Houses - Historic Buildings of Connecticut

John Henry Sessions House (1882)

The house built in 1882 for John Henry Sessions (also known as John H. Sessions, Jr.) in Bristol stands at 60 High Street, next to the house built later for his father, John Humphrey Sessions. As related in the 1907 history of Bristol, John Henry Sessions was

born in Polkville, February 26, 1849, and received a liberal education at the schools of Bristol. In 1873 he was admitted into the firm of J. H. Sessions & Son, trunk hardware manufacturers. He was a director of the Bristol Water Company at its organization and at the death of his father became its president. At the time of his father’s death he was elected vice president of the Bristol National Bank. Mr. Sessions, though a staunch Republican, took no active part in politics. In 1883 he was elected secretary of the Bristol Board of Fire Commissioners. On May 19, 1869 he married, Miss Maria Francena Woodford, who was born September 8, 1848, a daughter of Ephraim Woodford, of West Avon. Conn., and one son was born to them, Albert Leslie, born January 5, 1872.

After John Henry Sessions died in 1902, his son Albert L. Sessions took over leadership of J. H. Sessions & Son.

John Humphrey Sessions House (1888)

The house at 52 High Street in Bristol was built in 1888 for John Humphrey Sessions (1828-1899) and his wife, Emily Bunnell Sessions. Both were born in Burlington. As described in the 1907 history of Bristol:

In November, 1854, Mr. John Humphrey Sessions, a young man of 26 years, formed a partnership with Henry A. Warner, and rented a small factory in Polkville (Edgewood, as it is now called), in which to conduct a woodturning business. The small capital which he invested was the result of his hard labors, for early-in life he had been thrown entirely upon his own resources.

This partnership was dissolved in 1865, Mr. Sessions continuing in his own name the business, which at first consisted mainly of wood turnings for the various clockmakers in the vicinity, and which grew rapidly from the beginning.

In 1869 he bought a plot of ground on North Main street, Bristol, and built the main wooden building, now standing, and moved his plant to Bristol.

As the same book also relates:

About 1870 he purchased the trunk hardware business that had belonged to his deceased brother, Albert J. Sessions, and the business was a success from the commencement. In 1879 Mr. Sessions bought the property of the Bristol Foundry Co. on Laurel St., and together with his son Wm. E. Sessions, formed the Sessions Foundry Co. This business, like the others, proved a great success, and in 1896 they moved into their present plant on Farmington avenue.

All his life Mr. Sessions was identified with important concerns of the town. In 1875 he was one of the founders of the Bristol National Bank and was elected its first president, a position he held until the time of his death. He was president of the Bristol Water Company at the time of his decease. He was one of the original stockholders of the Bristol Electric Light Company and was its president until it merged into the Bristol & Plainville Tramway Company; was a stockholder in the Bristol Press Company.

Rev. Luke Daly Houses (1873)

Rev. Luke Daly, a Catholic priest, erected two Italianate houses in Kensington at 80 and 88 Main Street about 1873 on land he bought from George D. Boyer. When Daly died he left the houses to the Catholic Church, which owned them for twenty-five years.

James Norman House (1722)

The house at 409 Washington Street in Norwich was once the site of Isaac Huntington’s blacksmith shop. In 1722, James Norman acquired the property from Christopher Huntington and either converted the existing building into his residence or removed it and built a new one on the site. As related in Old Houses of the Antient Town of Norwich (1895) by Mary E. Perkins:

In 1714, the town grants to Isaac Huntington 4 rods of land (frontage 2 rods), “on ye side of ye hill to be taken up between Sergt. Israel Lathrop’s orchard and Sergt. Thomas Adgate’s cartway,” and here he builds a shop, and in 1717 he receives a grant of land south of this “to build a house on,” but he evidently prefers to buy his grandfather’s homestead, when the opportunity offers, and the land and shop (frontage rods) are sold in 1722 by Christopher Huntington, who has become the owner, to James Norman. James Norman either alters the shop into a dwelling, or builds a new house, which seems to stand on the former site of the shop.

[. . . .]

Miss Caulkins mentions a James Norman, who, in 1715 was captain of a vessel engaged in the Barbadoes trade, and in 1717 was licensed to keep a tavern. This James Norman may be the one whose house we have just located, or possibly the latter was the son of the sea captain. He was in 1723 a “cloathiar.” No record has been found of his marriage, or of the birth of children, but we know that a James Norman married after 1730 Mary (Rudd) Leffingwell, widow of Nathaniel Leffingwell, of whose estate he was the administrator. Mary (Leffingwell) Norman died in 1734. James Norman died in 1743, leaving a widow, Elizabeth, and three children, Caleb, Mary, and Joshua, the two latter choosing their brother Caleb for guardian. The heirs divide the property in 1753-4.

John A. Woodward House (1867)

John A. Woodward, a carpenter and Civil War veteran, erected the house at 235 Main Street in Watertown in 1867 (it has since been much expanded). Interesting evidence survives of a method employed to sell the house in 1880 in the form of a $1.00 share in the house, the reverse side of which reads:

Share in the beautiful residence property and lot occupied by J. A. Woodward, situated in the center of the charming village of Watertown, Conn., valued at sixty-five hundred [$6500] dollars, and also entitles the bearer to admission to a grand entertainment to be given at the warren house in that town, on Wednesday Ev., Oct. 27, 1880, at which time the residence will be delivered to the shareholders to be disposed of as they may direct

Update: Further information about the house can be found in the brochure for the 2011 Watertown House Tour. According to this document, the first people to live in the house were Eben and Margaret Atwood. Their daughter Amelia married Howard Miner Hickcox who started the Hickcox Funeral Home in 1884. It remained in the Hickcox family until it was sold to attorney Franklin Pilicy, whose 1980s addition doubled the size of the house.

Warren Coachman’s House (1859)

Truman A. Warren, a wealthy Watertown manufacturer, erected his large Italianate house in 1851 (Address: 5 The Green, Watertown). In 1859 he erected a cottage for his coachman next door (Address: 15 The Green).

Wheeler-Beecher House (1807)

Noted architect David Hoadley designed the house at 562 Amity Road in Bethany for Darius Beecher (1768-1833). Built in 1807, the house is considered a major example of the Federal style in New England, both in its exterior and interior detailing. It had a number of owners in the nineteenth century, including Abraham Beecher, who sold it to John Thomas, who then gave it to his son Lewis Thomas as a wedding present. Next it was owned by Orrin Wheeler, whose family retained it until 1899. The house was owned for a time in the twentieth century by Huntington Lee and his sister Josephine B. Lee, who added a wing on the south side where the Gale Electric Company made lamps and reproduced antiques. For a brief period in the early 1940s the wing was occupied by William Edwin Rudge, who published a graphic arts magazine called Print. The cover of Volume II, Nos. 3 & 4 (December 1941) featured an illustration of the house by Hugo Steiner-Prag. There also exists an etching of the house by John Taylor Arms entitled “Old Hoadley House, Home of “Print,” Bethany, Connecticut.”