by Jason Cope.
Paul Macneil (1883-1964) practiced in the Copper Country for about seven years, but in that short time he designed one of the area’s most famous buildings.
Biography
Paul Humphrey Macneil, an architect in the Copper Country between 1905 and 1912, was born in Illinois on April 15, 1883. Both of his parents were also from Illinois.1 He first appeared as a partner of H.T. Liebert in 1905, and may have started as a draftsman in that office.2 Later that year, in December, he opened his own office, P. H. Macneil, which was located in the Citizens Bank Building in Hancock.3 Macneil designed houses for Frank L. Van Orden and Arthur Walsh in East Houghton and Ward Smith in Hancock’s Lake View Addition, but it is uncertain if these houses survive.4 He also designed the Centennial Methodist Church, which has been demolished. He left the Copper Country between 1910 and 1912. By 1920, he had married his wife, Natalie, and moved to Pensacola, Florida, where he continued his architectural career.5 He then moved to Tuolumne, California, where he died on August 2, 1964.6
Buildings
- Jones House 1906
- Briggs School 1907
- First Baptist Church 1908
- St. Joseph’s Catholic Church (Interior) 1908
- Italian Hall 1908
- Ahmeek Mine Office 1908
- Worcester House 1908
Notes
- Search for your Ancestors, Ancestry Library Edition, 19 March 2006.
- Leibert & Macneil mentioned in Daily Mining Gazette, 5 August 1905, and ad 19 August 1905.
- Polk Directory, 1910. Daily Mining Gazette 16 December 1905.
- Evening Copper Journal, 20 October 1909, and Gundlach Collection, 85V.
- Fourteenth Census of the United States, Ancestry Library Edition, 19 March 2006.
- Search for your Ancestors, Ancestry Library Edition, 19 March 2006.