Henry C. Mercer

Born in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, in 1856, Henry Chapman Mercer was a scholar with wide-ranging interests. He studied at Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania, trained in law, and later moved into archaeology and the study of early American material culture. Rather than focusing only on famous artifacts, he became deeply interested in the tools and objects of ordinary life.

That curiosity shaped the work he is best known for. Mercer collected pre-industrial American artifacts on a large scale and also became an influential tile-maker associated with the Arts and Crafts movement. He designed three distinctive concrete landmarks in Doylestown: Fonthill, the Moravian Pottery and Tile Works, and the Mercer Museum.

As an author, he wrote about archaeology, travel, and the handmade traditions he wanted to preserve. He died in 1930, but his books, collections, and buildings still offer a vivid picture of the past and of one unusually imaginative life.