James Bogardus Scientist
James Bogardus (March 14, 1800 – April 13, 1874) was an American inventor and architect, the pioneer of American cast-iron architecture, for which he took out a patent in 1850. In the next two decades he demonstrated the use of cast-iron in the construction of building facades, especially in New York City, where he was based, but also in Washington, DC, where three cast-iron structures erected by Bogardus in 1851 were the first such constructions in the capital. The success of the cast-iron exteriors from 1850-1880 led to the adoption of steel-frame construction for entire buildings.Born in Catskill (town), New York, Bogardus quit school at the age of fourteen to start an apprenticeship at a watchmaker.Bogardus attached plaques to his cast-ironwork that read: "James Bogardus Originator & Patentee of Iron Buildings Pat' May 7, 1850." He married Margaret McClay.A small park in TriBeCa, where Chambers Street, Hudson Street and West Broadway (Manhattan) intersect is named James Bogardus Triangle.He was a descendant of the Rev. Everardus Bogardus (d.1647), the second clergyman in the New Netherlands. Bogardus died in New York City aged 74. Bogardus is interred at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York.
