Among the numerous brick houses built in Windsor in the early nineteenth century is the Quartus Bedortha House at 54 Poquonock Avenue. It was built by Quartus Bedortha in 1835. He was born in Agawam, Mass. on February 21 1808, married Ruth Loomis on February 28, 1832 (they had two children) and died on August 4, 1879.
The house at 256 Palisado Avenue in Windsor was built in 1767 for Elijah Mather, Sr. (1743-1796). The house has a hipped roof and an impressive classical entry with entablature that is probably original.
The Loomis School in Windsor, later to become Loomis-Chaffee, was founded by five Loomis siblings who had all lost their own children. In the 1910s, the firm of Murphy & Dana of New York created a plan for the school‘s campus that would feature a symmetrical quadrangle and covered walkways, reminiscent of Thomas Jefferson’s plan for the University of Virginia. Anchoring the quadrangle is the centerpiece of the Georgian Revival-style campus: Founders Hall, completed in 1916. The building, which originally contained the school’s entire academic program, also houses Founders Chapel.
The Henry Magill House, at 390 Palisado Avenue in Windsor, is a brick French Second Empire style residence, built for Henry Magill, a farmer, in 1861.
The mid-nineteenth century house at 736 Palisado Avenue in Windsor is a good example of the French Second Empire style, including a mansard roof. The exact date of construction (perhaps around 1865?) and the original owner of the house are unknown; the earliest known owner is John Kelley in 1885.
The oldest house in Windsor is the Loomis Homestead, located on the campus of Loomis Chaffee school. The oldest part of the house is now the south ell, built by Joseph Loomis in 1640. His son, Deacon John Loomis built the main section in 1688, the year he died, possibly for his son Timothy. In the 1870s, planning began for what would become Loomis Chaffee, established by five Loomis siblings, children of Colonel James Loomis and Abigail Sherwood Chaffee, who had all lost their own children. The school’s first buildings, completed in 1913-1916, were designed to match the axis of the Loomis Homestead, several degrees off of true north. The old house itself remained in the Loomis family until Miss Jennie Loomis deeded it to the Loomis Institute in 1901. She continued to reside in the house until her death, in 1944. Then it became a residence for a member of the Loomis Chaffee School faculty and continues as a museum and memorial to the Loomis family.
The Ecclesiastical Society of Poquonock in Windsor was first established in 1726 and a meeting house was built the following year. This was replaced by a second meeting house in 1798. By 1820, church membership had completely diminished, but in the 1840s a new Congregational Church of Poquonock was formed (now the Poquonock Community Church), which built a new meeting house in 1854. The old Society’s church was eventually torn down in 1882, but in 1893-1894 a mortuary chapel for the adjacent Elm Grove Cemetery (earliest stone 1738) was constructed on the same site.
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