The Gothic and Italianate house at 87 Ellsworth Street in Black Rock in Bridgeport was built in 1856 by Captain William Hall. He was a builder of clipper ships and his house was constructed on a hill overlooking the shipyards he owned on the point. The house became a two-family home during World War I and was a brothel in the early 1980s.
Designed by architect Abram Skaats, the house at 281 Barnum Avenue in East Bridgeport was built in 1872 for Augustus Dupee, a tool maker. The two-story Colonial Revival colonnade that now dominates the front of the house was added around 1940.
The house at 499 Washington Avenue in Bridgeport was built in 1877 for attorney Goodwin Stoddard. The house’s Victorian design has been compromised by the large modern addition which hides most of the original front of the building below the roof-line. Formerly the Spadaccino Funeral Home, the building is now owned by the Bridgeport Apostolic Church. According to Volume 2 of the Encyclopedia of Connecticut Biography (1917):
Goodwin Stoddard, of Bridgeport, son of Joseph and Sophia (Buddington) Stoddard, was born in Bethany, New Haven county, Connecticut, April 2, 1847. His education was completed at the University of Albany, where he was graduated in 1867, and where also he pursued his professional studies. He was admitted to the bar in New York State and Connecticut in 1868. He began practice in 1868 and immediately engaged in the trial of causes in Fairfield and adjacent counties, where he became one of the most eminent lawyers of the Connecticut bar. He was connected with many of the important cases, and served an important and influential clientele. Mr. Stoddard died July 26, 1909.
Mr. Stoddard married, October 21, 1875, Julia E. Sanford, born October 20, 1855, daughter of Edwin G. and Emily Adeline Sanford, of Bridgeport. They were the parents of two sons, Sanford and Henry B.
Morris Plan banks, private banking organizations which gave small loans to industrial workers, emerged in the second decade of the twentieth century and thrived through the end of the Great Depression. The Morris Plan Bank in Bridgeport was designed by Ernest G. Southey and was built at 102 Bank Street in 1924. Today, the building is part of the City Trust Building Complex, a commercial and apartment complex which also includes the Bridgeport City Trust Company Building (1927-1929) and associated Trust Department Building (the latter also designed in the Colonial Revival style by Southey), and the Liberty Building (1918).
According to A History of the Old Town of Stratford and the City of Bridgeport, Connecticut, Volume 1 (1886), by Rev. Samuel Orcutt:
St. Paul’s Church (Episcopal), was organized June 4, 1858, at the house of William H. Noble, on Stratford avenue, and the Rev. G. S. Coit, D.D., of St. John’s Church, was chosen rector. The Sunday school met, at first, in the coal office of D. W. Thompson, near the east end of the Centre Bridge, afterwards in rooms over a store upon the corner of Crescent avenue and East Main street. The Rev. N. S. Richardson, D.D., was the first settled pastor of this parish, his ministry beginning in January, 1868. The corner-stone of St. Paul’s Church, a handsome stone building upon Kossuth street, fronting Washington Park, was laid by Bishop Williams, October 6, 1868; the edifice was dedicated and occupied for worship July 29, 1869, but not consecrated until May 18, 1880. It cost about thirty thousand dollars.
The church was designed by E.T. Littell of New York. Today, it is St. Luke’s/St. Paul’s Church. (more…)
The house at 213 Ellsworth Street in the Black Rock neighborhood of Bridgeport was built in 1854 by Capt. Charles Allen. As described in Volume II of the History of Bridgeport and Vicinity (1917), Capt. Allen
came to Bridgeport in an early day and ran a packet between this city and New York. He was commander of the packet Emily and of the schooner Ella Jane for a number of years, owning both boats. He was afterward with the Bridgeport Steamboat Company as pilot of the Crystal Wave and he became a prominent representative of navigation interests in this city. He was a native of Westport, Connecticut, and arrived in Bridgeport in the late ’60s. He married Amanda J. Fairchild, a native of this city […] Throughout his entire life Charles H. Allen was identified with marine interests and became recognized as the most competent pilot on the Sound. He was owner and captain of his own boats, and for a number of years, with his brother, Sereno G., ran a packet line from Westport to New York. He was, moreover, a public-spirited citizen, active in support of measures and movements for the general good, thus displaying the same spirit of loyalty and patriotism which characterized his ancestors who served in the Revolutionay war.
The Isaac Jones House, at 227 Ellsworth Street, next door to the Allen House, was built the same year and was originally an identical Italianate structure, but was much altered in 1910.
The Queen Anne house at 385 Barnum Avenue in East Bridgeport was built in 1892 for A.W. Burritt, owner of a lumber company. In 2007, the house was acquired by the Bridgeport Rescue Mission and renovated to serve as a shelter for homeless women.
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