The church at 22 Crown Street in Meriden was built in 1868 as the West Meriden Baptist Church, later renamed the Main Street Baptist Church. Established in 1860, the church had an earlier chapel on the same site. The present church building’s tower was removed in 1946 and in the 1950s the Connecticut Bank & Trust Company built a branch right in front of the building. In 1997 the Baptist Church closed and sold the building to Faith Center Church of God in Christ.
The house at 60 Chaplin Street in Chaplin was built in 1840. It was once the parsonage of the Chaplin Congregational Church, before the current parsonage at 47 Chaplin Street was used. There is also a historic barn on the property.
The house at the corner of Harrison Road and Woodhouse Avenue in Wallingford was built in 1755 by Willoughby Williams (1736-1776), just before he married Abigail Alling on Jan. 22, 1756. Williams served in the French and Indian War. As related in the Commemorative Biographical Record of New Haven county, Connecticut (1902), he
is supposed to have come from England, where he was born in 1736. He died in 1776. Where he settled in Wallingford is still known as the “Williams section,” and is still occupied by a large number of his descendants. He was a weaver by trade, and was a very active man, and exceedingly athletic; he was able to put his great strength and endurance to good use in the French war, when he was taken prisoner at Quebec, and confined by the French on board a ship. In the night he dropped into the river, swam ashore, and reached the English lines.
The house in Wallingford remained in the Williams family until the 1940s.
The house at 389 Saybrook Road in Haddam, across from the road leading to Higganum Landing, was operated as a tavern during the area’s heyday as a river port and shipbuilding center. The house was built between 1799 and 1802, the year the Middlesex Turnpike opened. It was erected by Dr. Levi Ward (1771-1861), who soon left Connecticut, as related in Fifty Puritan Ancestors (1902), by Elizabeth Todd Nash:
Levi Ward, Jr., son of Levi and Mary Meigs Ward, born July 29, 1771, graduated at Yale College, studied medicine under Dr. Jonathan Todd, and took his M.D.; married Mehitable Hand, youngest daughter of Capt. Daniel Hand.
. . . .
In 1807 Levi Ward, Sr., John Ward and Levi Ward, M.D., went to the “Genesee Country” [in New York State] to settle. Bergen was then in the wilderness and Indians, bears, wolves, deer, were the neighbors of the little company from Haddam. Dr. Ward was the only physician in that locality, and he was sent for from distant settlements, entailing long wearisome journeys through the forests.
In 1817, from his new home in Bergen, Dr. Ward sold the tavern in Connecticut to George Smith. It was acquired by Cornelius Brainerd (1811-1884) in 1849. As described in The genealogy of the Brainerd-Brainard family in America, 1649-1908, Vol. II (1908), by Lucy Abigail Brainard:
In his earlier years he was a manufacturer of clocks. He was commissioner on roads and ferries in 1868, and commissioner to the Superior Court about 22 years. He was collector in the Second Congressional District in 1864 and the four years following. He was several years justice of the peace and selectman. He was nominated to the Whig State Convention Dec. 23, 1848. He was a committee to procure recruits in the late Civil War. He was county commissioner in 1855 and ’56. He represented the Nineteenth District in 1867 and ’68 in the Connecticut Senate, and was chairman of the committee on agriculture, on contested elections and on education. He introduced the bill for free schools and through his influence it was passed. He has been called “The father of free schools.” He held many offices in the gift of the people, both local and state wise, and was for a number of years United States deputy collector of internal revenue.
He was a power in politics in the Nineteenth District,clear headed and far seeing, doing good service for the Republican Party. His judgment was good and when followed, success in almost every case resulted. Firm and unyielding as a rock, he was nevertheless a true, tried and trustworthy friend. He never dissembled and never betrayed the trust and confidence placed in him. He was treasurer and director in the Higganum Savings Bank from its establishment, and director in “The Bank of New England,” East Haddam, from 1857 to ’74, inclusive.
In 1850, the New London, Willimantic and Palmer Railroad Company erected a train depot near what is now 14 Tolland Turnpike in Willington. The rail line became part of the Central Vermont Railway in 1871. The original depot burned down in 1894 and was replaced that same year by a new train station/freight depot building. The station/depot was originally called the Tolland Station, because nearby Tolland was the county seat. It was later renamed the Tolland & Willington Station, and then the West Willington Station. By 1947 the station had closed and was then used by the Ruby Lumber Company until it was renovated to become a branch of the Savings Bank of Tolland in 1976. The bank moved to a new location at Phelps Way in Willington in 1988 and took with it a collection of train memorabilia, donated over the years by local residents. In 2016, by which time it was a branch of First Niagara (it’s now KeyBank), the bank donated the collection of 22 objects to the Willington Historical Society.
The Carriage House of the historic Lockwood–Mathews Mansion in Norwalk (both are located in Mathews Park) was built around the same time as the main house, 1864. It was completed before the mansion and was not designed by the architect of that building, Detlef Lienau. Like the main house, the Carriage House is constructed of ashlar blocks, but the simplicity of its overall architectural effect is far more subdued than that of the lavishly decorated mansion. The Carriage House has a hipped roof that was once surmounted by a cupola, or belvedere, with a widow’s walk. It is thought that the building was originally set up to have carriages in the west wing, horse stables in the east wing, and a multi-purpose work and storage area in the center pavilion, with hay stored in the second story. The City of Norwalk acquired the property in 1942 and converted the Carriage House to a police building. The stables were converted into jail cells. Later, the city planning department moved into the building. In the 1990s the former Carriage House became the home of the Center for Contemporary Printmaking, a state-of-the-art printmaking facility.
The house at 286 Naubuc Avenue in Glastonbury is thought to date back to c. 1820, or perhaps even earlier. Its current architectural style is Greek Revival. In the 1850s, the house was the residence of Frederick Curtis, an industrialist. With his brother, Joseph S. Curtis, Frederick built a factory that was the first in the country to manufacture German Silver (also known as Nickel silver, it is made from an alloy of copper, zinc and nickel). It was first called F. Curtis & Company and, later, the Curtisville Manufacturing Company. In the 1860s, the house was the residence of Thomas J. Vail, who took control of the Curtis factory. He added the manufacture of firearms to the operations of the company, which was renamed the Connecticut Arms and Manufacturing Company. It eventually became the Williams Brothers Manufacturing Company.
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