Today’s Aetna, Inc. is the descendant of the Aetna Life Insurance Company, which was incorporated in 1853. In 1931, their corporate headquarters building was constructed on Farmington Avenue in Hartford. Designed by James Gamble Rogers, it is a Colonial Revival building far more monumental than any actually built during the colonial period. In a sense it is like the Old State House on steroids, and shares some stylistic similarities with that historic structure.
While it today features a Greek Revival appearance, originating in changes made in the nineteenth century, and it was also moved at some point to be above a new cellar, the Benjamin Bissell House actually dates to 1694, making it the oldest house in the East Windsor Hill Historic District. It sits on the original house lot owned by Eltweed Pomeroy and later by John Bissell, who gave it to his son, Thomas Bissell. This lot still stretches between the Connecticut River and Main Street.
The Moses Wells House, also known as the Nathan day house, was built around 1780 on Main Street in East Windsor Hill (South Windsor) by Moses Wells, a hatter from Colchester. His son Noah was married in 1781 and Moses sold him the house that same year. It is unusual for being a colonial era house with a mansard roof.
Built around 1730 on Broad Street in Wethersfield, across from the Buttolph-Williams House. Ezra Webb was the brother of the first Joseph Webb, father of the Joseph Webb who built the Webb House.
Built on Main Street in Wethersfield around 1725 for Dr. Daniel Hooker, a grandson of Thomas Hooker. It is the oldest surviving two chimney house in Wethersfield and is transitional because it lacks the Georgian center hallway typical of later two chimney houses. The house was enlarged in 1825 by Timothy Griswold. (Thanks to Anne Kuckro for information on this house).
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This house was originally located on Main Street in Hartford. It was built in 1788 for Amos Bull, a dry goods merchant, who had a shop on the first floor and also ran a school in the house. Bull once lived in the Silas Deane House in Wethersfield and one of his five wives was Abigail Webb from the Webb House. He sold the house in 1821 and it has since been moved twice: once in 1940 and a second time in 1971 to its present location on Prospect Street, behind the Butler-McCook House. The Amos Bull House is a Federal style brick half house, a type of townhouse more commonly found in larger cities than Hartford. In recent years, the building housed the Historic Preservation and Museum Division of the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism. Update: A major restoration of the house was completed in 2014 by Connecticut Landmarks. It is now that organization’s archival repository and offices.
Built in Wethersfield in 1761-1764, the First Church of Christ was the town’s third Meeting House. Designed in the Georgian style, it is a rare survival of a brick colonial meeting house. The steeple was most likely modeled on that of an Episcopal church, Trinity Church in Newport, R.I., which was in turn modeled on Christ Church in Boston. George Washington and the Comte de Rochambeau attended services here on May 20, 1781, during the period they were holding their important meetings in the nearby Webb House. In 1774, John Adams, who was visiting Silas Deane, wrote in his diary:
“We went up the steeple of Wethersfield meeting-house, from whence is the most grand and beautiful prospect in the world, at least that I ever saw.”
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