Hugh Segar "Sam" Scorer FRIBA FRSA (2 March 1923 – 6 March 2003) was an English architect who worked in Lincoln, England and was a leading pioneer in the development of hyperbolic paraboloid structures, particularly saddle roofs, using concrete. He also was involved in architectural conservation and research into the work of local 19th-century architects, as well as founding an art gallery in Lincoln, now known as the Sam Scorer Gallery. He held the rare distinction of having two of his buildings listed within his lifetime.
The Usher Gallery in Lincoln held an exhibition "Sam Scorer: A Life in 14 Buildings" until January 2024.
Family His grandfather was Charles Scorer (1847-1936) of 'Coombe Hurst' on Greetwell Road, the son of William Henry Scorer (1819 - 25 January 1901);Times Saturday January 26, 1901, page 1 the mother of Charles was Susan West, of Burwell, Lincolnshire. Charles married Anna Harriett Veitch (1846 - 31 October 1915) on 16 October 1873, in Chelsea.Times Tuesday November 7, 1882, page 1 Charles Scorer was deputy returning officer for Sleaford elections, and worked for Burton Scorers and White; Charles died on December 13, 1936 aged 89.Times Monday December 14, 1936, page 1Lincolnshire Echo Monday 14 December 1936, page 1
Uncles were Charles Reynolds Scorer (December 2, 1876 - August 27, 1958)Times Friday September 7, 1906, page 1Lincolnshire Echo Wednesday 27 August 1958, page 1 who lived at 'Sunny Mount', and on Drury Lane, with a daughter, Margaret Josephine, born on 25 September 1907,Times Thursday October 3, 1907, page 1 and Arthur Bruce Scorer (1881 - 1951);Times Saturday September 2, 1911, page 1 Arthur had a daughter on 27 August 1912,Times Saturday August 31, 1912, page 1 Gwendolen Anna Rowland Scorer, and a son Derek Rowland Scorer (January 28, 1914 - October 4, 2012), also educated at Repton. One of his aunts, Dorothy (1878-1961), married Roger Oldham on 20 April 1904, at St Nicholas in Lincoln.Times Friday April 22, 1904, page 1 As a widow, Dorothy later married his brother Charles Oldham (naturalist) in 1930.Times Wednesday April 15, 1942, page 7 His great uncle was the Lincoln architect William Scorer.
Early life He was the son of Eric Scorer (November 3, 1882 - August 11, 1966) and Maud Segar (July 4, 1883 - 19 March 1971), who lived at 'Coombe Hurst' on Greetwell Road. Eric West Scorer married Maud Segar on 23 April 1913 at St John and All Saints' Church, Easingwold.Times Saturday April 26, 1913, page 1Times Tuesday April 23, 1963, page 1 Maud was the daughter of the vicar Rev Halsall Segar.
He was brought up in Lincoln, one of five children. He was born at 11 Lindum Terrace.Times Tuesday March 6, 1923, page 1 His mother was the treasurer of the Lincolnshire Hockey Association.Lincolnshire Echo Monday 2 April 1962, page 6 In the early 1950s his father Eric was on the Central Health Services Council, and was on the BBC North Regional Advisory Council.Lincolnshire Echo Thursday 11 December 1952, page 7
His father was a senior partner in a firm of solicitors and later became clerk to Lindsey County Council. His mother was a lecturer at Bishop Grosseteste College, a teacher training college; His mother died at 7 Sewell Road in March 1971.Times Monday March 22 1971, page 24
A brother was Richard S. Scorer. Between 1936 and 1941 he attended the independent Repton School in south Derbyshire, where he became head boy and excelled at drawing.
He read Mechanical Sciences at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge in 1941, and enjoyed painting as well. In 1942 he was commissioned into the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve and met his wife in Canada, when training to be a Fleet Air Arm pilot. He served as a fighter pilot until 1945 but was invalided out of service, having crashed while attempting to land on a moving aircraft carrier in the Baltic Sea.
Combining his interest in artwork and mechanical design, he decided to become an architect. He entered the Architectural Association School of Architecture (AA) in the second year in 1946, and graduated in 1949.
