Patrick Keely


Patrick Charles Keely was an Irish-American architect based in Brooklyn, New York, and Providence, Rhode Island. He was a prolific designer of nearly 600 churches and hundreds of other institutional buildings for the Roman Catholic Church or Roman Catholic patrons in the eastern United States and Canada, particularly in New York City, Boston and Chicago in the later half of the 19th century. He designed every 19th-century Catholic cathedral in New England. Several other church and institutional architects began their careers in his firm.

Early life in Ireland

Keely was born in Thurles, County Tipperary, then a part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland on August 9, 1816, to a family in comfortable circumstances. His draftsman and builder father introduced him to architecture and training in construction; having come from Kilkenny to work on the building of St. Patrick's College, Thurles and Patrick was educated there, though nothing is recorded of his architectural design education.

Life in Brooklyn, New York

Keely emigrated to the United States, landing at Castle Garden in Manhattan in 1842, and settling in Brooklyn. He arrived at a time when Catholicism in the United States was expanding from its initial footholds in Baltimore, New York City and Boston. Initially, he worked as a carpenter and builder since there were few trained architects practicing and most structures were erected with the design assistance of the client and builder alone. Common practice held that the builder, whether trained as mason or carpenter, crafted his own plans, and details were often executed without even the aid of drawings. For a number of years Keely worked at his trade without attracting attention. During this time, he met the Rev. Sylvester Malone, a Roman Catholic priest his own age.
In 1844 Malone was appointed pastor of St. Mary's Church in Williamsburg and set about building a new church. As Know nothing sentiment was strong in the area, Malone let it out that the land he had purchased was for a cemetery. When the people in the area decided that they would rather have a church than a graveyard, opposition subsided. Together with Keely, he worked out a plan for a Gothic church possessing pointed arches, pinnacles, and a few buttresses. Working as a carpenter, Keely produced designs from which was the new church was built in 1846. Malone renamed it the Church of Ss. Peter and Paul to avoid confusion with St. Mary Church. The stained glass was by the Morgan Brothers, thus establishing a business relationship with Keely that carried through a number of projects. The church was demolished in 1957, when a new Ss. Peter and Paul was built.
In 1846, Kelly married Sarah Farmer; they had seventeen children; ten of whom lived to adulthood. Two of his sons worked in his office, another became a successful musician, the fourth, a physician. Sarah Keely died in 1876.

