Question: What do these two lists have in common with Nashua?

1. America’s Favorite Architecture

2. The Princeton Review’s Best 368 Colleges for 2009.

Answer: Both pay tribute to the renowned American architect and New Hampshire native Ralph Adams Cram, designer of Nashua’s Hunt Memorial Building located at the head of Main Street on Library Hill. To know more about the architect, check out The architecture of Ralph Adams Cram and his office by Ethan Anthony (Norton, 2007).

America’s Favorite Architecture is sponsored on the web by the American Institute of Architects and features the AIA150: the top 150 architecture projects selected by the American Public. New York City’s Cathedral of St. John the Divine is #23 on the list. Cram’s firm took over the project in 1907 and rendered an imposing gothic design for which the still unfinished cathedral is now famous.

The Princeton Review’s annual Best Colleges is a perennial favorite among the college-bound set. Representing less than 5% of 7000 colleges in the US (see the US Department of Education’s College Navigator for the complete list.), the Princeton Review, along with competitor US News & World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges” slices and dices rankings into all sorts of categories. While not all rankings are coveted (such as “Best Party Schools”, where UNH holds this years #11 spot), the lists are of particular interest to students, parents and administrators alike. Ranking #1 on this year’s “Most Beautiful Campus” list is Princeton University, where Cram served as Consulting Architect from 1907 to 1929 and during which time was responsible for the design and construction of 25 buildings.

Cram’s gothic revival style lives on across the country and is elegantly represented in Nashua in the Hunt Memorial Building. The Hunt, Nashua’s public library from 1903 to 1970, is a testament to the civic-mindedness of the Hunt family, who donated $50,000 to the city for this architectural gem “for the use of the public forever.”