Career
He worked for a year as assistant to George Grey Wornum. In 1950, he began work for Denis Clarke Hall (son of Edna Clarke Hall). His practice was at 200 High Street until January 1962.Lincolnshire Echo Monday 8 February 1960, page 2 He designed Brayford House in 1959.Lincolnshire Standard Friday 10 October 1969, page 36Lincolnshire Echo Saturday 11 October 1969, page 10
With Clarke Hall he designed three schools in Lincolnshire in the 1950s: William Farr School, Welton (1952) Lacey Gardens Junior School, Louth (1953)"Antram" (1985), pg.541 Riddings Comprehensive School, Enderby Road, Scunthorpe (1958 with extensions in 1965–70. Two-storey blocks with the classroom block linked to the service block by a vestibule. The kitchen is screened with a heavily rusticated or embossed wall. Vertical emphasis is provided by a watertower with glazed cistern.Antram, (1989), pg.634 From 1954, his architectural practice, Denis Clarke Hall, Scorer & Bright was based at 7 Lindum Terrace in Lincoln. Scorer was the Chairman of the RIBA East Midlands planning committee. He was the first Chairman of the East Midlands Group of the Victorian Society. In 2000 he founded The Gallery, now known as the Sam Scorer Gallery, in Lincoln.
In the 1980s his practice was Scorer and Pilling, with Bob Pilling, and Scorer & Hawkins in the 1990s, with Philip Hawkins. When the new university opened in 1996, he proposed a cable-car system to link with the north of Lincoln.Lincolnshire Echo Thursday 26 September 1996, page 6
Hyperbolic paraboloid structures
Thin shell concrete roofs were invented in Germany around the 1920s, as a means of achieving large spans with limited materials and at low cost. The strength of the roof lies in its shape, and the way it carries the loads by the forces exerted in the planes of the shell, rather than by the weight of their materials. The first shell roofs were simple barrel vaults. The earliest is Wythenshawe Bus Garage, Manchester, built 1939–42. After the Second World War, the form was taken further. One of the first engineers to specialise in concrete shell techniques in Britain was the German refugee of Hungarian-Jewish origin, Kalman Hajnal-Kónyi, who arrived in London in 1936, and who worked with Sam Scorer. Scorer became fascinated by the possibilities of shell roofs as a student, and designed a hyperbolic paraboloid roof in 1956 for a water tower in Ilkeston, Derbyshire. Félix Candela in Mexico was experimenting with ‘anticlastic’ or shells with double curvatures of opposing convexity and concavity, from which the hyperbolic paraboloid emerged. The form was particularly appropriate for developing countries because of its simple materials and low cost. The rationing of steel in the post-war period in Britain also was reason for the popularity of these designs. The 'hypar', as it is sometimes known, enjoyed a brief fashion, seen in buildings such as the Commonwealth Institute of 1960–2 and also the Wrexham Swimming Baths of 1964. Examples of Scorer's Work are: Lincolnshire Motor Company garage and showrooms, later used as the headquarters of the Lincolnshire Library service. Designed 1958, built 1959 by Sam Scorer of Denis Clarke Hall, Scorer & Bright; engineer Hajnal-Kónyi. Reinforced concrete construction to main former garage, with steel frame and concrete floors to circular corner block and curtain wall elevation to block facing Lucy Tower Street which has flat roof. Rear former garage, has a reinforced concrete hyperbolic paraboloid shell roof, supported on columns to provide a clear unobstructed area. Circular front showroom (now Prezzo) used to display cars. A listed building since 2000. Former petrol station at Markham Moor, Nottinghamshire. This same type of design was used for a petrol station (became a Little Chef restaurant in 1989 but is now a Starbucks' café) at Markham Moor on the south-bound A1/A57 near Retford, designed in 1959.Martin Wainwright Preservation bid for innovative 1950s motorway cafe, The Guardian, 5 January 2004. Retrieved 11 December 2011. The shell canopy was designated Grade II listed on 27 March 2012. In 1962 he designed the St John the Baptist Church in Ermine, Lincoln. Its aluminium roof is the shape of a hyperbolic paraboloid and the building has a hexagonal floor plan and concrete walls. It has been a Grade II* listed building since 1995.
