Norman Miller Doncaster (1873-1952)
Though he was born in Sheffield and died in Hampshire, Norman Miller Doncaster had strong links with Dore: married in Dore, he lived for at least ten years on Dore Road, and designed several buildings in Dore.
Norman’s background and training
Norman was born in 1873 into a prominent family of Quaker industrialists. He had one brother, Edwin Daniel, born in 1871. Their great-grandfather, Daniel Doncaster I, had established the steel-making company in which their father, Daniel Doncaster III, worked; their uncle Samuel became its Chairman in 1884.
Neither son followed in their father’s footsteps. Norman is recorded in the 1891 census as an architect’s articled pupil. He and Edwin were living with their parents in Broomhall. Although in 1891 Edwin was a steel merchant’s clerk, and was recorded in 1901 as a steel merchant, by 1911 he was an automobile agent and engineer living in Surrey.
Attempts to formalise architect training had been made from the 1830s onwards; the first university architecture courses were offered by King’s and University Colleges, London, in the 1840s. However, in the late 19th century, many architects still received their training as articled pupils, and so Norman’s training was not particularly unusual.
Norman’s first known work
In 1897, Norman’s uncle, Samuel Doncaster, commissioned Norman to design a house and lodge in the garden which he had created on the site of the former Whirlow Quarry. Whinfell was a large half-timbered house in the style known as Kentish Weald; the planned lodge was never built. Samuel’s grandson, Stephen Doncaster, recalled that his grandfather hated the appearance of the house because it was so out of keeping with local vernacular styles (Dore to Door autumn 2003). Sadly, the house was destroyed by fire in 1971. The garden, now named Whinfell Quarry Garden, had been donated to the city in 1968.