Elias Carter was born on May 30, 1781 in Ward, Massachussets, United States; the son of Timothy and Sarah (Walker) Carter. His father and his uncle Benjamin were partners in a building business in Worcester and the neighborhood, and although his father was killed by a fall when the boy was only three years old, and the widow, with her six children, moved to Greenwich, Massachussets, and remarried, it is certain that the tradition of building and designing remained strong in the family. Carter "certainly had the book which had been his father's guide, Battey Langley's Treasury of Designs".
Career
Soon after building a church in Brimfield, Massachussets, in 1805, Carter settled in that town for a time, and while living there built a hotel and several houses, some still standing. But he was, in these early years, much on the move; his wife told a grand-daughter they had lived in forty different places. He was, at one time, probably before 1805, in the South, which may account for the Southern influence apparent in the high porticos he loved. Already, in the Wyles and Hitchcock houses in Brimfield, this element appears, with columns two stories high combined with a balcony. In Templeton, Massachussets, he built a church in 1811, and probably the Artemus Lee house, very likely from his own designs, though it is hard to trace the exact steps by which he developed from builder into architect. In 1815 from plans by the famous Ithiel Town, he built the church in Thompson, Connecticut, and in 1818 that at Killingly, Connecticut A church at Mendon, Massachussets (1820), was built from designs by himself, and the pastor of the church at Milford, Massachussets, about the same date, speaks of him as "a skilful and faithful architect and amiable and pious man. " From 1828 till the time of his death Carter lived chiefly in Worcester, Massachussets. His known work there includes: the second Unitarian Church (1828); the Daniel Waldo house (1830), which excited much comment for the richness of its woodwork; the Waldo store, known as the "Granite Row"; the Insane Hospital (1832); houses for Alfred Dwight Foster (c. 1835), Judge Kinnicut (1835), Gov. Levi Lincoln (1836), S. M. Burnside (1836), the Burt (Smith) house, the Salisbury house, the Mason Moore and Leland houses on Main St. , and the Union Church, Front St. (1836 - 37). Outside of Worcester he designed the Leicester Academy (1832), the Morton house in Taunton, Massachussets, and the Insane Asylum, Concord, N. H. (1842). His last known work is a house in Monson, Massachussets (1859). He must have been a man of civic interests for he was an unsuccessful candidate for delegate to the General Court in 1834, and served on town committees in 1834 and 1837.
He was somewhat influenced by Asher Benjamin, but his work is usually more restrained, as he restricts himself, with few exceptions, to the Ionic and Doric orders. His churches were the typical white steepled churches of New England; it was the Worcester houses, in their dignity, their simple directness, and a certain monumental scale, which show best the skill and originality with which he adapted Greek detail to New England use.
Achievements
Connections
He was married on May 25, 1807, to Eudocia Lyon who died July 23, 1869.