page_title: Harold E. Wagoner
section_title: Biography
hierarchical_section_title: Harold E. Wagoner / Biography
caption_attribution_description: The Wesley United Methodist Church, located at 1207 West Green Street between S. Goodwin and S. Mathews Avenues in Urbana, Illinois, was built in 1959 and was designed by Harold Wagoner in an Expressionistic version of the Late Gothic Revival style. The church was founded in 1906 as Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church, formed out of Parks Chapel. In 1956, the church changed its name to "Wesley" to indicate that it was the church of the Wesley Foundation at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the first such organization in the country. (Source: [1] and [2])
context_page_description: Harold Eugene Wagoner was a prominent twentieth-century American ecclesiastical architect who designed many notable churches, including Coral Ridge Presbyterian and National Presbyterian, as well as helping design the interior of the United States Air Force Academy Cadet Chapel. His firm was entirely devoted to ecclesiastical work and had more than 500 commissions in 36 states. He was an instructor in architecture at the Drexel Institute of Technology for more than twenty years.
context_section_description: Wagoner was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to Harriet and Jesse Wagoner and earned a degree in architecture from the Carnegie Institute of Technology, now Carnegie Mellon University.  Immediately after graduation in 1926 he went to work for the Methodist Bureau of Architecture in Philadelphia where he would continue until its demise in 1933, during the Great Depression.  In that year he went to Fontainebleau to study at the École Americaine des Beaux-Arts.  After his time in France he moved back to Philadelphia where he was associated with the firm of Thomas & Martin followed by Wenner & Chance.  From 1942 to 1944, during World War II, he served as Chief of the Camouflage Unit, U.S. Army Engineers.
  In 1944 he was invited by Walter H. Thomas to form the firm Thomas & Wagoner. At the time of Thomas's death in 1948, the firm had approximately 30 church-related projects underway in 16 states. After Thomas's death, Wagoner formed Wagoner and Associates, which continued into the 1980s.  In 1948, he was given the Award of Merit by his alma mater, the Carnegie Institute, and during the 1950s and 60s he dominated the awards of the Church Architecture Guild of America.  Wagoner was vice-president of the Philadelphia Chapter of the AIA and also served as chairman of the Commission on Architecture, Lutheran Society of Music, Worship and the Arts and President of the Church Architectural Guild of America.  He was succeeded in his firm by Henry Jung.
caption: Wesley United Methodist Church in Urbana, Illinois
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