Shoor Building (1909)

The Federal-style Corning House once stood at 150 Trumbull Street in Hartford, just north of the old Hall of Records building. In 1909, it was replaced with what later became known as the Shoor Brothers Furniture Company building. Shoor Brothers did not move in until 1955. The original stores to occupy the building in 1909 were the Flint-Bruce Company furniture store and the Luke Horsfall Company clothing store. The building was designed by Isaac A. Allen, Jr, who also designed the similar Dillon and Sage-Allen buildings in Hartford. Among the businesses now occupying the Shoor Building today is Trumbull Kitchen. A modern addition now adjoins the building where the Hall of Records once stood.

Heublein Building, Hartford (1896)

Adjacent on the north of the old Charter Oak Bank Building, on Trumbull Street in Hartford, is the Heublein Building, built in 1896. It was originally the home of G.F. Heublein and Brothers, a liquor and wine company which created the world’s first bottled cocktails in 1892 and began making A1 Steak Sauce in 1895. G.F. Heublein later built the Heublein Tower. The building in Hartford was constructed on the site of the eighteenth-century house of Dr. Norman Morrison, which was demolished to make way for the new building. Dr. Morrison (1690-1761), who was born in Scotland, settled in Hartford around 1740. He is credited with being the first man to separate the practice of medicine from pharmacy.

Our Lady of Lourdes Church, Waterbury (1909)

As described in the first volume of the History of Waterbury and the Naugatuck Valley (1918), “In the year 1899 the Italian Catholics of Waterbury were organized into Our Lady of Lourdes Parish by the Rev. Father Michael A. Karam, the first pastor, at the request of the Right Rev. Bishop Tierney.” The parish’s first chapel was later replaced with the current Our Lady of Lourdes Church on South Main Street, begun in 1903 and completed in 1909. It was modeled after the Roman church of Santa Francesca Romana. According to the History quoted above:

The church has a frontage of 70 feet on South Main Street and is 127 feet in depth. The height of the nave or body of the church is 55 feet, and the campanile or bell tower is 100 feet in height. The basement was first completed and roofed over, and used for a number of years for church services, and was occupied also while the super-structure was being built. The general plan consists of a high nave, lighted by clerestory windows, with two aisles. Each aisle terminates in a semi-circular apse in which the side altars are placed. The main altar is also placed in a large semi-circular apse, surrounded by an entablature and columns in which are arches and niches for the numerous statues with which the interior is adorned. The exterior of the church is built of gray pressed brick and trimmed with Indiana limestone and terra cotta. The main roofs are of slate. The campanile, which was afterwards destroyed, was built near the rear after the manner of Italian churches.

American Brass Company Headquarters (1913)

For much of its existence, the American Brass Company was the largest brass manufacturer in the country. The company was founded in 1893, with the consolidation of five existing brass mills in the Waterbury area. Purchased by the Anaconda Copper Company in 1922, it lost its individual name and identity in 1960. The American Brass Company’s Headquarters building in Waterbury, built in 1913, has a brass-clad entryway. The structure rounds the curved corner of Grand and Meadow Streets. Today, the building is part of the Waterbury Superior Court House complex, with the main entrance now located in a large addition, built in 1998.

The Basilica of the Immaculate Conception (1928)

 

 

We conclude Waterbury Week with the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception. The first Roman Catholic church in Waterbury was St. Peter’s Chapel, purchased in 1847 from Episcopalians, who were at the time moving to a larger building. The Chapel was moved to the site on East Main Street where St. Patrick’s Hall would later be built. In 1857, across the street from the Chapel, the first church in Waterbury specifically built to be a Catholic Church, the Church of the Immaculate Conception, was dedicated. In 1925 to 1928, a new Immaculate Conception Church was built on Waterbury Green, on the site where the William B. Merriman House once stood. Designed by the firm of McGinnis and Walsh, the church was modeled on the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, one of the four major Catholic basilicas. A Vatican decree in 2008 conferred on Immaculate Conception Church the status of a minor basilica.

Elton Hotel (1904)

The Elton Hotel, at Prospect and West Main Streets on the Green (Video link) in Waterbury, was for many years the city’s grandest hotel and a social and businesses center. Built in 1904 and designed by Wilfred Griggs in the style of the French Renaissance, the Elton Hotel featured luxurious amenities, including several restaurants and ballrooms. The hotel was constructed on the site of the colonial-era Scoville Homestead, which was torn down to make way for the new building. The Elton Hotel‘s first manager, Almon C. Judd, developed what became known as the “Ideal Tour,” an automobile route through New England, starting at the Elton and stopping at various hotels and resorts. Over the years, many celebrated people stopped by or stayed at the Hotel Elton. John F. Kennedy made a campaign speech in 1960 from the hotel balcony and the humorist, James Thurber, wrote the story, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” (pdf) which features a Waterbury hotel lobby, at the Elton. Today the building serves as an assisted-living facility.