St. Catherine Church, Broad Brook (1881)

Rev. James Smyth, pastor of St. Mary’s Church in Windsor Locks, celebrated the first Catholic Mass to take place in the Broad Brook section of East Windsor in 1856. Later, a mission church dedicated to St Patrick was built on land donated by Broad Brook Catholics and it remained in use until 1880. Originally under the jurisdiction of St. Bernard’s, Rockville, the mission was transferred in 1863 to the new parish of St. Patrick’s in Thompsonville. The cornerstone for a new mission church, located at the intersection of Rye Street, Main Street and Windsorville Road in Broad Brook, was laid by Bishop Lawrence S. McMahon of Hartford in early fall of 1880 and the church was completed late the following year. The church again became a mission of Rockville in 1882 and four years later, in 1886, became a separate parish, dedicated to St. Catherine of Siena. The church has stained glass windows depicting scenes from the life of St. Catherine designed by the artist Emil Frei. The adjoining rectory was completed in 1887. The church has been updated over the years, with a new wing being added in 1957. Now, together with St. Philip Church in East Windsor, St. Catherine’s is part of St. Marianne Cope Parish.

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Winchester Soldiers’ Monument (1890)

Like the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Arch in Hartford, another of Connecticut’s most dramatic memorials to the Civil War is the Winchester Soldiers’ Monument, located in the circular Memorial Park at the end of Crown Street in Winsted. Sitting atop a hill, the monument takes the form of a three-story Gothic-style tower built of ashlar granite with a sculpture of a Civil War soldier, designed by George E. Bissell, atop a circular corner tourelle that projects from the third level. After two decades of discussion over the location and design of the memorial, it was finally erected in 1889-1890 and dedicated on September 11, 1890. The completed monument was designed by Robert W. Hill of Waterbury. At the bottom of the hill in front of the monument is a square entrance arch at the start of a path leading up to the tower.

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First Congregational Church, Portland (1850)

First Congregational Church, 554 Main Street, Portland, CT

The origins of the First Congregational Church of Portland go back to 1714 when it known as the Third Society of Middletown, later called Chatham. The areas that are now the town of Portland and East Hampton were incorporated in 1767 as the Town of Chatham. Portland separated from Chatham to become the Town of Portland in 1841. The Society had two earlier church buildings before the current one. As related in the 1884 History of Middlesex County:

At the annual meeting in 1845, difference of opinion prevailed as to the location of the prospective new church, and accordingly a committee, consisting of Deacon Job H. Payne, Philip H. Sellew, and Ebenezer B. White, were appointed to select two or more judicious and disinterested persons as an advisory committee, to consult together and report. The next year, by a vote of nine to fifteen, it was determined to place the new edifice on the old site, but it was decided by the moderator (one of the deacons of the church) to be no vote. At a meeting soon after it was voted thirteen to seven to build on “Meeting House Hill.” This was likewise decided by the same moderator to be no vote. It is presumable that the foregoing decisions were reached by the moderator, in view of the smallness of the number present, the general want of enthusiasm, and possible lack of requisite pledges. Three years elapsed, when, November 6th 1849, it was voted twenty-six to nine, three not voting, that the meeting house should be erected on the lot owned by John I. Worthington, situated between the dwelling houses of Harlord H. Caswell, and George H. Pettis, and William H. Bartlett, Ebenezer B. White, Henry E. Sage, Philip H. Sellew, and Reuben Paynewere appointed a building committee. The present church edifice was built in 1850, and on the 18th of December of the same year was dedicated. It is of Gothic structure, 70 by 39 feet. The building cost $6,200; the site, bell, furniture, and other accommodations, $1,450; total, $7,650.

St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Marble Dale (1822)

St. Andrew’s Church, Marbledale

Last Sunday I featured St. Andrew’s Church in Kent, erected in 1826. Not far away, in the village of Marble Dale in the town of Washington, is another St. Andrew’s Church built about four years earlier, between 1821 and 1822. Both of these Episcopal churches (as well as ones in Caanan and Salisbury) were built at a time when these parishes had Reverend George B. Andrews as their pastor. The parish in Marble Dale was originally established in 1764 in New Preston. Harassed during the American Revolution because they were predominantly loyalist, the members of the congregation temporarily abandoned their original building, but after the war were formally organized as the New Preston Episcopal Society in 1784. After plans to move their church building to be near the Congregational Church fell through, they rented and then purchased a Quaker meeting house, which was used for services until the current church was built. The building was enlarged in 1855 to plans by the Rev. Nathaniel Sheldon Wheaton (1792-1862), who also underwrote for the project. Rev. Wheaton later served (1831-1837) as second president of Trinity College in Hartford.

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St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Kent (1826)

St. Andrew’s Church in Kent.

The earliest Episcopal/Anglican worship in western Connecticut began in the town of Kent in 1763, served by itinerant missionary priests ordained in England. They worshipped in a now lost St. Thomas’s Church built on Kent Plain sometime between 1768 and 1772. St. Andrew’s Episcopal Parish was first organized as St John’s Parish in 1806. In 1819, Reverend George B. Andrews took charge of the Episcopal congregations in both Kent and nearby Marbledale (in New Preston). He was soon serving congregations in Caanan and Salisbury as well. His wealthy wife contributed greatly to funding the erection of churches in these parishes. The current church building in Kent, located at the corner of modern Routes 7 and 341, was constructed in 1826 of fieldstone in the Gothic Revival style. In gratitude to Rev. and Mrs. Andrews, the parish was renamed from St. John’s to St. Andrew’s.

In the 1870s the chancel and sacristy were added to the west side of the building and the bell tower’s original crenelated top was replaced with a pointed steeple. The church underwent major renovations in 2014.

St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Hebron (1826)

St. Peter's Episcopal Church, Hebron
St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Hebron

Today, St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Hebron has a brick Federal style appearance, but when it was erected in 1826, it was more extravagantly Gothic, with numerous turrets and pinnacles. It was thought to have been modeled on a church that Rev. Samuel F. Jarvis had seen in Italy (and was even referred to as “Jarvis’ Folly”). At the time, Bishop Brownell said that it was the second most beautiful church in the diocese after Trinity Church in New Haven. An unusual feature of the design is that the tower is located at the rear of the building rather than the front. The building has had a number of alterations and renovations over the years. The parish was established in 1734, when the controversial Congregational minister Rev. John Bliss and his followers declared themselves for the Church of England and formed the sixth Episcopal church in Connecticut.

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