Built c. 1809-1810, the house at 81-83 East Main Street in Branford was originally the home of Jonathan Foot (1772-1851), a cabinetmaker and undertaker. The house descended to his daughter, Clarissa, who had married Dr. Isaac Palmer Leete. The house has an addition that was probably built by Dr. Leete to use as his office. In 1885 the east part of the house was sold to Eliza Robbins and it may be at that time the house was converted to its current configuration as a duplex.
“New Place” is a dorm of Miss Porter’s School in Farmington. It was built in 1906 at 53 Main Street on the site of the old Rev. Samuel Whitman House. As related by Julius Gay in Farmington, Connecticut, the Village of Beautiful Homes (1906):
Crossing the road up the mountain we find on the corner the square house with the pyramidal roof and the chimney in the center, owned and occupied by the Rev. Samuel Whitman during his ministry. Parts if not the whole of the building are much older than its well-preserved walls would indicate. Tradition says the kitchen was built out of the remains of the old meeting-house and the Rev. William S. Porter who knew more about the history of the town than any man who lived or is likely to live, says that the house, probably the front, was built by Cuff Freeman, a colored man of considerable wealth, of course after the death of Mr. Whitman.
New Place was erected in 1907 by builder R.F. Jones of Hartford for Elizabeth V. Keep, then headmistress of Miss Porter’s School. Mrs. Keep lived there until her death in 1917. She willed the property to Miss Porter’s School. Her son, Robert Porter Keep II, became headmaster in 1917 and he and his wife, Rose Anne Day Keep, resided at New Place until 1929.
Ukrainian Catholics first settled in Terryville in Plymouth in 1895. They did come directly from Eastern Europe but initially settled in central Pennsylvania before relocating to Connecticut. They established a voluntary association called the Rus Ruthenian Brotherhood of St. Michael the Archangel in 1902. Having worshiped in New Britain from 1896 to 1904, the Archangel St. Michael Ruthenian Greek Catholic Congregation then began holding services in a school on Main Street in Terryville. The congregation acquired land on Allen Street in March 1905 on which to build their own church. The cornerstone for the new church was blessed on July 4, 1910 and St. Michael Ukrainian Catholic Church at 35 Allen Street was soon completed. A sacristy was added to the north side of the church in 1944.
The Jesse Atwater House, 443 Amity Road in Bethany, was built between 1750 and 1760. The house has a two-story front porch that was added in the nineteenth century when the property was used as a “fresh air” home for city children.
The house at 947 Litchfield Turnpike in Bethany was built c. 1780 to serve as the station house of the Old Toll Gate. In 1832 the house was owned by Archibald Abner Perkins (1784-1869), who operated a tannery nearby and had a leather store and shoe shop across the street.
Center School is a one-room school house built on the Green in Prospect in 1867 at a cost of $900. It was erected to replace an earlier school house that had burned. The building was used as a school until the nearby Community School was built in 1936. The old school house was then used for various purposes by the town until it became a museum operated by the Prospect Historical Society.
The house at 6 Green Circle in Woodbury was built around 1823 for William Camp Cogswell (1796-1874). A merchant, Cogswell was twice married, first in 1821 to Frances Pomeroy Whittlesey (1801-1837); second in 1838 to Catharine A. Sherman. Cogswell ran a shop south of the house under the name Cogswell and Sherman. As described by W. A. Strong in a letter printed in The Town and People: A Chronological Compilation of Contributed Writings from Present and Past Residents of the Town of Woodbury, Connecticut (1901):
The pleasant days when I attended school in the old brown school house come back with greater force when the changes since that time are considered. Then the country store kept by Mr. Cogswell was where the people from far and near brought their butter and eggs to exchange for sugar, molasses, dry goods and Yankee notions. “Doc” was the presiding genius behind the counter, and we small boys looked with wonder and envy on the treasures he controlled. His fiddle was our delight and nothing could excel the music from his magical bow.
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