Personal life He married Anne Humphrey on 8 October 1943 at St. George's Cathedral (Kingston, Ontario).Times Thursday October 10, 1968, page 20 His British wife was the only child of Professor George Humphrey (psychologist) (1889-1966), who worked at Queen's University at Kingston, known for Humphrey's law, formed in 1923, who lived locally to the church. His wife's mother, Muriel Miller, had married in 1918; she died 1955.Times obituary Tuesday April 26 1966, page 14 They were married by Very Rev Reginald Seeley, the Dean of Ontario.Times Monday November 1 1943, page 1 His wife's father died on April 24 1966 at 52 Sherlock Close in Cambridge.Times Tuesday April 26 1966, page 1 The stepmother of his wife was Berta Wolpert; Berta's sister, Maxine, was the wife of Austrian actor Peter Illing, who broadcast on the BBC German Service.
They had a son and a daughter (Catherine Scorer, who died in April 1986). His son Paul was born on 3 November 1945. Paul studied Physics at the University of Nottingham,Times Tuesday November 6, 1945, page 1 and married in 1968, a woman from Dallington, Northamptonshire.Times Saturday March 23, 1968, page 10
In the early 1950s he lived at 1 Greetwell Road.Lincolnshire Echo Friday 4 September 1953, page 4 By 1959 he lived at Gibraltar Hill.Lincolnshire Echo Wednesday 28 January 1959, page 3 By 1967 lived 7 Lindum Terrace.Lincolnshire Echo Friday 21 July 1967, page 11 He drove a Jaguar E-Type.Lincolnshire Standard Friday 28 July 1967, page 13 Away from architecture he was a motor-racing enthusiast, attending many of Europe's grand prix circuits. He owned a succession of fast cars, such as a Lotus Elan and various Jaguars, all with his personalised number plate of 'EVL 1'. He held life memberships of the National Trust, the Victorian Society and Reform Club and took an interest in Liberal politics.Personal knowledge, Dr Nina Baker.
In 1967 he proposed a radio station for Lincoln.Lincolnshire Echo Monday 23 January 1967, page 7 He was in the Lincoln Fabian Society. He stood for Labour in the Carholme Ward on 11 May 1967, but lost to the Conservatives.
In September 1950 his eldest brother Philip Segar Scorer (March 22, 1916 - May 18, 2003) married Monica Smith at St Alban's church in Coopersale in south-west Essex. The service was conducted by her father, and assisted by Canon Kenneth Sansbury.Lincolnshire Echo Tuesday 26 September 1950, page 4 Monica was the daughter of the local vicar Rev Stanley Smith.Times Tuesday April 18, 1950, page 7 Philip had a daughter on 7 July 1951Lincolnshire Echo Saturday 7 July 1951, page 6 and again on August 12, 1956.Times Wednesday August 15, 1956, page 1 In 1972 Philip's daughter Julia married Nordahl Anthonisen, of Norway.Times Wednesday June 28, 1972, page 16 In 1992 another of Philip's daughters married Timothy John Penn of Glamorgan.Times Thursday January 23, 1992, page 18
His brother Richard stood as a Labour candidate for Esher in 1970 and 1979.Lincolnshire Echo Thursday 22 June 1967, page 7
In November 1955, his sister (Joyce) Mary Segar Scorer (27 July 1921 - 25 January 2011)Times Friday July 29, 1921, page 1 married General Sir Ouvry Lindfield Roberts in the King Henry VII Chapel, Westminster Abbey.Lincolnshire Echo Thursday 17 November 1955, page 1Grimsby Telegraph Saturday 26 November 1955, page 4
His sister Audrey Segar Veitch Scorer (December 2, 1917 - 29 October 1986) died in the county hospital.Times Saturday December 8, 1917, page 1Lincolnshire Echo Thursday 30 October 1986, page 26