Old Naugatuck High School (1905)
Saturday, August 28th, 2010 Posted in Beaux-Arts, Naugatuck, Schools | No Comments »
One of the most important buildings designed by McKim, Mead & White in Naugatuck is the High School on Hillside Avenue, constructed in 1905. Naugatuck industrialist and philanthropist John H. Whittemore wanted the school to have a prominent position on a hill overlooking Naugatuck Green and the many other structures that he had commissioned the firm to design. To adapt to the sloping site, the firm created a building in which each of its three floors has an entrance at ground level and each side is designed with its own distinct appearance. Based on Greek temples, the school is constructed in pink granite and pressed buff brick. A new High School was built on Rubber Avenue in 1959 and, although the original school’s interior was damaged by fire in the 1960s, it was painstakingly restored to become a junior high school, now called Hillside Middle School.
Naugatuck National Bank (1930)
Friday, August 27th, 2010 Posted in Beaux-Arts, Commercial Buildings, Naugatuck | No Comments »
Built in 1930 on Church Street in Naugatuck, the cubic Naugatuck National Bank building has prominent quoins and a strongly rectilinear appearance. The Bank was founded in 1883 and the 1930 building replaced an earlier structure, also once located on Church Street, which was built in 1893 and designed by McKim, Mead & White.
The Bronson B. Tuttle House (1881)
Saturday, July 24th, 2010 Posted in Houses, Naugatuck, Queen Anne | No Comments »
In 1858, John Howard Whittemore formed a company with Bronson B. Tuttle to produce malleable iron hardware, a company that was eventually known as Naugatuck Malleable Iron. Tuttle’s brick house, unlike that of his partner Whittemore, survives today in Naugatuck Center, at the north end of Church Street. Built in 1879 to 1881, the brick and brownstone residence, designed by Robert Wakeman Hill of Warterbuy, is Queen Anne in style, elaborated with elements of other styles. The gable ends and tower dormers are decorated with a quarter sunburst design. There is quatre-foil-pierced terra-cotta cresting along the roof line. The original wraparound porch was later removed. The house remained in the Tuttle family until 1935, when it was given to the Borough of Naugatuck, the house has served as a school and is now the offices of the Naugatuck Board of Education.
Naugatuck Savings Bank (1910)
Wednesday, July 14th, 2010 Posted in Beaux-Arts, Commercial Buildings, Naugatuck | No Comments »
The Naugatuck Savings Bank, a pressed buff brick and limestone building, was constructed in 1910 on Church Street in Naugatuck Center. The original south end of the building, with a grand entrance, was designed by the New York firm of Crowe, Lewis & Wickenhofer. The north end is an addition, built in 1934. The Bank was initially founded in 1870 as the Naugatuck Savings and Building Loan, formed to enable employees of the the Borough’s rubber-producing companies, Naugatuck Malleable Iron and other industries to build their own homes in town. Today, the building serves as the Bank‘s executive offices.
Thomas Neary Memorial Building (1911)
Saturday, July 10th, 2010 Posted in Beaux-Arts, Commercial Buildings, Naugatuck | No Comments »
The Thomas Neary Memorial Building is one of the many impressive buildings constructed in the center of Naugatuck at the turn of the nineteenth century, a period of development sponsored by John H. Whittemore. Located on the corner of Church and Maple Streets, the Neary Building is a business block of offices and shops which anchors a row of commercial buildings on Church Street, south of Naugatuck Green. Completed sometime between 1906 to 1911, the heavily ornamented Neo-Classical Revival structure was designed by the Waterbury firm of Griggs & Hunt (Wilfred Griggs designed many similarly impressive buildings in Waterbury). It was built through the efforts of William J. Neary, a lawyer, in honor of his father, Thomas J. Neary, a businessman who owned and operated a wholesale and liquor business on Water Street.
Howard Whittemore Memorial Library (1894)
Wednesday, May 12th, 2010 Posted in Beaux-Arts, Libraries, Naugatuck | No Comments »
The Howard Whittemore Memorial Library, on Church Street in Naugatuck, was built in 1894 as part of the grand beautification plan of industrialist and philanthropist John Howard Whittemore for his adopted home town. The Library, named in honor of a son who had died young, was one of the first of the many structures that Whittemore, influenced by the “City Beautiful” movement, commissioned for Naugatuck Center. Designed by McKim, Mead & White and utilizing the same plan as the firm’s Walker Art Gallery at Bowdoin College, the Neo-Classical Revival library is constructed of pink granite, with buff terra-cotta panels above the windows and in the pediment above the front entrance. The frieze running around the buildings is incised with names of famous authors. The Library has a modern addition to the rear.
Congregational Church of Naugatuck (1903)
Sunday, April 11th, 2010 Posted in Churches, Colonial Revival, Naugatuck | No Comments »
The Congregational Church of Naugatuck is on Division Street, across from Naugatuck’s Green (part of which is owned by the Church and is leased to the Borough of Naugatuck). This is the Church’s third building. The first was built on a hill to the east in 1782, a year after the congregation was formally gathered. In 1831, it was moved to a location across from the present church, on the northeast corner of what is now the Green, on land donated by Daniel Beecher, an inn keeper. It was sold and moved again, this time across the street to become a store, being replaced by the second church, built in 1853-1854. The present church was built in 1903 and was designed by the renowned architectural firm of McKim, Mead and White. It was one of several commissions by the firm around Naugatuck Green arranged by the prominent local industrialist, John Howard Whittemore.
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