Ira Eaton House (1810)

The house at 12 Maple Street in Kent was built c.1810 for Ira Eaton (born 1786) and his wife Lucinda (born 1790). Ira was a farmer who represented Kent in the state legislature in 1833. The house was enlarged around the time of the marriage of Ira and Lucinda’s son, Luther. His life is described in the History of Kent, Connecticut (1897), by Francis Atwater:

Luther Eaton, a son of Ira Eaton, was born in Kent January 4, 1826. He was educated in the public schools of the town and J. C. Howard academy in Warren, Conn. On March 26, 1850, he married Miss Sophronia E. Tobey, of Poughkeepsie, N. Y., his present wife. From his youth up Mr. Eaton has been a farmer and still has something to do in overseeing his farms, and for thirty years he has been a packer and dealer in Connecticut leaf tobacco. In politics has always been a strong Democrat, both for sound money and protection, what has been fitly called a Samuel J. Randall Democrat. Mr. Eaton has always been one of the public men of Kent, and has held nearly every town office, besides representing the town in the Legislature in 1865, and with others had very much to do in 1881 in forming the Kent Water company, which succeeded in furnishing the village with an abundance of good water. Mr. Eaton has been president of the Water company since 1882, and there has been no public enterprise started in the town of Kent but what Mr. Eaton has done his full share in both paying out money and in seeing to it that it was done as it should be. The family of Eatons came to Kent about 1757 from the town of Tolland, Tolland county, Connecticut.