Gardella Block (1880)

The two adjoining business blocks at 46-52 and 42-44 Main Street in Ansonia are both referred to as the Gardella Block in the nomination for the Upper Main Street Historic District. They are part of a row of five buildings (along with the Sentinel Block at 36 Main Street, the Hotchkiss Block at 54-64 Main Street, and the building at 70 Main Street) that were erected c. 1880 (or as early as sometime before 1875) by the W. & L. Hotchkiss Company and distributed after the company dissolved in 1885. George Gardella, who came to Ansonia from Italy in 1882, opened a fruit, nut and confectionery business on Maple Street 1883. He moved his business to 46 Main Street in 1910 and retired in 1931, passing his business to his two sons. Another notable Gardella in Ansonia was Pasquale Gardella, an Italian immigrant who ran a peanut stand at the Maple Street bridge. After the stand burned down about 1896 he rented a store in the Ansonia Opera House on Main Street.

Sentinel Block (1881)

The Ansonia Housing Authority is located at 36 Main Street in Ansonia, at the end of a row of adjoining commercial blocks on the west side of Main Street, just south of the intersection with the Maple Street Bridge. The building displays the date 1881 under its cornice. It is sometimes called the Sentinel Block (it is given this name in the nomination for the Upper Main Street Historic District) because it was once home to the the offices of the Naugatuck Sentinel newspaper. In the book Derby and Ansonia (in Arcadia Press’s Then and Now series, 2004), it is referred to as the Gardella Building, a name that the the Historic District nomination gives for the two adjacent buildings just to the south. (more…)

Page-Malone House (1905)

The house at 91 Bellevue Avenue in Bristol was erected c. 1905 for DeWitt Page (1869-1940), an Industrialist, philanthropist, and owner of Thoroughbred racehorses. Originally from Meriden, DeWitt Page worked his way up from the shipping department to become president of the New Departure Manufacturing Company. He married Mae Belle Rockwell, sister of Albert Rockwell, founder of New Departure. In 1933, DeWitt and Mae Page gifted Page Park to the City of Bristol. They only lived in the house at 91 Bellevue until about 1917, when their new mansion was completed at 181 Grove Street (the mansion was demolished in 1971). The Bellevue Avenue house was then owned by William J. Malone (1879-1961), a judge of the city court who also presided as Speaker of the state House of Representatives.

Fishtown Chapel (1889)

The Fishtown Chapel at Mystic Seaport was originally erected by the community of Fishtown in Mystic to serve as a place for Sunday School and prayer meetings in 1889. It took only three weeks to build. For a time around 1900 the Chapel served as a schoolhouse for Groton’s Ninth School District. It then remained unused for many decades until it was moved to Mystic Seaport in 1949. Restored, it was rededicated as a chapel in 1950. As seen in old postcards of the Chapel, it once had a steeple which has since been removed. (more…)

Bidwell Tavern (1880)

The Bidwell Hotel in Coventry was built in 1822 and closed in 1938. The hotel’s Tavern continues in business at 1260 Main Street, not far from the old hotel building. The Bidwell Tavern is located in the former office building of the E. A. Tracy Shoddy Mill. The company, which expanded greatly in the later nineteenth century under the leadership of Eugene A. Tracy, produced shoddy, a recycled wool made by shredding old cloth to be rewoven into a reusable lower-grade product. The mill complex grew to include twenty buildings, but it closed in 1929 and the town of Coventry took ownership of the property. The former office building was used as the Coventry Town Hall from 1934 to 1964. Today, a section of the Bidwell Tavern is an area called “the vault,” where town records were once stored.