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

Gilbert Sisson House (1819)

Attention Readers: I will be at the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center tonight at 5:00 PM discussing and signing copies of my book, Vanished Downtown Hartford. Please come to this Nook Farm Book Talk if you are in the area! The house at 85 Main Street in North Stonington was built in 1819 (according to the sign on the house) or circa 1790 (according to the nomination for North Stonington Village Historic District). It was the home of Gilbert Sisson, a cabinetmaker and merchant. Born in 1769, Sisson married Desire Main in 1791. One of their sons, Charles Grandison Sisson (1807-1874), became a contractor and railroad president in New Jersey. Another, Noyes Sisson (1798-1872), was a cabinet maker and farmer in North Stonington.

Norwalk Savings Society (1923)

Chartered in 1849, the Norwalk Savings Society occupied various spaces, including rooms in the United Bank Building from 1868 into the early twentieth century. The bank constructed a Classical Revival building at 48 Wall Street in 1923. An interesting incident in the history of Norwalk’s banking industry is related in the 1901 volume Norwalk After Two Hundred & Fifty Years as follows:

The history of a savings bank, as a rule, does not make an exciting narrative, particularly when it is carefully managed and its depositors successful and thrifty. Norwalk’s savings banks have enjoyed every advantage contributing to a peaceful financial life. Once only the Norwalk Savings Society by having a “run,” precipitated by the thoughtless attempt at wit on the part of a local newspaper. In the rear of the Street Railway barn was a high mound which had furnished the building sand of Norwalk for several years and was believed to contain a further abundant supply. Without previous indication the sand was exhausted and cobbles only were found. The local paper, departing from its usual course of recording the sickness of Mrs. Smith’s child or the painting of Brown’s rear fence, essayed a “scoop” on the sandbank incident and announced that the managers of the oldest bank in town were astounded to discover that their reserved deposits, which they believed to be good were on examination found to be worthless. The explanation that the statement referred to a sandbank was never read bv many bank depositors, but grabbing their books, they demanded payment from the old Norwalk Savings Society. To the credit of the paper it must be said that every effort was made by it to overcome the ill effects of its silly joke. Unauthorized statements and injudicious news items have in other cases and in other papers done harm to the business interests of Norwalk, even where every wish of the publishers was for the growth of the industry referred to.

John Mather House (1827)

Born in Westfield, Massachusetts in 1780, by age twenty-one John Mather was a merchant running a store in Hartford. In 1806 he started a glass works in Manchester (then still a part of East Hartford). It was soon destroyed in a fire, but the following year Mather was back in business, producing a variety of glass bottles. A hurricane in 1821 destroyed his glass factory and there is no evidence it was ever rebuilt. The location of the glass works was behind the current brick homes in the area of 109-119 Mather Street in Manchester. Mather’s home in Manchester, where he lived from 1827 to 1844, is located at 97 Mather Street, at the corner of Eastfield Street. Mather was a Mason and the local Lodge met in his house from 1829 to 1844. A painting of the house by Manchester artist Russell Cheney (1881-1945) is in the Masonic Temple on East Center Street in Manchester. A hearth with original paneling, taken from the Mather House, is also now located in the Masonic Temple with an inscription recognizing Mather’s contributions to Masonry.

Christ & Holy Trinity Episcopal Church of Westport (1863)

Christ & Holy Trinity Episcopal Church of Westport was formed in 1944 as a merger of two earlier Episcopal parishes. Christ Church (built 1833), which stood at the northeast corner of the Post Road and Ludlow Street, was consecrated on November 2, 1835. As the town grew new residents arrived who wanted a more progressive parish. In 1863 they built another Episcopal church, the Memorial Church of the Holy Trinity at 75 Church Lane. The new church was built on the site of the Disbrow Tavern, where George Washington stopped on June 28, 1775, on his way to Boston to assume command of the Continental Army. The two congregations merged in 1944, selling the former Christ Church and retaining the larger Holy Trinity Church building.

George A. Bailey House (1844)

The house at 26 Hurlbutt Road in Gales Ferry, Ledyard, was built in 1844 for George A. Bailey, a whaling captain, who owned it until 1861. After passing through other owners, it was purchased by Elizabeth Frost of New Jersey, whose family used it as a summer home. The Frosts modified the house, adding the current wraparound porch. In later decades, Nelson Parker could often be seen sitting on the porch. He bought the house in 1921 and his family owned it for 52 years. Active in local community affairs, Nelson Parker was known as an unofficial mayor of Ledyard. He had earlier been in business in Norwich, as described in Vol. III of A Modern History of New London County (1922):

Nelson Parker, the seventh child of Richard Samuel and Mary M. (Selsor) Parker, was reared and educated in Brooklyn, New York, receiving his formal training in the public schools. He then learned the paint manufacturing business with his father, and the two worked side by side in carrying on the business, until the elder Parker’s death. At that time Mrs. Parker became president of the company, and Mr. Nelson Parker secretary and treasurer, as well as general manager. This arrangement still continues, and the business is now one of the important industries of Norwich. The original name of Parker, Preston & Company is still retained. Besides being one of the foremost manufacturers of Norwich, Mr. Parker is interested in every phase of public life, and stands for the best in civic development and progress. In political choice he is a Republican. He is a member of Somerset Lodge, No. 34, Free and Accepted Masons, and is a member of the Chamber of Commerce. The family are members of the Central Baptist Church. On September 17, 1911, Nelson Parker married Mary H. Hurlbutt, of Gales Ferry, Connecticut, daughter of Henry W. and Lydia (Perkins) Hurlbutt. Mr. and Mrs. Parker are the parents of one daughter, Margaret H. Parker.

Charles H. Curtiss House (1910)

The house at 331 Main Street in Bristol, built c. 1910, is listed as the Curtiss House in the nomination for the Federal Hill Historic District. Around 1918, Charles H. Curtiss, 331 Main Street, was secretary of Local No. 50, Order of Railway Conductors of America. Curtiss had earlier (c. 1910 to c. 1914) lived at 265 Main Street in Bristol. Charles H. Curtiss (1864-1922), a Democrat, served in the state house of representatives from 1919 to 1920.

Twin City Building (1875)

The building at 9-11 Wall Street in Norwalk was built in 1875 but Col. Frederick St. John Lockwood on the site where the general store of E. Lockwood & Sons operated in the eighteenth century. The building originally had retail stores and a market on the first floor, offices on the second floor and Lockwood Hall, a large hall for public functions and entertainments, on the third floor. The structure was remodeled in the Art Deco style and renamed the Twin City Building in the 1930s. In the 1950s and 1960s the second floor was shared by the Hilltop Athletic Club and Radio Station WNLK. Today the building’s principal tenant is The Fat Cat Pie Co.