Knowlton Memorial Hall (1924)

Knowlton Memorial Hall, located at 25 Pompey Hollow Road in Ashford, was built in 1924 to serve as a town hall and library. These facilities are located on the second floor, while a large hallway and auditorium occupy the first floor. The building was the gift of Charles C. Knowlton (1844-1924), a native of Ashford who was a partner in a Putnam silk mill. He resided in New York City, where he marketed the firm’s silk, but he would spend summers in his home town of Ashford. He gifted Knowlton Memorial Hall in honor of his father, Jonathan W. Knowlton, and his ancestor, Col. Thomas Knowlton (1740-1776), who had served in the Revolutionary War. Col. Knowlton led a company of men who fought at the Battle of Bunker Hill and was killed the following year in fighting in New York. Knowlton Memorial Hall was designed by Herbert Loud and is constructed of local fieldstone, reflecting a rustic aesthetic associated with the Craftsman movement. The Babcock Library, originally opened in 1866, was established through a gift of $3,000 from Archibald Babcock (1780-1862), another successful Ashford native who became a brewer in Charlestown, Massachusetts. Initially located in the Warrenville General Store, the library had for many years been housed in the residence of librarian Peter Platt before finding a permanent home in Knowlton Memorial Hall. Babcock also gave $3,000 to establish the Babcock Band, which is the nation’s oldest civilian cornet band.

Abraham Cruttenden House (1735)

The book Madison: Three Hundred Years By the Sea (1976), p. 39, dates the Abraham Cruttenden (or Crittenden) House to 1639. Abraham Cruttenden was one of the original settlers of what would become Madison and he arrived in New Haven with other settlers of Guilford in 1639. A more recent dating of the house, which is a Colonial cape at 123 Boston Post Road in Madison, is 1735. In 1967, Yale architect Albert Riese erected a mid-century modern box at the rear of the house as a wing for his elderly mother. Riese’s daughter and her husband extensively renovated the house in 2012.

Temple Beth Shalom (1940)

The building at the corner of Myrtle and Linden Streets (63 Linden Street) in Manchester was built in 1940 by Temple Beth Shalom. The synagogue added a school wing in 1946. The Temple later moved to a larger building at 400 Middle Turnpike East and in 2009 merged with Temple B’nai Israel of Rockville to form Beth Shalom B’nai Isreal, which is one of the largest Conservative Jewish congregations east of the Connecticut River. The former Temple Beth Shalom building was purchased by the Town of Manchester in 1965 and was remodeled to become the Manchester Senior Center. Today it houses the Manchester Youth Service Bureau.

Salvation Army, Bristol (1891)

Merry Christmas! Pictured above is the Salvation Army’s Bristol Worship and Service Center at 19 Stearns Street in Bristol. Much altered over the years, the building was erected in 1891 for the Swedish Lutheran Lebanon Congregational Church (later simplified to Lebanon Lutheran Church), founded in 1887. In 1963 Lebanon Lutheran merged with Bethesda Lutheran Church of Forestville to form Gloria Dei Lutheran Church. The newly formed church erected a new building on Camp Street in Forestville and the old building on Stearns Street was sold to the Salvation Army, which had previously had its headquarters on Prospect Street.