friendship Fountain is a large fountain in Jacksonville, Florida. It is in St. Johns River Park (also known as Friendship Fountain Park) at the west end of Downtown Jacksonville's Southbank Riverwalk attraction. The world's largest and tallest fo ...

, formally the Jacksonville Children's Museum * Dickinson Hall (1971) at the

campus in Gainesville, formerly the Museum of Natural History/ Florida Museum of Natural Sciences. The earth-

berm A berm is a level space, shelf, or raised barrier (usually made of compacted soil) separating areas in a vertical way, especially partway up a long slope. It can serve as a terrace road, track, path, a fortification line, a border/ separation ...

ed concrete building is listed on AIA's Top 100 Buildings in Florida * Police Administration Building, Jacksonville *

Daniel State Office Building The Hyatt Regency Jacksonville, located at 225 East Coastline Drive, is a 19-story high-rise hotel in Jacksonville, Florida. With 951-rooms, it is the largest hotel in North Florida. At , the hotel is the 23rd tallest building in Downtown Jackson ...

, Jacksonville (now an annex and parking garage for the Hyatt Regency Riverfront Hotel) *

Morgan home, Atlantic Beach Morgan may refer to: People and fictional characters * Morgan (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters * Morgan le Fay, a powerful witch in Arthurian legend * Morgan (surname), a surname of Welsh origin * Morgan (singer) ...

(1974), Morgan's home in Atlantic Beach, influenced by the stepped structure of the Roman seaside town

Herculaneum Herculaneum (; Neapolitan and it, Ercolano) was an ancient town, located in the modern-day ''comune'' of Ercolano, Campania, Italy. Herculaneum was buried under volcanic ash and pumice in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. Like the n ...

Listed on AIA's Top 100 Buildings in Florida Hyattjax

References

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The Ocean House
1930 births">20th-century American architects
The Ocean House
1930 births 2016 deaths Jacksonville Modern architecture Brutalist architects Fulbright alumni

Works

See also

References