Thomas Henry Poole

Thomas Henry Poole (born 1860) was an American architect who designed numerous churches in New York City.

Little is known about his early life and education. Poole is listed in a Manhattan city directory as an architect in 1887, when he was 27, suggesting that he may have had a substantial apprenticeship. [Streetscapes, by Christopher Gray, "The New York Times", Dec. 22, 2002] In 1900 he was listed at 15 West 30th Street. In 1918, the T.H. Poole Co. had offices at 13 West 30th Street.

Works (partial list)

Poole was a Roman Catholic, and most of his commissions were for the archdiocese in and around New York. He seldom designed Protestant churches; but these too were in the city.

*One of the earliest Poole designs is the Holy Name of Jesus Roman Catholic Church on the northwest corner of West 96th Street and Amsterdam Avenue, begun in 1891 and dedicated in 1900. The Gothic design features an interior hammerbeam roof.

*Poole was a parishioner at the Church of Our Lady of Good Counsel, at 232 East 90th Street. It is also Gothic but with huge Tudor-style paired turrets at each end. The church is executed in an unusual Vermont marble, a filmy blue-white with rich veining. It was completed in 1892.

*One of his few commissions not for a Catholic parish was the Harlem Presbyterian Church in 1905. Located at West 122nd Street and Mount Morris Park West, it boasts a strikingly eclectic design with a dome on top of a Romanesque lower section. It is in the Mount Morris Park Historic District.

*The wildly ornate neo-Gothic facade of the 1907 St. Thomas the Apostle Church, on 118th Street just west of Saint Nicholas Avenue, was for many years a neighborhood landmark. In 2008 it is slated for demolition. [Streetscapes, by Christopher Gray, "The New York Times", Dec. 22, 2002]

Outside New York City, Poole designed:

*The Church of the Transfiguration, 268 S. Broadway, Tarrytown, New York. Built by the Carmelites and dedicated in October 1898, it is a Gothic design done in granite. [Blessed by the Archbishop, "The New York Times", Oct. 17, 1898, p. 7]
* [http://stceciliachurch.com Saint Cecilia's Church] , 55 West Demarest Avenue, Englewood, New Jersey, completed 1910. Also a Carmelite church in the Gothic tradition, it was built for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Newark.

Writing career

Poole also served his Catholic faith as a writer. He contributed articles to "The Messenger", a church publication with offices in Manhattan. He wrote a detailed architectural review of the Westminster Cathedral when it opened in London, England, in 1903:

“…outside of its practical character it ought certainly to lead to the further development of all that is beautiful in art and to the better interior adornment of our churches… giving us the best possible facilities for the carrying out of all the requirements of our religion to the fullest possible extent with all the solemnity and grandeur that the service of man can invoke and the offering of our best works and thoughts as well as of our bodies and souls to God the Lord and Master of all.” ["The Messenger", 1903, page 498]

Poole’s name also appears as a contributor in the "Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference", published in 1913. He wrote entries about architectural terms, such as apse chapel, also known as the lady chapel. [The Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913, page 660]

References