Hartford - Historic Buildings of Connecticut

Amos Bull House (1788)

This house was originally located on Main Street in Hartford. It was built in 1788 for Amos Bull, a dry goods merchant, who had a shop on the first floor and also ran a school in the house. Bull once lived in the Silas Deane House in Wethersfield and one of his five wives was Abigail Webb from the Webb House. He sold the house in 1821 and it has since been moved twice: once in 1940 and a second time in 1971 to its present location on Prospect Street, behind the Butler-McCook House. The Amos Bull House is a Federal style brick half house, a type of townhouse more commonly found in larger cities than Hartford. In recent years, the building housed the Historic Preservation and Museum Division of the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism. Update: A major restoration of the house was completed in 2014 by Connecticut Landmarks. It is now that organization’s archival repository and offices.

Katharine Seymour Day House (1884)

Built in 1884 on the corner of Farmington Avenue and Forest Street in Hartford’s Nook Farm neighborhood, for the lawyer and real estate developer Franklin Chamberlin. Chamberlin was also the original owner of of the neighboring Harriet Beecher Stowe House and he sold Mark Twain the land to build his house, which is also next door. The architect of the Chamberlin-Day House was Francis Kimball, who is most well-known for his skyscrapers. It was later owned by Willie O. Burr, owner and editor of the Hartford Times. In 1939, the house was bought by Katharine Seymour Day, the grand-daughter of John and Isabella Beecher Hooker and the grand-niece of Harriet Beecher Stowe. Day was living in the Stowe House and rented the Day House to her cousins. She later used the house to store her collection of art, antiques, and documents, many associated with the Beecher, Stowe, Hooker and Seymour families. In 1941, she founded what would become the Stowe-Day Foundation, now known as the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center. After her death, the Stowe House was restored and the Day House continues today as the offices and research library of the Stowe Center.

The Mark Twain House (1874)

Built in 1874 on Farmington Avenue in Hartford’s Nook Farm neighborhood for Samuel Clemens (aka Mark Twain) and designed in the High Victorian Gothic style by Edward Tuckerman Potter (who was known for his churches, including the Church of the Good Shepherd). Mark Twain lived here from 1874-1891 with his wife, Olivia Langdon Clemens, and their three daughters: Suzy, Clara and Jean. His wife was the one primarily involved in planning with the architect–apparently all Sam Clemens asked for was a red brick house! He also had a servant’s wing and a carriage house and employed about seven or so servants, including his butler, George Griffin, maid Katy Leary and coachman Patrick McAleer. It was while living here that Mark Twain wrote such classic works as The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. Bad financial decisions, including his investment in the Paige Compositor typesetting machine, led to near bankruptcy, and forced the Clemens family to move to Europe in 1891. After a round-the-world lecture tour, Clemens was able to pay off his debt, but as his eldest daughter Suzy had died in the Hartford house during a return visit there in 1896, the family never returned there and he sold the house in 1904. Over the years, the house was used as a school, a library and an apartment building. It was restored in the 1960s and 1970s and is open as part of The Mark Twain House and Museum.

Hartford Times Building (1920)

Built in 1920 on Prospect Street as headquarters for the Hartford Times, the city’s evening newspaper, which existed from 1817 to 1976. Designed by Donn Barber, the Beaux-Arts building features six green granite Ionic columns salvaged from the Madison Square Presbyterian Church in New York (designed by Stanford White; built in 1906, demolished in 1919 to make way for the Met Life Building’s expansion). The recessed porch also features allegorical scenes. For many years, the building hosted campaign speeches by presidential candidates. Current plans for the building involve its adaptive reuse as an annex of the neighboring Wadsworth Atheneum, as such it will be an important part of the Adriaen’s Landing development.

Charles Boardman Smith House (1875)

One of the few surviving homes built in the nineteenth century in Hartford’s Nook Farm neighborhood. It was built on Forest Street in 1875 for Charles Boardman Smith, of the Smith Worthington Saddlery Company, and was designed by Richard M. Upjohn in the High Victorian Gothic style. It shares similarities with Upjohn’s Connecticut State Capitol building and the (now demolished) West Middle School of 1873.

Cheney Building (1876)

Built in 1876 on Main Street in Hartford for two brothers from the family that owned the Cheney Silk Mills in Manchester. The R. and F. Cheney Building was designed by the famous architect, Henry Hobson Richardson, and represents an early work in his distinctive Richardsonian Romanesque style, later exemplified in the (now gone) Marshall Field’s Wholesale Store, built in Chicago in 1885-1887. The Cheney Block is considered one of Richardson’s greatest buildings and considered by some to be Hartford’s most architecturally significant building. Originally used for retail space on the ground floor, with offices and apartment space above, it later housed Brown Thomson‘s and then G. Fox and Co.‘s Department stores. Today it is known as the Richardson Building and is again used for a mix of office and retail space, including a Residence Inn and the City Steam Brewery Cafe.

Ashmead-Colt House (1859)

Built in 1859 for James Ashmead, on Wethersfield Avenue in Hartford, adjacent to the Day-Taylor House and across from Samuel Colt’s Armsmear. Ashmead and his partner, Edmund Hurlbut, were in the business of gold beating. Sam Colt’s nephew, Sam C. Colt, bought the Italianate house in 1865 and it was most likely he who added the Second Empire style tower and porte-cochere. A later owner added the Colonial Revival portico and pilasters on the corners. Today, the house is home to a legal firm.