Houses - Historic Buildings of Connecticut

William P. Jordan House (1885)

Built c. 1885, the house at 228 North Street in Willimantic was the home of William Peter Jordan (1863-1953), a hardware dealer who was born in Lebanon, Connecticut. His career is described in A Modern History of Windham County, Connecticut, Vol. II (1920):

in 1884 he directed his attention to commercial pursuits by accepting a clerkship in the drug store of Wilson & Leonard of Willimantic. After a time Mr. Wilson became sole proprietor and in 1890 sold to Mr. Jordan an interest in the business, which was then conducted under the firm style of F. M. Wilson & Company. Mr. Jordan was a partner in the enterprise until 1898, when he joined his brother, Frederick D. Jordan, in a partnership and thus became prominently connected with the hardware trade of Willimantic. He has continued in this line and the business has since been reorganized under the name of the Jordan Hardware Company, of which he is the secretary and treasurer. The company conducts both a wholesale and retail business and their patronage is very gratifying.

William P. Jordan does not confine his efforts to a single line, however, for he is identified with many important business interests which constitute leading factors in the commercial and industrial development of the city. He is now the treasurer of the Windham Silk Company, of which he became a stockholder and director in 1901. He is also the president of the Watts Laundry Machinery Company, engaged in the manufacture of presses and mangles, on which they hold patents, their output being shipped all over this country and also to France under government contract. Mr. Jordan also became a stockholder and one of the directors of the Willimantic Trust Company, which he assisted in organizing in 1915, and he is identified with the Willimantic Industrial Company and is president of the Jordan Automobile Company, which is featuring the Dodge, Buick and Cole cars, their sales territory covering Windham and New London counties in the sale of the Dodge and Cole, while their sale of the Buick cars covers a part of Windham county and of Tolland and New London. Mr. Jordan’s interests have thus become important and extensive and his activities place him in the foremost rank of the leading business men of his adopted city.

John Porter II House (1800)

The house at 32 Broad Street in East Hartford was built sometime between c. 1800 and the early 1820s, possibly by John Porter II. The house has a later, elaborately carved, Victorian-era porch. In 1855 the house was owned by Charles C. Ashley, a silversmith.

Jonathan Weston House (1835)

The Jonathon Weston House, located at 5 Common Road in Willington, was built before 1835 as a story-and-a-half Cape Cod-type house attached to a to a single story earlier building. Between 1897 and 1955 the house was converted to two stories. The maple trees on the front lawn were planted by W.W. Curtiss in 1877.

Samuel Weed House (1917)

The Samuel Weed House, at 2 Park Street facing Norwalk Green, was built in 1917. It may be named for the Samuel L. Weed who was cashier of the Fairfield County National Bank. The house is now used as offices.

H. E. Bishop House (1906)

The H. E. Bishop House, at 87 East Avenue in Norwalk, is a Colonial Revival residence, built c. 1905-1906. Designed by Joy Wheeler Dow of Wyoming, NJ, architect and author of American Renaissance: A Review of Domestic Architecture (1904), the house is modeled on the c. 1723 house at Shirley Plantation, on the James River in Virginia. The Bishop House attracted much attention after it was built, being featured in several magazines. In “Residence of H. E. Bishop, Esq., at Norwalk, Connecticut” (American Homes and Gardens, Vol. V, No. 21, February, 1908), Francis Durando Nichols writes:

The site chosen for the house was fortunately an elevated corner lot, more spacious by far than is usually to be had in the popular residential section of a city. Taking its situation as a keynote, the designer has given his composition an effect of massive elegance which makes it one of the most striking houses in its vicinity.

In “A New House Inspired by an Old One” (House & Garden, Vol. XVI. No. 1, July, 1909; reprinted in Distinctive Homes of Moderate Cost, 1910), Henry Lorsay, 3rd writes:

The house is surely not one of the million that we are perfectly content to pass by with never a second look. It compels attention, not because of any eccentricity in design, not because of any weird hybrids among its architectural motives, nor because of any unusual and dazzling color scheme, but solely because it does have that elusive quality of architectural distinction.

In “Four Colonial Houses” (American Forestry, Vol. 23, No. 279, March, 1917), Rawson Woodman Haddon writes:

The way by which we may preserve in the domestic architecture of today an undefinable charm—a certain warmth of personality with which American history has invested the wooden house——is what Mr. joy Wheeler Dow shows us in the buildings he has designed, and in his writing upon the various developments of American architecture, both historic and modern.

The house is now used as offices.

Rev. Hezekiah Bissell House (1750)

669 Bloomfield Ave Rev Hezekiah Bissell 1750

In 1738 the Rev. Hezekiah Bissell became the first pastor of the parish of Wintonbury (now the First Congregational Church in Bloomfield), serving 45 years until his death in 1783. Rev. Bissell’s house, built in 1750, is located at 669 Bloomfield Avenue. His table stone is located in the Old Wintonbury Cemetery.

Canfield-Turner House (1795)

When the house at 86 Green Hill Road, across from the Green in Washington, was built in 1795 it was a story and a half with a rear lean-to and was known as Squire Marshall’s. Daniel Canfield bought the house in 1798 and raised it to two full stories. Not wishing to pay the $200 required to raise the first floor’s seven feet six inch ceilings, he made the second floor ceilings ten feet high instead. The house remained the residence of the Canfield family until the death of Daniel N. Canfield. Daniel and his brother Lewis were carpenters, farmers and abolitionists. Daniel N. Canfield was town clerk and treasurer and started the Washington public library association. In the 1890s his daughter Florence Canfield Kinney inherited the house, which was rented out for many years. In 1899 one of the small rooms was given to the D.A.R. to use as a historical room. Rev. Herbert B. Turner bought the house to use as a summer home around 1920 and hired architect Ehrick K. Rossiter to redesign the interior, replacing its many smaller rooms with larger spaces.