Bacon Academy opened in 1803 in a plain but imposing three-story brick Federal-style building in the center of Colchester. The school was established with a $40,000 donation left in the will of Pierpont Bacon, a prosperous farmer, who died in 1800. It was decided by the new institution’s trustees that the school would focus on preparing young men for college, while local boys could also attend to prepare to enter business careers. The school had its heyday in the first half of the nineteenth century, especially under the leadership of John Adams (1803-1810), who later became principal of Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, and Charles Pomeroy Otis (1827-1837). Famous alumni of Bacon Academy include Stephen F. Austin, known as the Father of Texas, William Alfred Buckingham, Connecticut’s Civil War governor, and Lyman Trumbull, later a senator from Illinois. Bacon Academy’s national reputation declined in the early twentieth century, by which time it had become a more traditional privately endowed high school for the town of Colchester. It eventually passed from exclusive control by trustees to being supported by town tax money. Later additions to the building include the Victorian-era arched doorhood over the main entrance and a small rear ell, added in the early twentieth century. The current cupola is another nineteenth century addition, built over the original bell tower. By 1962, due to the growing student body, the students were moved to a new building. The original structure is still used by the town for school offices.
