Clock Tower Mill (1886)

clock-tower-mill.jpg

The Clock Tower Mill, originally called the Spinning Mill, was constructed in 1886, on the corner of Forest and Elm Streets in Manchester, as part of the Cheney family‘s mill village complex. The earliest mills of the Cheney Brothers Silk Manufacturing Company were built in the 1830s along Hop Brook. As steam power superseded water power by the 1880s, the Cheney Brothers began to build in the area north of Hartford Road, starting with the Spinning Mills. The functional mill buildings feature some architectural decorations, including the Spinning Mill’s five-story Italianate clock tower. During World War II, the mill housed the Cheney Brothers’ Pioneer Parachute Co. (founded in 1938). There is an interesting story of a WWII private from Manchester who, about to jump over Normandy, was making a final inspection of his parachute and discovered it had been inspected by his own mother, who worked at the factory! Today the Clock Tower Mill is part of the Cheney Brothers National Historic Landmark District. In an example of adaptive reuse, the structure has been converted to apartments available for rent.

The A. Everett Austin, Jr. House (1930)

austin-house.jpg

On this Veteran’s Day, I went to see the play at the Hartford Stage, Chick, The Great Osram, about the life of A. Everett Austin, Jr. Known as “Chick,” Austin was the director of the Wadsworth Atheneum from 1927 to 1944 and during his tenure made Hartford a center of the art world. He built up the Atheneum’s collections of both Old Master Paintings and modern art, brining to the first major exhibition of Picasso to the united States. He was also involved with the performing arts, staging the premiere of Gertrude Stein and Virgil Thomson‘s Four Saints in Three Acts, with an all black cast, and bringing George Blanchine to America. It was the biographical play’s last day, but an exhibition called Magic Facade: The Austin House, about the home Chick Austin built on Scarborough Street in Hartford, continues through April 20.

The house, constructed in 1930, was designed by Leigh H. French, Jr., under Austin’s direction. A Palladian Villa, it was modeled on the 1596 Villa Feretti-Angeli in Dolo, Venezia, Italy. The house gives the feeling of a stage set, as it is only one room deep. When I was in high school, I heard one variation of an urban legend about the house, according to which it was a mere facade for a power station! The house was bequeathed by Chick’s widow, Helen Goodwin Austin, to the Atheneum in 1985 and has recently been restored. It is available for tours on request with a donation to the Sarah Goodwin Austin Memorial Fund.

Cheney Hall (1866)

cheneyhall.JPG

The Cheney Brothers Silk Manufacturing Company flourished in Manchester in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Nineteenth century mill village complexs, which included housing for workers, also featured entertainment venues for the community. Built in 1866, as a theater and cultural center, Cheney Hall was designed by the Boston artist and architect C. H. Hammatt Billings, who had also created the original illustrations for Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Over the years , audiences at Cheney Hall would see theatrical performances, boxing matches, high school graduations, and many famous speakers, including Horace Greeley (who had dedicated the building in 1867), Mark Twain, Susan B. Anthony, Henry Ward Beecher, Grover Cleveland and William H. Taft. The building was used as a hospital during the 1918 flu pandemic. Used as a fabric salesroom from 1925 to 1976, the building was then in bad condition, but was saved from demolition when the Cheney Brothers National Historic Landmark District was created in 1978. Restored in 1991, Cheney Hall today hosts performances of the Little Theatre of Manchester and is available for rentals.