At 121 Holcomb Street, in the Blue Hills section of Hartford, is a striking example of the Stick Style. A Victorian Stick cottage built around 1875, it displays the style‘s distinctive trademarks of decorative half-timbering (called stickwork) and ornamental woodwork.
The house at 133 Main Street in Southington was built in 1865 for Julius N. Savage, who was in the carriage bolt manufacturing business. It was later owned by James F. Pratt, a merchant who organized the Southington National Bank. The house is named for Marcellus B. Willcox, (1844-1918), president of the Southington National Bank and of Peck, Stowe & Wilcox, a hardware manufacturing company based in Southington. The Willcox House is an excellent example of the Stick style, displaying “stickwork” (decorative half-timbering on the exterior walls), decorative brackets and trussing on the gables.
Trinity Episcopal Church, on Main Street in Thomaston, was built in two sections in 1871 and 1880. Representing the transition from the Gothic Revival to the Stick style (with board-and-batten siding, decorative gable bargeboards and a pyramidal steeple) it was built to the designs of Richard M. Upjohn, architect of the Connecticut State Capitol Building. Trinity had begun as a mission of the Episcopal Church in Plymouth (founded in 1740) and became an independent parish in 1869. Since 1996, the church has been St. Peter’s-Trinity Church, formed through a merger of St. Peter’s Church, Plymouth and and Trinity Parish, Thomaston.
The Stick-style house at 348 Hopmeadow Street in Simsbury was built in 1879 on the site of a c.1679 house, built by John Pettibone, Sr. The house was later owned by Rosetta Pettibone Bestor (1769-1825), wife of Dr. John Bestor. After her death, it was purchased by John Owen Pettibone in 1826. A large landowner, he was a probate judge of Simsbury and served in the State Senate. After his death in 1876, the property passed to his niece, Charlotte Pettibone Winslow, who tore down the old house and built the present one. She was the widow of Rev. Horace Winslow, who had retired and moved to Weatogue. According to the Commemorative Biographical Record of Hartford County (1901):
Mr. Winslow was married, May 8, 1850, at the Church of the Puritans, New York City, by the pastor, the Rev. George B. Cheever, D.D., to Charlotte Henrietta Pettibone, daughter of the late Capt. Jonathan and Mrs. Fanny Rosanna (Phelps) Pettibone, of Simsbury, Conn. Mrs. Winslow has for more than fifty years been a worthy and sustaining helpmate to her husband, and has always been interested in his work. She is of a kind and lovable disposition, and her devotion to her husband and children is unsurpassed. She was born at Weatogue, Simsbury, and was only three years old when she attended her first school, was a pupil of various private schools, and was graduated at the age of sixteen at Hartford Female Seminary, with first rank in her class. She also took courses in French, Music and Art while residing in Hartford, and later at New York City, being for a time a pupil at the private school of Madame Okill. About the year 1844, Miss Delia Bacon, of New Haven, sister of Rev. Leonard Bacon, D.D., conducted a class of young ladies in higher branches of study, This class Miss Pettibone joined, giving special attention to the Bible, to Shakespeare, and to philosophy, and the few months spent in New Haven were most delightful and profitable, as Miss Bacon was a lady of rare ability and attainments.
The George Richardson House is a Queen Anne-style residence built in 1887 at 311 Barnum Avenue in East Bridgeport. The house’s architect was Henry A. Lambert. There appear to be two prominent George Richardsons associated with Bridgeport at this time. The house was built for George Richardson, originally a railroad engineer in Troy, NY. He became superintendent of the Consolidated Safety Valve Company, which he founded with his partner, Richard H. Ashcroft, in Boston in 1879. The company moved to Bridgeport six years later. Both men had earlier patented new safety valve designs in the 1860s. The house was later owned by George E. Nothnagle of the George E. Nothnagle & Son furniture store in Bridgeport. (more…)
The first Academy building in Orange was constructed about 1821, across from Orange Green. In 1878-1879, a larger building replaced it. The second floors of both successive buildings were used for the school, while the first floors were used as assembly rooms by the town. In the twentieth century, town offices began moving into the building, which was enlarged to the rear. Administrative use by town government continued until a new Town Hall was built in 1967. The building next served as offices for the town’s Board of Education until 1989. Since then, the Academy has been leased to the Orange Historical Society for use as a museum.
The Crosley F. Fitton House, built around 1865, is at the corner of Elm and Prospect Streets in Rockville, Vernon. Crosley Fitton, born in England, was brought to the United States at the age of three. As described in Illustrated Popular Biography of Connecticut (1891), he
became a woolen manufacturer, as was his father before him. Twenty-six years ago he came to Rockville, and for twenty-four years he has been the agent of the Rock Manufacturing Company, being the oldest in continuous service of all who have held official connection with the manufacturing establishments of Rockville. As a woolen manufacturer he ranks among the most able in New England, and during his connection with the Rock Company it has enjoyed continued success and prosperity under his management. The mills have been enlarged, the most improved machinery obtained, the force increased, and woolen goods manufactured equal to any produced in the country. Mr. Fitton [d. 1891] was always a hard worker, and often the first man at the mill in the morning and the last to leave at night.
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