The Wellington MacDonough House, which faces Broad Street Green in Wethersfield, is a Colonial Revival home inspired by the many Colonial structures in Wethersfield’s Historic District. It was built in 1937 on a site once occupied by the house of John Chester, which stood until 1869. The property had also been owned by Franklin Comstock, of Comstock, Ferre & Co.
The Elijah Lewis House was built around 1780 or 1790 by Farmington‘s master builder, Judah Woodruff. Lewis was a farmer and served as a quartermaster in the Revolutionary War. Both he and his son, Elijah Lewis, Jr., were abolitionists and the house was a station on the Underground Railroad (it is on the Connecticut Freedom Trail). In 1977, to improve the flow of traffic on Farmington Avenue, the house was moved back from the road and rotated 90 degrees, with a new address on Mountain Spring Road. The house, which is currently for sale, was also occupied by the artist, Robert B. Brandegee, who left paintings on some of the interior door panels.
The North Canton School building was built in 1872, near the North Canton Methodist Episcopal Church. It was used as a school from 1872 to 1942. Because its original location was right at a fork along Cherry Brook Road, the schoolhouse was moved in 1927 when the road was widened. It is now located on the church’s property.
The Elkanah Cobb House, on Water Street in Stonington Borough, is one of the oldest in town. Built in 1760s, the Cobb House is a one-and-a-half story structure with a gambrel roof and unusual 9 over 6 sash windows. Cobb was the owner of the house at the time when Stonington was bombarded by British ships on August 19, 1814 during the War of 1812. According to The Homes of our Ancestors in Stonington, Conn., by Grace Denison Wheeler (1903), the house “stood in the thick of the fight near the [American] battery, and so has many scars received during the bombardment.” Benson J. Lossing visited Stonington in 1860 and mentions the house in his Pictorial Field-Book of the War of 1812 (1869).
For Halloween, we present a classic Victorian Stick Style house, the 1884 Frank Sanford House, on Lovely Street in Unionville. The Stick Style is viewed as a transitional style between the earlier Gothic and Italianate and the later Queen Anne styles. Some see the Stick style as an independent style, others as a part of the broader category of Queen Anne. Sanford, who owned a lumber and hardware business, married Marion Hawley and soon joined his brother-in-law, C. R. Hawley in founding the Sanford and Hawley lumber and building materials company, which is still in operation today.
The Daniel Rust House, on Main Street in Coventry, was built in 1731. The house is now a Bead and Breakfast. According to its website, the house, “was established in 1800 by the Rose family as a place to rest and refresh yourself before undertaking the remainder of your journey.”
Constructed in 1876, to celebrate the Nation’s centennial, the building which now serves as Coventry‘s Visitors’ Center was originally the Town Office. The bankruptcy of the Tracy-Elliot Mills in 1929 led to the town’s takeover of the company’s properties and the conversion of their office building to serve as the town’s offices. The 1876 building then served as a post office through the Second World War, but later fell into disrepair. The building was restored and used by the town’s Bicentennial Commission in 1976 and was again refurbished by the Coventry Historical Society to serve as a Visitors’ Center on Main Street. Since 2002, it has been operated by the Village Improvement Society.
