Historic Buildings of Connecticut - Exploring the Nutmeg State One Building at a Time

Noah Parker House (1772)

Built in 1772, the house at 113 Lake Street in Coventry, across from the entrance to the Nathan Hale Cemetery, is known as the Noah Parker House. In the early nineteenth century, the house served as an inn operated by Martin Lyman (1782-1859), who was also postmaster in 1822. Lyman purchased the house from Jeremiah Fitch in 1819 and he sold it to John Boynton in 1825. By the late 1850s, the house was owned by Ralph Crittenden and William Tibbals, makers of percussion caps and metallic cartridges. During the Civil War they were the leading manufacturers of cartridges in the United States. The house was also the post office for South Coventry in the 1920s.

Jeremiah Ripley House (1792)

At 77 Ripley Hill Road on Coventry is a house that was once home to Captain Jeremiah Ripley, who ran a store and was Connecticut’s Assistant Commissary during the Revolutionary War. The earliest part of the house was built 1762 by Nathaniel Rust Jr., and Capt. Ripley stored gunpowder in the cellar in 1777. As related in the 1912 Historic Sketch of Coventry, complied by Ruth Amelia Higgins:

The assistant commissary for the State was Jeremiah Ripley, who lived on Ripley Hill in Coventry. In May, 1777, Capt. Huntington, of Norwich, was ordered to deliver 100 barrels of Continental powder to Cap. J. Ripley, of Coventry, to be carefully kept until further orders. February 26, 1778, the same Jeremiah Ripley was directed by the General Assembly to send under a guard so soon as might be, two tons of fine powder in his hands to Ezekiel Chevers, commissary of artillery at Springfield.

Across Ripley Hill Road from the house is where 116 men of the Coventry militia assembled to march to Massachusetts in response to the Lexington Alarm of 1775. Ripley later constructed what is now the main block of the house, completed in 1792. In the early twentieth century, the house was owned by George Dudley Seymour, who restored the Nathan Hale Homestead. Seymour remodeled the interior of the Ripley House, repaneling one of the rooms with boards from one of the Nathan Hale schoolhouses.

Ezekiel Sibley House (1795)

The house at 100 Common Road in Willington is thought to have been built by Ezekiel Sibley around 1795. Beza Soule bought the property in 1818. Beza Soule (1783-1825) came from a family of stone carvers from Plymouth County, Massachusetts. His widow Mary sold the house in 1837 to Clark Noble and it remained in the noble family for until 1887.

John Tyler House (1710)

The house at 242-250 East Main Street in Branford is thought to have been built by John Tyler, Jr. around 1710-1715. A rear lean-to, added later in the eighteenth century, gives the house a saltbox shape. A later owner was James Goodrich Palmer (Jimmy Palmer), who lived in the house for twenty years and made cheese in the second floor bedroom. The house is now a bed & breakfast.

Dr. John B. Griggs House (1918)

Dr. John Bagg Griggs was a general practitioner in Farmington, from 1897 to 1899 living with his wife, Mary Ellen Bolter, at 41 Main Street, where their son, Dr. John Bolter Griggs, was born. After next living at 101 Main Street, they moved to Stamford in 1903. After his first wife died in 1905, Dr. Griggs married again and moved with his wife, Valina D. Griggs, to Hartford in 1907. Dr. Griggs practiced as an internist until 1917 and was involved in the first X-ray laboratory in the city, established at Hartford Hospital in 1910 under the leadership of Dr. Arthur Heublein. Completed in 1918, the Griggs residence at 1380 Asylum Avenue in Hartford was designed by architect Edward Thomas Hapgood.

By 1996 the house had been owned by the State of Connecticut for nearly fifty years. Once used as offices but then left vacant and considered to be “surplus property,” the house was bought at auction by Peter and Diane Valin, who lovingly restored the much deteriorated house to once again become a grand West End residence.

First Baptist Church of Willimantic (1858)

The First Baptist Church of Willimantic is located at 667 Main Street. As related in Bayles’ History of Windham County, Connecticut (1889):

The church was organized October 20th, 1827. At first the school houses were used for meetings, but a spirit of opposition arose and they were debarred this privilege. With aid from abroad they succeeded in building a meeting house on the site at present occupied. The site was purchased of Alfred Howes, and Messrs. Reed, Hardin and Fenton, of Mansfield, were contracted with to erect the church. The building, being completed, was dedicated May 27th, 1829. A Sabbath school was immediately organized. [. . .] The church is a neat and commodious building, which, with the lot it stands upon, is valued at twenty-five thousand dollars. Connected with the church is a vigorous Young People’s Society of Christian Endeavor and a large and flourishing Sunday school.

The 1827 edifice was replaced with the current church building in 1858. As related on the church’s website:

In 1968, the First Baptist Church of Willimantic had an opportunity to sell its building after the Valentine’s Day Fire destroyed the 1865 Union Block. The declining church voted not to sell and to remain a downtown church, which is where it still stands. In 2002, First Baptist voted not to close its doors and instead chose to celebrate its 175th anniversary.

Davidson Carriage Barn (1885)

At 254 Carrington Road, across from the Davidson House, 539 Litchfield Turnpike, in Bethany is the a historic carriage barn. It was erected c. 1885, a few years after S. G. Davidson built the farmhouse. According to local tradition, the barn was used for blacksmithing. It may also have housed equipment used by the Davidson Telephone Exchange System. This company, run by S. G. Davidson’s son, Tyler D. Davidson, installed five phone lines in Bethany between 1898 and 1903. Phone installation was free, but subscribers paid a $12 yearly rental fee. The Southern New England Telephone Company took over the system in 1907.