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Merchants Exchange (Boston)

Merchants Exchange (Boston)
Merchant's Exchange, Boston, 1852

The Merchants Exchange building in Boston, Massachusetts, was built in 1841 to a design by architect Isaiah Rogers. Centrally located on State Street, it functioned as a hub for business activities in the city.

History

The Merchants Exchange served as one of Boston's "great gathering-points of the traders -- the marble-paved and frescoed hall ... with its newspaper files, bulletins, wind vane, and ship registry." It was "elegant ... with a fine reading-room, ... and besides accommodations for the post office, and for several insurance and brokers' offices, affords many conveniences for the mercantile community."

Architecture

Built between 1841 and 1842 by architect Isaiah Rogers, Merchants Exchange was considered "among the best specimens of architecture in Boston" and "a dignified building in its day." Re-modelling occurred after the building "went down" in the fire of 1872.

After 1890, the "Exchange Building" occupied the site of the former Merchants Exchange building.

Function

The building housed business activities, such as:

  • Board of Trade (est. 1854)
  • Boston Board of Marine Underwriters (est. 1850)
  • Boston Marine Society
  • Boston Stock Exchange (1844–1853)
  • Commercial Exchange (est. 1871)
  • Post Office (ca.1860–1872)
  • Soldiers' Messenger Corps

References

Images

Image:State Street, Boston, Mass..jpg|State Street Image:State Street, looking down, Boston, Mass..jpg|State Street Image:1869 MerchantsExchange Nanitz map Boston detail BPL 10490.png|Detail of 1860s map of Boston, showing Merchants Exchange building Image:1885 MerchantsExchange Boston.png|The Exchange, ca.1885 Image:1885 MerchantsExchange Boston2.png|Reading room, ca.1885

References

  1. Edwin Hodder. Cities of the world. Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co., 1882; p.278.
  2. Charles Augustus Goodrich. The family tourist: A visit to the principal cities of the western continent: embracing an account of their situation, origin, plan, extent, their inhabitants, manners, customs, and amusements ... together with sketches of historical events. Case, Tiffany and company, 1848; p.57.
  3. John Hayward. [https://books.google.com/books?id=RqUZAAAAYAAJ A gazetteer of Massachusetts]. J. Hayward, 1847.
  4. Bacon, Edwin M.. (1922). "Boston: A Guide Book to the City and Vicinity".
  5. [https://books.google.com/books?id=fQ0DAAAAIAAJ The Nation]. Nov. 14, 1872.
  6. Bacon, Edwin M.. (1886). "Bacon's Dictionary of Boston".
  7. Justin Winsor. [https://books.google.com/books?id=QtZ5AAAAMAAJ The memorial history of Boston], including Suffolk County, Massachusetts, 1630-1880. J. R. Osgood and co., 1881.
Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

commercial-buildings-completed-in-1842 former-buildings-and-structures-in-boston greek-revival-architecture-in-massachusetts economic-history-of-boston financial-district,-boston 19th-century-in-boston 1842-establishments-in-massachusetts
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