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  • “The Showy Town of Savannah”: The Story of the Architect William Jay by John D. Duncan and Sandra L. Underwood
  • Jeroen van den Hurk
“The Showy Town of Savannah”: The Story of the Architect William Jay. By John D. Duncan and Sandra L. Underwood. (Macon, Ga.: Mercer University Press, 2019. Pp. [x], 438. $40.00, ISBN 978-0-88146-689-8.)

Architecture does not exist in a vacuum but instead reflects the influences of religion, politics, economics, technology, transportation, and social history, to name but a few. John D. Duncan and Sandra L. Underwood’s impressive book [End Page 462] on the English architect William Jay gives readers the broader context for not only Jay’s work but also his background and the world he entered when he came to North America in 1817. Duncan and Underwood tell readers about Jay’s trials and tribulations leading up to 1817 and after. Well researched and heavily documented, “The Showy Town of Savannah: The Story of the Architect William Jay is organized into seven parts and includes numerous illustrations and an extensive bibliography.

The brief introduction to “The Showy Town of Savannah” provides the reader with the state of current knowledge about William Jay, based largely on a handful of twentieth-century sources. Duncan and Underwood point out that our understanding of Jay was hemmed in by early scholarship focusing on architectural developments in the Northeast and by the fact that his style, which Duncan and Underwood identify as the Regency style, was seen as “an uncongenial blossom on American soil” (p. 7).

William Jay was born around 1792 in Bath, England, the oldest son of the renowned Reverend William Jay. The fame of his father and his grandfather’s occupation as a stonemason most likely provided the young Jay with an introduction to the world of architecture and set him on his future course. Jay’s early architectural career was shaped by John Soane, who was one of his professors at the Royal Academy of Arts in London in 1808. Soane’s lectures and his love for Greek architecture had a profound influence on Jay, and Jay wholeheartedly embraced the Grecian style. Duncan and Underwood construct a concise timeline of Jay’s education, his work in the office of David Riddall Roper, and the projects Jay was involved with before coming to Savannah, Georgia, in 1817. All of this experience labeled him as a Regency architect.

Professional disappointments in England and a family connection to the merchant and shipper Richard Richardson most likely led Jay to Savannah, where he designed Richardson’s house. Jay was responsible for numerous houses in Savannah as well as several public buildings. Due to the uncertain economic climate in Savannah emerging around 1819, Jay sought his salvation in Charleston, South Carolina. Jay’s stay in Charleston was relatively short, but he did leave his mark on the built environment. American architect Robert Mills may have become the proverbial thorn in Jay’s side, forcing Jay to move once more. Jay had a brief sojourn in Washington, D.C., in 1822, only to return to England later that same year. Jay picked up the building thread in England finding work in Cheltenham. In 1828 he was declared bankrupt and struggled to find steady employment. Perhaps in a last-ditch effort, in 1836 he accepteda position in the British civil service in Mauritius, where he died one year later.

Duncan and Underwood have done an excellent job bringing Jay’s largely forgotten work back into the light and providing readers with a broad context in which his work was created. “The Showy Town of Savannah” is an important contribution to understanding not only buildings but also the people and the society that created them. [End Page 463]

Jeroen van den Hurk
Salve Regina University
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