Barnes-Waldo House (1789)

Jonathan Barnes, a lawyer, was born in Southington in 1763, graduated from Yale in 1784, studied at the Litchfield Law School, and was admitted to the bar in 1789. He soon settled in Tolland, which had become a county seat in 1785. He married Rachael Steele in 1789. Barnes, who served as a town selectman in Tolland from 1798 to 1802 and in the Connecticut Legislature for twenty-eight terms, died in 1829. His oldest son, also named Jonathan Barnes, later became a prominent lawyer in Middletown. The Barnes House, at 34 Tolland Green, was next owned by Obediah Waldo, also a lawyer, who served as selectman, postmaster, town clerk, and member of the state House of Representatives. The house’s side ell was once used as an office.