Architectural Style

Casa Bianca (1848)

Casa Bianca is an Italianate house in New Haven, built around 1848. It most likely originally stood on Orange Street, but was moved to Bradley Street around 1882. In the early twentieth century, it was the home of George Dudley Seymour, a lawyer and preservationist. Born in Bristol, Seymour specialized in patent law in New Haven and was also dedicated to municipal improvements in the city. He urged the adoption of city planning (in line with the ideas of the City Beautiful Movement) and served as secretary of the city plan commission and the committee planning the construction of a new public library. Seymour also led the campaign to erect a statue of Nathan Hale on Yale’s Old Campus and he later restored the Nathan Hale Homestead in Coventry.

The Nehemiah Sperry House (1857)

The Italianate-style Nehemiah Sperry House was built in 1857 on Orange Street in New Haven. It was the home Nehemiah D. Sperry, a businessman and Republican politician. He was a builder and contractor, who joined his brother-in-law, Willis Smith, in the prominent New Haven firm of Smith & Sperry. Much of the Orange Street neighborhood was developed by the company, which also constructed the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument in the city’s East Rock Park. Sperry served as New Haven’s postmaster, Secretary of State of Connecticut and as a U.S. Representative in Congress from 1895 to 1911. A lighthouse in New Haven Harbor, which no longer exists, was named in Sperry’s honor, as he had contributed much to the harbor area’s development. Sperry’s house, which has a design likely attributable to the office of Henry Austin, was originally much lighter in color and resembled the similar Edward Rowland House on Wooster Square.

Second Randolph Please House (1832)

Around 1832, Randolph Please built his second home in Middletown, across College Street from his first home. This newer building has a classic Greek Revival temple-front. In 1916, it was remodeled to become a church. Today, it is Middletown’s First Church of Christ, Scientist.

The First Randolph Please House (1822)

Randolph Please built two homes in Middletown, on opposite sides of College Street, where it meets Broad Street. The first is a Federal townhouse, built around 1822, which once had four chimneys and a kitchen ell. The house is part of the Broad Street Historic District.

The Parke-Buckley House (1770)

Joseph Parke was a cooper who moved from Groton to Middle Haddam in 1758, when the community was still developing into what would become an important shipbuilding port on the Connecticut River. One of Parke’s sons built an asymmetrical saltbox house at Knowles Landing in 1770. After the Revolutionary War, it was occupied by Chauncey Buckley, a wealthy merchant and owner of privateers during the war.

John Slade Ely House (1901)

Dr. John Slade Ely was professor of the Theory and Practice of Medicine at Yale Medical School from 1897 until his death in 1906 (when a memorial professorship was established in his honor). Dr. Ely lived in a Tudor-style house, designed by S. G. Taylor, on Trumbull Street in New Haven. When his widow, Grace T. Ely, died in 1960, she left the house as a non-profit arts center.

Psi Upsilon, Wesleyan University (1893)

Psi Upsilon, the fifth oldest college fraternity in the United States, was founded at Union College in 1833. The Xi chapter was established at Wesleyan University in 1843 and the fraternity’s building was constructed in 1893. The Dutch Renaissance Revival building was designed by Colin C. Wilson and constructed of yellow Perth Amboy brick.