Architectural career

The Church of Sts. Peter and Paul was considered an epoch in Catholic building in America. The much-praised work established him as a competent architect and builder at a time when a number of new Roman Catholic churches were being planned "but a relative scarcity of competent architects of the Roman Catholic faith, and Keely's reputation for honesty and integrity quickly made him a popular choice among the hierarchy and clergy throughout the eastern United States."
Thereafter, Keely effectively became the in-house architect for the Roman Catholic archdioceses and was approached from all sides with requests for designs of churches and other necessary structures for an expanding religious life. Art historian William Pierson Jr. said of Keely that "... he developed a practice which ultimately became a virtual monopoly in Catholic Church building for more than a quarter of a century."
In Brooklyn alone there was a great wave of Catholic settlers for whom churches were urgently needed and Keely was the only one thought of to do the work. He continued as a carpenter / craftsman in conjunction with his designing duties. The neo-gothic St. Mary Star of the Sea in Carrol Gardens was built in 1853 with one center aisle and two side aisles. Keely was assisted by carpenter Thomas Houghton.
The cornerstone of St. Mary's on Kent Avenue was set in November 1854. The red brick church was dedicated by Bishop John Loughlin and its name changed to St. Patrick's. The building is noted for its roof dormers that illuminate windows in the wall of the nave.
St. Brigid's on E 8th St. in Manhattan was built in 1848 to a Carpenter Gothic design by Keely, who carved the five-pinnacle reredos, organ case, and wooden altar himself.
Keely designed St. Mary's in Yonkers in 1848. When it was dedicated in November 1851, the name was changed to the Church of the Immaculate Conception, although still popularly called St. Mary's. When the new church, designed by Lawrence J. O'Connor, opened in 1892, Keely's building became the Parish Hall.
Keely designed the Jesuit Church of the Immaculate Conception in the South End of Boston in the style of Italian Renaissance Revival in 1858, as well as its walnut case holding the organ pipe work. It was built of white New Hampshire granite. For many years it served as the church for Boston College. Immaculate Conception closed in 2007 and was later sold to developers who planned to convert it to apartments. In 2018, in response from objections raised by area residents, the South End Landmarks Commission denied the developer's request to remove the traceries from the side windows of the Church.
Keely also designed the Jesuits Church of the Gesù, the college chapel for the Collège Sainte-Marie de Montréal. Built in 1864, it was completed the following year. Influenced by the Church of the Gesù in Rome, it is the only entirely baroque-style church in Montreal.
Constructed between 1873–75, St. Bernard's Church on W 14th St. was designed in Ruskinian Gothic style. Its "twin towers, triple-portal entrance, and rose window inset into a pointed arch reveal a masterful blending of French and English influences." The church has at least one Tiffany window. It was the first church dedicated by an American Cardinal, Archbishop of New York John McCloskey. In 2003, St. Bernard's merged with Our Lady of Guadalupe to form the new parish of Our Lady of Guadalupe at St. Bernard Church.
ceiling, carved by Keely himself, at St. Mary, Charlestown, MA.
The cornerstone of the second St. Francis Xavier Church West 16th Street was laid in May, 1878 on land immediately to the west of the old church. Keely designed it in a "Roman Basilica" style, —the church has a Neo-baroque exterior with a façade of bluish-gray granite. The main entrance is sheltered by a gabled portico. The stained-glass windows, in a pre-Raphaelite style, were by the Morgan brothers, frequent collaborators of Keely. The church was dedicated by Archbishop Michael Corrigan on December 3, 1882. The current church has been in use since 1882 and underwent extensive restoration on 2001.
St. Mary's, Charlestown was commissioned by pastor John McMahon, the younger brother of Bishop Lawrence Stephen McMahon of the Diocese of Hartford, for whom Keely had built St. Joseph's Cathedral. The Gothic exterior combines Rockport granite with brick trim. The church is noted for its hammer-beam oak ceiling with angels, carved by Keely himself. The altar was likely designed by Thomas F.Houghton, Keely's son-in-law and principal draftsman.

Cathedrals

Keely later partnered with his wife's brother-in-law, James Murphy in Brooklyn, New York, and Providence, Rhode Island, under the name Keely & Murphy from the 1860s to 1867, until Murphy opened his own practice in Providence.
Keely worked throughout the eastern United States and Canada, primarily in the industrial mill towns and cities of the state of New York and New England, principally a designer of Roman Catholic churches or institutional buildings. Among his work were several cathedrals in the Northeast and "many of the more substantial parish churches" later "elevated to cathedral status during the twentieth century." He designed a few churches for Protestant congregations...."
Several later noteworthy architects began their careers with Keely's firm, including Elliott Lynch, James Farmer, James Murphy, his son John J. Keely, and son-in-law, Thomas F. Houghton. His son, Charles Keely, an architect in his father's firm died in December 1889 at the age of thirty-five of pneumonia, while in Hartford, consulting with the bishop on business.
In 1884, Notre Dame University awarded Keely its Laetare Medal. The medal has been awarded annually to a Catholic “whose genius has ennobled the arts and sciences, illustrated the ideals of the Church and enriched the heritage of humanity.” Established in 1883, Keely was the second person to receive the award after historian John Gilmary Shea.
Keely died on August 11, 1896 after a long illness, while still directing the completion of several churches with his son-in-law, Thomas Houghton. He was buried in Holy Cross Cemetery, Brooklyn, under an inauspicious polished granite block embossed "KEELY."

Works

;Arkansas
;Connecticut
;District of Columbia
;Illinois
;Louisiana
;Maine
;Maryland
;Massachusetts
;New Hampshire
;New Jersey
;New York
;Ohio
;Pennsylvania
Saint John the Baptist, Philadelphia, PA
;Rhode Island
;South Carolina
;Vermont
;West Virginia
;Wisconsin
;Canada