The Dickinson family, though not among the first settlers, were yet prominent people on Saybrook Point during and after the Revolutionary war. Captain George Dickinson, who was born in 1770, was for many years a ship master and at times resided in foreign ports as agent. He was at Copenhagen, Denmark, when that city was bombarded by Captain, afterward Lord Nelson, and at his death, in 1857, at the age of 81, was the wealthiest man in the town.
The original Acton Library building in Old Saybrook was erected in 1873 on land donated by Thomas Acton at the corner of Old Boston Post Road and Pennywise Lane. The Library was dedicated on July 4, 1874. Thomas C. Acton (1823-1898) was a New York City politician and Police Commissioner whose summer home in Old Saybrook was across the street from the library. Begun as a subscription library, it became a public library in 1904. A new Acton Library was constructed in 1967 at 60 Old Boston Post Road. The former library, at 40 Old Boston Post Road, was bought from the town by architect Robert Wendler in 1970. He converted it into a single-family residence.
The main block of the house at 91 North Cove Road in Old Saybrook is thought to have been built in 1734 by John Ingraham (1679-1750). The house has later additions at its western end. The house passed through a number of different owners until it was purchased by Paul R. and Anna Opp of Irvington, New York in 1928. They built a sea wall and boat house. They used the home on weekends until 1937, then as a summer home until they made it their year-round residence in 1942. Mrs. Opp resided in the house alone after the death of her husband in 1944 She sold it in 1950.
The house at 110 North Cove Road in Old Saybrook, built c. 1810, has a Federal-style central bay with a Palladian window and an elaborate entry (the elongated doorway surround may represent an early twentieth-century alteration to accommodate a newer fanlight over the door). The house was built by Bushnell Kirtland, a shipbuilder. His brother, Asa Kirtland, built the nearby house at 100 North Cove Road in 1805.
The Capt. Dolbeare House, located at 70 North Cove Road in Old Saybrook, is an 1855 ship captain’s home. The house was enlarged and remodeled in 1931, at which time the two-story colonnade on the west gable end was most likely added. The house was renovated by developer John Aldi in the 1990s.
In 1745, William Tully of Saybrook divided his property among his heirs, with land at North Cove going to his son, also named William Tully. Soon after (c. 1750), the second William Tully built the house that still stands at 135/151 North Cove Road in Old Saybrook. Perhaps starting with just one room, the house has been much enlarged over the years. The house is also known as Heartsease, perhaps for the flower Viola tricolor that once grew in the yard. The name may also have originated during the period of time the building served as a summer house for female workers. At one time the house was known as the Whittlesey House for Captain John Whittlesey, who seems to have owned it at some point in the eighteenth century. During the Revolutionary War, on the night of August 8, 1779, a notable incident took place at the house. A group of Tories from Middletown had been caught having brought goods down the Connecticut River to sell to the British. Their confiscated merchandise was stored in the basement of the Tully House under the charge of the third William Tully, then 21 years old. As related by Mabel Cassine Holman in “Along the Connecticut River” (The Connecticut Magazine, Vol. XI, No. 4, 1907):
eight Tories came to the house and demanded entrance. Tully refused to open the door. Without further words it was broken in. Taking his old flint gun, Tully fired; the musket-ball passed through the first man, who still advanced, but the one directly back of him dropped dead. Tully turned upon the other six, wounding one with his bayonet; the remainder escaped by the windows. When the first man whom Tully shot discovered the ball had passed through him he dropped dead with one hand on the window and the other grasping a chest of tea.
For a time his relations with his colleagues were satisfactory; but eventually he was dissatisfied with his compensation, and imagined that there was a conspiracy to slander him, so that he ceased giving his lectures in the spring of 1841. His resignation of his professorship was not accepted until August, 1842. Subsequently he spent nearly a year in South Carolina, without his family. In the spring of 1851 he removed to Springfield, Massachusetts, where he died on February 28, 1859, in his 74th year. During his later years his professional occupation was mainly in consultation, and his circumstances were sadly straitened. He was buried in New Haven.
Dr. Tully was much respected during his lifetime as a particularly learned doctor and a research-oriented professor. As related in Sketches of the Old Inhabitants and Other Citizens of Old Springfield of the Present Century (1893), by Charles, Wells Chapin:
The late Noah Webster, D.D., in the preparation of his dictionary, acknowledged his indebtedness to Dr. Tully for important aid, in that he had the supervision of the department of the work relating to the subject of medicine. Dr. Tully died February 28, 1859, aged 73 years
