After graduating from MIT, Lapham worked for Fay, Spofford & Thorndike in Boston including work with Adams Cram. In 1917, Lapham moved to Akron, Ohio taking a position with Carmichael Construction Company until the outbreak of the U.S. role in World War I. He applied by mail and joined a South Carolina unit. He attended Officer's Training Camp at Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia and Fortress Monroe in Virginia. During the war he served at Fort Moultire in Charleston and the 61st Artillery Brigade, 1st Army, American Expeditionary Forces in France. Upon discharge, he joined C.F. Warner of Cleveland, Ohio before returning to Charleston to partner with Albert Simons in 1920.Blevins, Documentation of the Architecture Samuel Lapham and the Firm of Simons & Lapham, Master of Fine Arts in Historic Preservation Thesis, Savannah College of Art & Design, 2001, p 4-5.
