The Yale-Beach building, on the left in the image above, is a commercial structure at 143-149 Main Street in downtown Seymour. Built in 1900-1901, the building had a Masonic Hall, which became home to Morning Star Lodge No. 47 in 1901. The building on the right (151-13 Main Street), was built in 1902.
Ponemah Mills, in operation from the 1870s to the 1970s, was a cotton textile manufacturer with a massive mill complex in the village of Taftville in Norwich. Along Norwich Avenue can be found Mill #1, built in 1871, and Mill #2, built in 1884. In 1929, the company erected a building for its offices, attached to Mill #2, directly in front of that structure’s north tower. The building is now home to Amazing Furniture. The former mill buildings are now being converted into luxury apartments.
The construction date of the house at 1047 Main Street in South Glastonbury is not known. An assessor gave it a date of c. 1800. It was much altered in the late nineteenth century, possibly during the period of time when it was owned by John Stevens, a carpenter who died c. 1910.
Begun as a mission in 1859, St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Mystic was organized as a parish in 1865. That same year, the parish acquired land at what is now 15 Pearl Street for a church. The cornerstone was laid in 1866 and the first service was held on Christmas Morning, 1867. Once the church was free from its large construction debt of $9,000, the building was dedicated on St. Mark’s Day, April 25, 1873. An education wing was erected in 1962.
The factory building at 132 Main Street at Warehouse Point, East Windsor, was built in 1875 by the Leonard Silk Company. Founded by J. N. Leonard in Rockville, the company produced thread from raw Japanese Silk. The industrial history of the site the Leonard Silk mill goes back to 1804, when Brazail Sexton started a woolen mill. The East Windsor Woolen Mill later failed and the property was acquired by Jehiel Simonds in 1870. The Leonard Silk Company became a tenant of the five-story building, along with the Barber & Chapin Silk Company. Not long after moving in, the building burned down in a dramatic fire on the evening of December 16, 1874. The fire had threatened the neighboring gas works, which were saved, preventing a disastrous explosion. Leonard’s company soon rebuilt, as reported in the Hartford Courant (under “State Correspondence”) on January 26, 1875:
It was two weeks after the fire before they concluded on their present course; and in the short time which has elapsed they have accomplished an astonishing amount of work, in the way of erecting a dye-house and fitting up new quarters with power, machinery, &c., necessary to conduct their business.
To protect against fire, the new factory utilized a sprinkler system, supplied from a water tank in the bell tower. The tower also contained a 780-pound bell, cast in 1868 in Sheffield, England. Leonard soon expanded his business, partnering with Luther J. Warren to expand the Warner silk mill at Northampton, Mass. As described in Picturesque Hampshire (1890):
Mr. Leonard came here fresh from his well known triumphs at Warehouse Point, Conn., where, as is generally known, he had the name of making a full honest weight of silk to the spool, and the very best in the market at that. Mr. Leonard has brought to Northampton the same spirit of intense application and painstaking attention which distinguished him in Connecticut
An addition to the Warehouse Point mill was constructed in 1887 and two more in the early twentieth century. The silk mill closed in 1940 and the bell was sold in 1960. Various companies have since occupied the building, most recently Keystone Paper & Box Company, Inc.
At 3 Lester Avenue in Pawcatuck is a two-family Italianate-style house built in 1857. The nomination for the Mechanic Street Historic District lists the building as a Masonic Hall, so it may have been used at some point by Pawcatuck Lodge No. 90. Chartered in 1863, the Lodge met for a time in the Pawcatuck Hotel and later at other locations. For many years the Lodge shared space with Franklin Lodge No. 20 of Westerly, Rhode Island. More recently, the Pawcatuck Lodge merged with Asylum Lodge No. 57 of Stonington and Charity & Relief Lodge No. 72 of Mystic to form Costal Lodge No. 57.
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