The Barney Library in Farmington, adjacent to First Church, was built in 1919. Originally called the Village Library, it was donated to the town by D. Newton Barney, in honor of his mother, Sarah Brandegee Barney. A children’s wing was added in 1959. The Village Library was the town’s main library until 1983, when it became a branch library. It was renamed the Barney Library in 1999.
Built sometime between 1847 and 1855 on South Main Street in West Hartford. Like the similarly Greek Revival-style Stephen Willard House in Wethersfield, it features a gable-end facing the street and a side entrance. The round-headed window in the gable is an Italianate, rather than a Greek Revival feature. Substantial additions on the rear of the house project on either side, the one on the north elevation creating a tri-gable L-shape. The house was probably built by George Buckley, who sold his farm to Charles Coffing in 1863.
Built in 1837, the Stephen Willard House, on Broad Street Green in Wethersfield, followed the Greek Revival style of the time by having its gable-end face the street. This was to emulate the facade of a classical Greek temple. Unlike Greek Revival houses in which the front door was also on the facade, such as the Chester Bulkeley House (also in Wethersfield), the Willard House features a side entrance.
Stephen F. Willard was a later owner of the house. He began as a traveling salesman for the seed company Comstock, Ferre & Co., eventually becoming its president. He was also a founder of the American Seed Trade Association and the Wethersfield Village Improvement Association.
Originally built as a center-chimney house in 1846 for Dr. Aretus Rising on South Main Street in Suffield. In 1854, the house was bought by John Welles Loomis, a successful tobacco entrepreneur, who converted it to a center hallway, two chimney house with Greek Revival features. Loomis later built an Italianate house nearby for his son, George W. Loomis.
Built between 1828 and 1830, on High Street in Middletown, the Samuel Russell House is regarded as “one of the premier examples of Greek Revival architecture in the Northeast.” It was constructed for Samuel Wadsworth Russell, who was an important figure in the early nineteenth century China trade. Russell commissioned the well-known architect, Ithiel Town, a proponent of the Greek Revival, to design the house. The construction of the house was supervised by the builder-architect, David Hoadley. With the Russell House, Town created one of the first homes in America to feature a Greek temple design, utilizing correct Greek proportions and six Corinthian columns on the facade. Its design would prove influential in the creation of other Greek Revival houses. It also set a high standard of elegance for Middletown’s High Street, which Charles Dickens is supposed to have called the most beautiful street in America. The house was given to Wesleyan University by Thomas Macdonough Russell, Jr in 1937.
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.
Built on Main Street in Wethersfield around 1830. The Chester Bulkeley House is one of only two surviving brick Greek Revival Houses in town. It is currently run as a Bed and Breakfast.
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