Obituaries : Edward C. Bassett; Architect Designed Many S.F. Skyscrapers

Edward Charles Bassett, internationally prominent architect whose work ranged from San Francisco’s Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall to the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, has died. He was 77.

Bassett died Saturday in Mill Valley, Calif., of complications after a stroke.

A design partner for Skidmore, Owings & Merrill architectural firm in San Francisco for 21 years, Bassett designed many of the skyscrapers in the city’s famed skyline--including the Crocker Galleria and the Industrial Indemnity Building as well as the symphony’s home. Across the bay, he designed the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum.

His buildings included the Australian Mutual Provident Society complex in Melbourne and the Wells Fargo Bank Plaza in Houston.

Bassett’s work also can be seen in smaller cities, including Columbus, Ind., home of Cummins Engine Co., where his mentor, Finnish architect Eero Saarinen, had worked. Bassett designed the town’s City Hall.

Born in Port Huron, Mich., Bassett worked in his architect father’s office as a teenager.

After Army service during World War II, in which he was wounded in Okinawa, he attended the University of Michigan.

In 1963, Bassett earned the Arnold W. Brunner Memorial Prize awarded by the National Institute of Arts and Letters to the architect who shows promise of contributing to architecture as an art. He also earned the Maybeck Award from the California Council of the American Institute of Architects.

In addition to his wife Doris, Bassett is survived by daughters Christine Carlisle and Ann Bassett Wheelock, sons Joseph and Peter, and three grandchildren.