Captain William Bull Tavern (1745)

Happy Thanksgiving!! The Captain William Bull Tavern in Litchfield was built around 1745 on a farm on the East Litchfield Road, part of the Hartford to Albany highway. It is not known who built the house, but Capt. Bull was the owner of the farm by the 1790s. He had served at the capture of Fort Ticonderoga in 1775. The house passed through various owners until Frederick Fuessenich of Torrington purchased it in 1923. By that time it had fallen into disrepair and was in danger of being dismantled. Fuessenich saved it and moved the building to a new site about two miles away, placing it across from where the old tollhouse on the Torrington Turnpike had once stood. Fuessenich, an avid collector of antiques, restored and furnished the house, which he renamed the Tollgate Hill Tavern. (The house was featured in an article in the September 1925 issue of Country Life magazine). He also brought other colonial buildings to his property to create a period ambiance, including a house believed to have been the first school house used in the town of Berlin. The antiques collection was dispersed during the Depression. In the 1930s, Fuessenich and his wife established an inn at the Tavern. The Inn has since continued under various owners and the kitchen was completely renovated in 2003.

G. Burgess Fisher House (1930)

Built in 1930 for G. Burgess Fisher and his wife, the house at 105 Scarborough Street in Hartford is one of the homes that will be open as part of the Mark Twain House & Museum‘s 31st Annual Holiday House Tour on Sunday, December 4, 2011. Described as “semi-Tudor” and French-Norman Chateau in style, the house was designed by Milton E. Hayman. It features Tudor elements (presented in a more ordered fashion than is typical of the style) and also has examples of classical detailing. The house was featured in an advertisement, headed “Modern De Lux Living” in the Hartford Courant of April 26, 1932. The ad, placed by the Hartford Gas Company, extolled the house’s modern amenities, including the “All-Gas Kitchen.” The original gas stove was later bought by Martha Stewart for one of her own houses.

Timothy Wadsworth Stanley House (1860)

The Gothic Revival mansion at 1 Hillside Place in New Britain was built in 1859-1860 for Timothy Wadsworth Stanley, a successful businessman and state legislator. With his three brothers, Stanley had founded the Stanley Rule and Level Company in the 1850’s, which would much later become part of the Stanley Tool Works, founded by another brother. In 1866, Stanley became the first president of the Union Manufacturing Company. He was also vice-president and later president of the New Britain Savings Bank. His house was originally surrounded by a four-acre estate, designed by the landscape architect Jacob Weidenmann.

Sterling Bradley House (1835)

Sterling Bradley was a well-known citizen in nineteenth-century Hamden, who served as a selectman in 1832, 1833 and 1834. In 1829, he inherited the second of two houses built by his father, Amasa Bradley, on Whitney Avenue in the Mount Carmel section of town. As described in The Connecticut Quarterly, Vol. IV, No. 4 (1898):

Sterling Bradley, a life-long resident of Hamden, became the sole proprietor of the Cheshire turnpike during the latter part of the time when toll was collected. His stalwart form was a familiar figure, usually accompanied by a team of unusually fine oxen. At one period his home became the country tavern that furnished refreshment to the throngs of people that traveled over his road.

As described by John H. Dickerman in the Colonial History of the Parish of Mount Carmel (1904):

Sterling Bradley, whose houses and barns still stand as he built them on the old colonial highway, afterward the turnpike, was an early promoter of choice cattle. His Durham stock long held precedence in the town, and his name became proverbial as associated with fine oxen. It was the custom at the County fair to award a liberal premium to the most numerous and best team of oxen exhibited by any town within the county. The team started at or near the home of Sterling Bradley and continued to augment as it proceeded through the town until one hundred and twenty-five yoke of oxen were gathered in the “round up” on New Haven Green. Mount Carmel always carried home the banner of victory when an effort was made to get out its full quota.

While continuing to operate the tavern in the house built by his father, Sterling Bradley built a new house, around 1835, across the street, at 3997 Whitney Avenue.

Dr. Edward Fitzgerald House (1901)

The Colonial Revival house at 480 East Washington Avenue in East Bridgeport was built in 1901 (or perhaps as early as 1893). It was the home and office of Dr. Edward Fitzgerald, who was appointed medical examiner in the city in 1924. In the 1970s, the house was bequeathed to the United Way of Eastern Fairfield County by Dr. Fitzgerald’s widow and was then sold to an immigrant resettlement agency. By the 1980s, many Victorian-era homes in the Washington Park neighborhood were in bad condition and abandoned as drugs and crime dominated the neighborhood. In 1989, the house’s owner was beaten over the head with a crowbar and tied up by a burglar, but managed to free himself and shoot the intruder three times. In 1995, the house was eventually foreclosed on and sold to investors who were anticipating the opening of a casino nearby that was never built. The house was then acquired by the Washington Park Association and in 1999 was the first of ten properties in the neighborhood to undergo restoration by the Association in a revitalization project supported by grants, a loan and Federal tax credits.

Avery Lamb House (1841)

Prospect Street in New London is notable for being a well-preserved example of a mid-nineteenth century streetscape, with houses in the Greek Revival style predominating. Sabin Smith laid out Prospect Street in 1837 and then proceeded to sell his holdings. In 1841, Avery Lamb, a cooper, hired builder Lewis Crandall to build two houses, at nos. 16 and 20. Lamb sold the former, but the latter, 20 Prospect Street, became his own house. (Note: the sign on the house itself displays a date of 1836.) (more…)

Alsop-Weeks House (1780)

At 202 Washington Street in Middletown is a house that has gone through a number of stylistic changes over two centuries. Known as the Wetmore-Weeks or Alsop-Weeks House, it was built around 1780 by Chauncey Whittlesey, wealthy merchant and supporter of the American Revolution. The house was later owned by Charles R. Alsop, developer of the now rare Alsop Pocket percussion revolver. Alsop, who also served as mayor of Middletown (1843-1846) and state senator (1855), made alterations to the house around 1840, remodeling the Georgian-style building in the then-popular Gothic Revival style. Later in the nineteenth century, the Atwater family remodeled the interior of the house in the neo-Federal style. They sold it to Frank B. Weeks, who had just served as governor of Connecticut from 1909 to 1911. After his term, Weeks became a trustee of Wesleyan and bequeathed the house to the University at his death in 1935. The house has since been a student residence. A rear addition was constructed in 1966.