Oscar Enders

Oscar Enders (ca. 1866–1926) was the chief designer in Isaac S. Taylor's office for most of its existence — from about 1890 until Taylor's death in 1917 — and the largely uncredited hand behind much of its best work. A Milwaukee native who developed his skills in Chicago, where he was a member of the Chicago Architectural Sketch Club, Enders was credited by contemporaries with the designs for the Planters Hotel and the Board of Education Building, and the NRHP nomination for the Hamilton-Brown Shoe Factory attributes its abstract, Secession-inflected detailing to him. He helped establish the St. Louis Architectural Sketch Club and served as its second president in 1895. A 1927 tribute in Pencil Points observed that "Isaac Taylor was always generous enough to credit Oscar as the author" of the firm's designs of the period, and Taylor left Enders his architectural library and records at his death. Enders died in Chicago in December 1926.