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

Saint James Roman Catholic Church, Manchester (1876)

After the Civil War, there was an influx of Irish immigrants arriving in South Manchester to work at the Cheney Brothers’ silk mill. The Cheneys donated an acre of land on Main Street where the cornerstone for a new Catholic church was laid in August of 1874. The silk factory was closed that day to allow full attendance of Catholic residents. In spite of the liberal attitude of the Cheneys, there was also anti-Catholic sentiment in Manchester. The unfinished church was vandalized during the night of May 4-5, 1876. Thirty-five stained glass windows were smashed, altar ornaments were stolen and the vandals attempted to set the church on fire. Work on Saint James Church continued and the Gothic edifice was dedicated on August 20, 1876.

191-195 Main Street, Middletown (1835)

The present style of the front facade of the building at 191 to 195 Main Street in Middletown dates to c. 1891, when the original two-and-one-half story structure with a gable roof was raised to a full three stories. The north section of this commercial building was built in 1835 by Joshua Stow, a former county judge and Middletown post master (also a politician and ardent Jeffersonian Republican) who operated a store. In 1845 the building passed to William Trench, who rented it out to various commercial tenants. From 1882 to 1887 it was rented by the Middletown Police, who used it as the town’s first police station. The matching south section of the building was in place by 1856 (and may have been built at the same time as the north half (1835), with the brick fire wall down the center of the building being shared by the owners of the two separate halves).

Charles Eben Jackson Cottage (1881)

The Shingle-style summer cottage at 27 Pettipaug Avenue in the Borough of Fenwick in Old Saybrook was built in 1881 by Charles Eben Jackson (1849-1923) of Middletown. As related in the Illustrated Popular Biography of Connecticut (1891):

Charles Eben Jackson was born in Middletown, January 25, 1849. He was educated at St. Paul’s School, Concord, N. H., receiving a thorough preparation for the business activities of life. After leaving school he engaged as a clerk in a mercantile establishment, and later in a banking office in New York city. In 1872 he made the acquaintance of Miss Evelyn Quintard, daughter of E. A. Quintard of New York city, whom he married in 1873, and by whom he has had eight children, seven of them now living. Mr. Jackson has for a number of years been at the head of the Middletown banking house of C. E. Jackson & Co., well known among the reputable financial institutions of the state. He is also vice-president of the Middlesex Banking Company, treasurer of the Berkeley Divinity School, and of the Russell Library Company, and has minor official connection with other institutions of Middletown. He is by religious faith and profession an Episcopalian, being a member and senior warden of Holy Trinity parish.

The cottage later sold to Margaret Cutter Goodrich, wife of Dr. Charles Goodrich, a Hartford obstetrician. The cottage then passed through other owners, being purchased by the Brainard family in 1949. You can read more about the cottage in Marion Hepburn Grant’s The Fenwick Story (Connecticut Historical Society, 1974), pages 131-134.

Southport National Bank (1833)

The building at 227 Main Street in the village of Southport in Fairfield was built in 1833 as a bank. It was originally a branch of the Connecticut Bank of Bridgeport, chartered in 1832. The branch later became the Southport Bank, independently chartered in 1851 (it became the Southport National Bank in 1865). After an embezzlement (Oliver T. Sherwood, the bank’s Cashier, was charged with defaulting on bank notes after he fled town; he was later imprisoned) the Southport National Bank went into receivership in 1903 and was reorganized as the Southport Trust Company. The building was converted into a residence in 1923.

Moseley Talcott House (1851)

A granite panel on the Main Street facade of the house at 2190 Main Street in Glastonbury identifies it as the home of Moseley Talcott. A stone house built in 1851, it was much added to in the twentieth century.

The Glebe House, Cheshire (1851)

The house at 568 South Brooksvale Road in Cheshire was built in 1851 on land long owned by the Brooks family. The first residents of the house, which was known as the Glebe House, were Rev. David March and his wife, Anna Brooks March, whose brother David Brooks had deeded the property to her. Rev. March was pastor of the Cheshire Congregational Church from 1845 to 1848.

Eliza Brazell House (1875)

Back in 2012, workers restoring the house at 1 Imlay Street in Hartford discovered Victorian-era architectural details that had long been hidden under vinyl siding. Thought to have possibly been built in the twentieth century and purposefully excluded from the Imlay and Laurel Streets Historic District, the house was revealed to have been erected in 1875 by Porter Whiton, a builder who also remodeled the Old State House to serve as Hartford’s City Hall. The home’s first resident was Mrs. Eliza Brazell, a widow who was born in Ireland in 1850. Restored by the Northside Institutions Neighborhood Alliance, the house has been returned to its original appearance and use as a single-family home.