Elijah Booth House (1771)

Elijah Booth House

The house at 968 Main Street North was constructed sometime before 1771 (perhaps as early as 1716?), when the property was acquired by Elijah Booth from Edward Hinman. Booth was a cabinetmaker and in 1806 his dwelling house, joiners shop and barn were acquired by Eli Hall. The house remained in the Hall family until it was sold by Hall’s daughter, Lydia Ann Hall, who married Sherman B. Warner, sold it in 1892. From 1915 to 1918 the house was one of five, including the Peter Parley House, that were were owned as a seasonal estate by Robert and Antonia Treupel of Mamaroneck, NY. They sold their houses to the Lutheran Inner-Mission Society of Connecticut, which sold the Booth House to Delia Hunihan in 1933. She lived there with her husband John until 1959. Restoration of the house was begun by its next owner, Mark Messier, and was continued by Carl and Elizabeth Kamphausen, who bought it in 1962.

Edward E. Honiss House (1893)

Edward Everett Honiss House

Edward Everett Honiss (1866-1927) operated a grocery and general merchandise store in East Berlin. He was one of a series of men who had run the store, as described by Catharine Melinda North in her History of Berlin (1916):

From the time as far back as the memory of the oldest living person goes, a prosperous store has been conducted at the stand south of the Freedom Hart place, which for many years has borne the sign of Henry N. Galpin.

Names obtained of those who have been at the head of the business here are as follows: Orrin Beckley, about 1810; Samuel Porter (died 1838, aged eighty-eight); Horace Steele & Dr. David Carpenter; Plumb & Deming, 1835; Benjamin Wilcox; S. C. Wilcox; Galpin & Loveland; Henry N. Galpin; Strickland Bros., and lastly E. E. Honiss. This store formerly carried a line of everything that the community might need, including drugs. Physicians’ prescriptions were compounded here until, by mutual agreement, H. N. Galpin surrendered his drug department to Alfred North, who, in exchange, gave up the sale of his drygoods to Mr. Galpin.

The Honiss family also had interests in a flour and grist mill. E.E. Honiss’ substantial Queen Anne house, built around 1893, is located at 255 Berlin Street in East Berlin.

Grace Episcopal Church, Yantic (1902)

Grace Episcopal Church

The mill village of Yantic in Norwich was home to the Yantic Woolen Company Mill. In 1824 Erastus Williams purchased a preexisting mill and enlarged it to produce woolen products. He and his wife, Elizabeth Dorr Tracy, oversaw the organization of Grace Episcopal Church in Yantic in 1853. Their daughter Elizabeth was the first church organist. Erastus was succeeded by his son and then by his grandson, Winslow Tracy Williams. Under the latter’s administration a new Grace Episcopal Church was erected. It was dedicated in 1902.

Learned-Aiken House (1799)

157 Washington Street, Norwich

Built c. 1799 by master Ebenezer Learned, master carpenter, the house at 157 Broadway in Norwich was probably originally a Federal style building. In May 1812 the property was deeded to B. M. Ballou and in 1861 it was bought by Connecticut Governor William Alfred Buckingham for his daughter, Eliza Coit Buckingham, and son-in-law, General William Appleton Aiken (1833-1929). That same year, in late April, Gen. Aiken was dispatched by Gov. Buckingham on a mission to Washington, D. C. to assure President Lincoln of Connecticut’s support in the Civil War.

In 1867 Aiken mortgaged the house the enlarge it and remodel it in the Greek Revival style with a columned portico. He made further alterations in 1880 and 1890. It remained in the Aiken family until 1940 when Aiken’s daughter Mary sold it. In 1950 the house was bought by architect John E. McGuire who in 1957 partitioned the interior to rent out half the house as apartments.