Pinehurst (1860)

Pinehurst is an Italianate villa at 154 Washington Street in Norwich. Described as “one of the most picturesque places in Norwich,” it was built around 1860 for Joshua Newton Perkins. According to A Modern History of New London County, Vol. II (1922):

A New York architect, Mr. Gervase Wheeler, and his associate, William T. Hallett, erected the brick house where it now stands. The house was large and commodious, and its position afforded a fine view of the valley and cove. It resembled the Italian villas on the shores of the lakes. A photograph taken in 1866 shows the simplicity and beauty of the plan; the “Newton Perkins Place” was one of the show places of the city.

Mr. Perkins was one of the prominent men of Norwich, active in the advancement of its educational and industrial interests. After a period of some twenty years, business affairs took him to New York, and the house passed into the possession of Robert Bayard of New York. The Bayards did not occupy the house, which was in charge of a caretaker till it was purchased by Mrs. Edward Gibbs, who made many alterations and additions, among them the wide verandas; the “Newton Perkins Place” was merged into “Pinehurst,” its present name.

[…] By an odd coincidence, New York again proved a magnet, and the Gibbs family went to that city to reside. The house again was uninhabited, till 1904, when Frank Allyn Roath, a descendant of Robert Allyn, one of the original proprietors of Norwich, became the owner; Mr. Roath enjoyed his beautiful home but a few short years. He left it to his wife, Gertrude Hakes Roath, who is much interested in horticulture, and a true lover of nature. Under her supervision the grounds show the effects of the renewed care, and many wild flowers are finding homes in congenial soil.

On the verandas of Pinehurst, author Paul Leicester Ford worked on his novel, The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him (1894). Pinehurst was designed to resemble the homes of rural Italy, which have rambling wings added to over generations. Today, the house is the Pinehurst Apartments.

John Rossetter III House (1799)

At 15 Liberty Street in Clinton is a Federal/Greek Revival house. The National Register of Historic Places Nomination Form for the Clinton Village Historic District estimates its date as c.1830. The historic marker, currently on the house, bears the date 1799 and describes it as the homestead of John Rossetter 3rd and Elizabeth Buell. Interestingly, just down the street, at 3 Liberty Street, is the 1734 home of John Rossetter, which passed into the Buell family around 1800.

Clark-Stockade House (1780)

About 1659, Deacon George Clark began construction of the first house in Milford to be built outside the early settlement’s protective stockade. The building, known as the Stockade House, was expanded over time into a saltbox structure. It is also called the “Nathan Clark Stockade House,” named for a grandson of George Clark. This original house was dismantled in 1780 by Michael Peck, a builder, and David Camp, his assistant. They constructed a new house, using building materials salvaged from the one they took down. In the twentieth century, the house served as a rooming house, tea room and Milford’s first public hospital. In 1974, the Clark-Stockade House was moved from Bridgeport Avenue to become part of Wharf Lane, the Milford Historical Society’s complex of colonial houses.

Jonathan Dickerman I House (1770)

The house at 3217 Whitney Avenue in Hamden was built around 1770 by Jonathan Dickerman (1719-1795), father of the Jonathan Dickerman who built the 1792 farmhouse now at 105 Mt. Carmel Avenue. The elder Jonathan Dickerman settled in what is now Hamden in 1743. During the Revolution, he served on New Haven’s Committee of Inspection. The house was next owned by his son, Amos Dickerman and then by Amos’ son Ezra (1800-1860). Three years after Ezra’s death, the house was sold by his heirs. Today, the house has modern siding and has recently lost its original central chimney.

Captain Elisha White House (1750)

Capt. Elisha White was born in Windsor in 1706. As recorded in the Memorials of Elder John White (1760), by Allyn S. Kellogg, “He settled early in Bolton, but removed to East Guilford, (now Madison,) Conn., about 1744, and thence to the adjoining town of Killingworth, about 1749. He lived in that part of Killingworth which is now Clinton, and was for a while engaged in mercantile business. He died there, probably about the year 1778.” In 1750 he purchased the land in Clinton on which he soon built a house, constructed of brick thought to have been brought from England by ship as ballast. Known as “Old Brick,” the house is now a museum, owned by the Clinton Historical Society.

Giles Pettibone Tavern (1794)

In 1794, Giles Pettibone, Jr., son of Col. Giles Pettibone and grandson of Jonathan Pettibone of Simsbury, built a tavern on the Green in Norfolk. After Giles Pettibone died in 1811, according to The Norfolk Village Green (1917), by Frederic S. Dennis,

His son Jonathan Humphrey Pettibone, who died in 1832, succeeded his father as Tavern keeper. This Tavern a little later was kept by John A. Shepard […] This Tavern was known as Shepard’s Tavern and during the stage coach era was a place of great activity. Here the stages stopped to change horses en route between Hartford and Albany and between Winsted and Canaan. This Tavern was in late years rebuilt for a private residence by Mr. Frederick M. Shepard, the son of Capt. John A. Shepard, and was occupied by him and his family as a summer residence. […] An interesting fact connected with the old Tavern is that seven generations of the Shepard family have lived in it.

The Tavern is now covered with aluminum siding, but the central doorway surround is the original wood.