Built in 1862 and 1863, on Charter Oak Place in Hartford, two Italianate double houses, the Pease House (above) and the neighboring Fenn-Eaton House (below), are among the earliest duplexes in the country. While three stories are visible when viewing the two houses’ facades, they both actually have five stories.
Over 25 years after designing the Church of the Good Shepherd in 1869, Elizabeth Colt persuaded Edward Tuckerman Potter to come out of retirement and design a Parish House for the church in 1896. The new structure was built as memorial to her son, Caldwell Hart Colt, an ardent yachtsman, who had died at sea in mysterious circumstances. Many of the decorative features of the building therefore have a nautical inspiration. Its High Victorian Gothic style, already well out of fashion when it was built, matches well stylistically with the neighboring church building.
The Orient Insurance Company Building was constructed in 1905, on Trinity Street in Hartford, next to the Bushnell Memorial Hall and near the State Capitol. It is just around the corner from Elm Street, which by the 1920s became known as Insurance Row, after four more companies built offices there near the Capitol. Designed by Davis & Brooks in the grand Beaux-Arts style, the Orient Insurance Company Building originally featured a large dome, which is no longer extant. The building now serves as state offices.
An excellent example of Art Deco style architecture, the Polish National Home, on Charter Oak Avenue in Hartford, was completed in 1930. Together with SS. Cyril and Methodius Church, it was once at the center of Hartford’s Polish community. Although that community has since dispersed throughout the Greater-Hartford area, the Polish National Home continues to serve the region’s Polish-Americans. An informative article from the Hartford Courant provides interesting background information on this historyczna budowla stanu Connecticut.
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The Hartford neighborhood of Asylum Hill got its name from the American Asylum for the Education and Instruction of Deaf and Dumb Persons, which was founded there in 1817. A century later, the organization changed its name to the American School for the Deaf and moved to West Hartford. Its Hartford property was purchased by the Hartford Fire Insurance Company, which had been founded in 1810. This firm was the first of many to leave downtown Hartford and build a new headquarters in Asylum Hill. The headquarters of the company, which is now known as The Hartford Financial Services Group, was constructed in 1921 in a Classical Revival style, designed by Stevenson & Dodge, with Parker, Thomas & Rice.
Located on Capitol Avenue in Hartford, right across from the State Capitol building, Connecticut’s State Library and Supreme Court Building was constructed in 1908-1910. It was designed by the New York architect, Donn Barber, in a style influenced by the Italian Renaissance. The statues above the front entrance, installed in 1913, are figures of Justice, History, Art and Science, sculpted by Michel Louis Tonnetti. The building’s East Wing houses the State Library, while the West Wing houses the Supreme Court. Between the two wings is Memorial Hall, which is home to the Museum of Connecticut History. As with the neighboring State Capitol, visitors can take tours of the Supreme Court.
After completing her home on Wethersfield Avenue in Hartford in 1893, Mary Borden Munsill had one built next door for her son, Gail Borden Munsill. The home, completed in 1895, is constructed using yellow brick, which gives it a distinctive appearance. The son’s house, unlike the mother’s, is less ornate and, with its greater smoothness and symmetricality, looks ahead to the Colonial Revival style.
