Daniel C. Dunham papers, 1955-2021, bulk 1960s-1990s

Daniel C. Dunham was born in Omaha, Nebraska in 1929. He was adopted. From an early age, he was an avid traveler, hitchhiking back and forth to the East Coast. In 1950, he earned a Bachelor of Science from the University of Wisconsin where he was a dual major in both physics and art. Dunham, who worked as a cleaner to pay for his studies, would tinker in the physics lab during his shifts, which drew the attention of Professor John Duffie. With Duffie and Daniel Farrington, Dunham developed an interest in invention and solar energy, and in 1957, he and Duffie filed a patent for a solar energy cooker. Throughout his career, Dunham would return to the solar cooker, developing a number of variations and related products, such as a solar distiller. However, the solar cooker was never picked up by a manufacturer.

After graduating from the University of Wisconsin, he studied at the Ecole americaine des beaux-arts in Fontainebleau, France, where he met his future wife, Mary Frances Raphael, who was enrolled in the music program. Afterwards, he worked odd jobs, and it was while working for an American air base in Morocco when someone suggested Dunham should become an architect. After writing to Harvard University, he was enrolled at the Graduate School of Design where he met Max Bond, Jr. with whom he would have a long professional and personal relationship. During his time at Harvard GSD, Dunham became involved in the Construction Workshop, where he developed a fascination for thin-shelled concrete. This interest would later come to fruition in his work on the Kamalapur Railway Station. He earned his Masters of Architecture in 1959 and then immediately set off for London, where he studied at the School of Tropical Architecture on a Fulbright Scholarship. For his coursework, he returned to Morocco to conduct research in North Africa on temperature regulation in traditional courtyard houses, and this research would inform his later interest in nocturnal radiation and solar energy. His first article, "The Courtyard House as Temperature Regulator," emerged from this work and was published in The New Scientist in 1960.

After graduating from Harvard and the AA, he was hired by Louis Berger to head their new office in Dhaka, Bangladesh–then East Pakistan. Dunham and Berger maintained a life-long personal relationship, even after Dunham left his employment after only two years. Yet, it was during his tenure as Chief Architect that Dunham completed the bulk of his architectural work. He designed master plans and buildings for the Rajshahi University, Mymensingh University, Barisol College, and, most famously, the Kamalapur Railway Station. In 2022, the latter was included in the Museum of Modern Art's exhibition on "decolonial" architecture in South Asia. He also developed numerous designs for rural villages.

While in Dhaka, Dunham, his wife, Mary Frances, and daughter, Katherine, lived like locals, eschewing the foreigners' housing complexes. His designs were likewise sensitive to the needs of vernacular traditions and he involved his students in prototyping. Shaheen Choudhury Westcombe described Dunham's architecture as "simple, practical, and environmentally friendly and respected the local traditions." Dunham and his family also became fluent in Bengali. He also wrote for local newspapers in Dhaka to instruct construction professionals on best practices.

In 1961, Dunham was invited to help establish the first faculty of architecture at the nascent East Pakistan University of Engineering and Technology (EPUET; now BUET), in collaboration with the US Technical Assistance Program and Texas A&M University, which provided the curriculum and visiting professors. Dunham worked with Richard Edwin Vrooman (first dean of BUET) and James C. Walden to teach architecture history and studios. Other Texas A&M University professors who were at BUET at the time include Jack Yardley and Samuel T. Lanford. According to Da Hyung Jeong, who wrote the catalog essay for the MoMA show, Dunham was "convinced that a sound architectural education was of paramount importance to the nation's future" and he "played a paramount role in training the subsequent generation of architects." Indeed, Dunham would maintain correspondence with his students–and their students–for years to come. During the Bangladesh Liberation War, Dunham lobbied the United States Congress against supplying military aid to West Pakistan, and his latrine project for Calcutta was related to the large influx of Bangladeshi refugees into the city. Katherine Dunham donated material related to this lobbying effort to the Bangladesh War Museum. In 2013, the Government of Bangladesh honored Daniel Dunham (posthumously) and Mary Frances Dunham for their contribution to the 1971 War of Liberation.

While holding this role until 1967, he began consulting for organizations like the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Calcutta Metropolitan Planning Organization for the Ford Foundation. It was during this consulting work that he developed an interest in planning. Thus it was in 1967 that Dunham and his family returned to the United States so he could complete a Masters of Planning at Columbia University. During this time, he continued as a consultant for various organizations, such as the Ford Foundation, Save the Children, USAID, and the United Nations. Upon earning his masters in 1971, he became an adjunct professor and taught courses on urban planning for developing nations, environmental design and solar energy. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Dunham extensively traveled back to Bangladesh, Mauritania, Somalia, Djibouti, the Caribbean, and other nations. He worked for Volunteers in Technical Assistance, Save the Children, and USAID on alternative energy projects and flood disaster relief and was known as "USAID's cyclone man." Letters from his Somalia project praise Dunham's quick work, good work, and friendly attitude to everyone involved, including "domestic help," and his attention to local details. In other correspondence, he is referred to as the leading expert on developing nations' planning needs.

All the while, he continued teaching and iterating on solar cookers and solar distillers. In 1987, as part of an exchange program between Columbia GSAPP and Yunnan Institute of Technology, Dunham and his family relocated to China where he served as a visiting professor for three months. He taught four courses on the history of city planning, while Mary Frances taught English and Katherine served as a teaching assistant.

Throughout the early 1970s, Dunham also pursued a doctorate degree in planning at Columbia. His well-documented research was concerned with "mess" housing for single male workers in Bangladesh–a topic he initially became interested in while teaching at EPUET. Though he completed a manuscript, he never completed the doctorate as he was actively engaged in teaching and preferred the "real-world" work of his consultancy projects to academic writing.

In 1985, Dunham followed Max Bond to the City College of New York's School of Architecture and Environmental Studies (now the Bernard and Anne Spitzer School of Architecture). Dunham taught courses on tropical architecture.

In the 1990s, Dunham also became interested in bamboo construction techniques and attended workshops in Myanmar and Thailand–though, photographs from his time in Dhaka indicate that this was a longer-term interest.

Daniel C. Dunham died in New York City on 19 December 2000.

Sources:

Islam, Rafique. Daniel Dunham: Pioneer of Modern Architecture in Bangladesh. Scottsdale, AZ: The Book Patch, 2013.

Jeong, Da Hyung. "Kamalapur Railway Station." In The Project of Independence: Architectures of Decolonization in South Asia, 1947-1985, curated and edited by Martino Stierli, Anoma Pieris, and Sean Anderson, 202. New York City: The Museum of Modern Art, 2022.

Westcombe, Shaheen Choudhury, MBE and Mary Frances Dunham. "The Legacy of Architect Daniel C. Dunham's Teaching in Bangladesh." Daniel C. Dunham Papers, Box 2, Folder 15, Fiftieth Anniversary International Seminar on Architecture: Education, Practice and Research, Dept. of Drawings & Archives, Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University.