Ira Smith House (1791)

Ira Smith of Prospect was born in 1757 at his family homestead on Cheshire Road in Prospect. He served fifteen months in the Revolutionary War, going in place of his father, who was drafted in 1777. Ira was a private in Capt. Jesse Kimball’s company of Col. John Chandler’s 8th Connecticut Regiment. He was at Peekskill, at Germantown, detached for the defense of Fort Mifflin, and at Valley Forge. Smith later applied for a pension, giving a deatailed account of his service. After returning home, Ira Smith built the house at 61 Cheshire Road in Prospect sometime between 1779, when he married Elizabeth Judson, and 1791, when his father, Ephriam Smith, gave him 35 acres of the family farm. Ira and Ephriam were among the founders of Prospect’s Congregational Church. Ira died in 1835 and his son, John Andrew Smith, lived in the home until he died in 1878. It was then purchased by the Plumb family, who today operate Plumb Farm Flowers.

689 Tolland Stage Road, Tolland (1820)

The house at 689 Tolland Stage Road in Tolland was built c. 1820. It was originally located across the street, then called the Rockville Road. Around 1850, the lower level of the building was used as a workshop by Ira K. Marvin, who had settled in Tolland in 1820 and made carriages and wagons. In 1842 he had a serious illness and turned from carriage-making to farming. In 1851 he became a deacon of the Baptist Church. His son, Edwin, served in the Civil War and wrote the regimental history of the Fifth Connecticut.

Wadsworth-Dorman House (1826)

The house at 165 Main Street in Farmington was possibly built as early as 1826 by Sidney Wadsworth (1786-1846), whose family homestead is across the street. Rumah Dorman (1837-1916), wife of Civil War veteran Edward H. Dorman, bought the house in 1865. Erected as a one-and-a-half story tenement, the house was enlarged in the early twentieth century by Rumah Dorman’s son, Frank E. Dorman. He also added a wraparound front porch that has since been removed. Frank E. Dorman served as sheriff and for a time was a night watchman at the Hillstead estate where he sometimes made the night rounds with Theodate Pope Riddle, who had trouble sleeping. The house was sold out of the family in 1963. (more…)

Former Nichols Store (1874)

Although it is now used as a diner, the building at 12 Tolland Turnpike in Willington, next to the old railroad depot, was built as a store. The first store in West Willington opened in 1837. The business was acquired by John Carpenter in 1874, when the current building was erected. In 1888, Charles Nichols bought it, moved the building to its current location and added a grain room. Hans Hansen acquired the business in 1902 and added a post office section in 1936. By the time of his death in 1939, Hansen’s Grain and Grocery Store was being run by his daughter, Ester (1913-2014), and her husband, Floyd W. Phelps. It was renovated in 1957 to become Phelps Market, which later moved to Phelps Crossing nearby.

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Old Congregational Church Parsonage, Coventry (1792)

When the house at 99 High Street in Coventry was built as the Congregational Church‘s parsonage, c. 1792, the church building was located nearby, facing what is now Veterans Memorial Green. By the time the church’s congregation merged with that of the Village Church on Main Street in 1869, the former parsonage had become a private residence. Built as a one-story structure, the house was raised to two stories after the Civil War, with the front porches likely added about the same time. The hexagonal corner porch was probably added c. 1900.